Review: The Miniaturist
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2 stars. This is absolutely well-written and interesting, and I read it under 24 hours, which is a testament to the storytelling. But I found that a lot of the mystery fell flat - or at least, fell to the wayside to make room for a predictable, melodramatic soap opera.
SPOILERS BELOW.
The Miniaturist takes place in Amsterdam in the 1600s. Our protagonist, Nella, arrives to begin her marriage to a wealthy merchant trader ... and everything pretty much goes downhill from there. Nella's new family is not warm or friendly. Her husband does not visit her at night. Her questions go unanswered. She feels unwelcome, and like a failure.
But then she finds a distraction - a dollhouse of sorts, gifted to her by her enigmatic husband. She solicits the services of a local miniaturist and mysterious events unfold, seemingly related to the little gifts delivered for her house.
And then things take a really strange turn for the ... dramatic. In a very human sense of the word. Nella discovers her husband is gay, and that her sister-in-law is pregnant with the baby of their black servant (gasp!).
And Nella somehow completely gets over her husband's secret, despite being a young and immature person living in the buttoned-up 1600s, and helps deliver her niece in a very vivid and graphic and bloody birth scene. And then her husband is executed.
We don't really ever discover anything else about the miniaturist, despite her ability. Is she a prophet? A spy? A witch? It's just an intriguing thread woven into an ultimately bland and unconvincing tapestry.
The writing here is good, and the research is very well incorporated. But I don't buy comparisons to Sarah Waters or Emma Donoghue. The Miniaturist is too dry, too focused on the wrong things, and too confused. It just wasn't a rewarding read, for me.