An orphaned governess takes up a new position in a remote manor and begins to develop inadvisable feelings for her employer. You’ve heard this story before—or have you? L. V. Russell puts a new twist on this classic Gothic premise in The Quiet Stillness of Empty Houses, which came out earlier this month from small indie press Quill & Crow Publishing House.
Theodora Corvus grew up with Woodrow House, her family’s estate, crumbling around her. Despite its dreary atmosphere, creaking floors, and empty hallways—not to mention the ghostly watchers that peer at her from the edges of the lake—Theodora loves her home. But after her first governess job at the nearby Kingsward Manor ends in disaster, Theodora has to leave her home and aging grandmother behind to take up a new position at Broken Oak. Her new life gets off to a rough start when Theodora’s carriage overturns and tumbles into the river just before reaching the stately manor. Theodora stumbles, bedraggled, damp, and bereft of luggage, up to Broken Oak and is greeted by the manor’s only staff member, a no-nonsense housekeeper called Ms. Rivers. But she fares better in her first meeting with her young charge, a lonely but good-natured girl named Ottoline. Meanwhile, Ottoline’s father, Lord Cassias Thorne, is something of a mystery. Reticent and often holed up in his bedroom with headaches, Cassias nonetheless makes overtures of friendship toward Theodora and insists upon familiar terms of address that defy their class differences. The longer Theodora stays at Broken Oak the more she comes to care for both her young pupil and the lord of the house. But still, she cannot shake the sense that something is wrong. Broken Oak is too silent—its walls do not speak to her the way that Woodrow’s did. Only the attic, with its paradoxical locked door and doorknob polished by use, seems to call out to Theodora. At night, she is continually awoken by footsteps outside her bedroom, yet only manages to catch a glimpse of white. And when it isn’t some mysterious midnight visitor, it’s Cassias sleepwalking through the halls looking for someone, or Ottoline frightened by one of her dolls that won’t remain where it’s put. The silence of Broken Oak Manor hides a secret. But does Theodora even want to know what that secret is?
In a clever move, The Quiet Stillness of Empty Houses uses the trappings of Charlotte Brontë’s Jane Eyre to lull you into the sense that you know where this story is going. Like Jane, Theodora is an orphaned young woman, alone in the world, who leaves an abusive situation to become a governess at an unfamiliar estate. She is charmed by her angelic young pupil, and even more so by her brooding and mercurial employer, but experiences strange visitations in the night and discovers that the door to the attic is locked. Surely that locked room contains one of Cassias Thorne’s wives—or does it? Could it, Bluebeard-like, contain the remains of Ottoline’s mother Rose, the deceased first wife for whom Cassias seems to still pine? Or might the current Lady Thorne, whom no one likes to talk about and whose imperious portrait hangs in the gallery while she allegedly enjoys a trip to the seaside for her health, be locked up there like a crazed Bertha Mason? The novel continually points you toward one of these two obvious conclusions before taking a sharp, unexpected twist at the end that flips the whole book on its head.
Another interesting element of this novel is its quiet acceptance of the supernatural. From her very first night living at Woodrow House after her father’s death, Theodora can see a mass of black-eyed specters that hover in the mist above the lake. Rather than reacting with fear, the young Theodora peers into the crowd, hoping to see the spirits of those she has loved and lost. This sight is also not treated as abnormal by Theodora’s grandmother, who seems to be able to see them too and offers the explanation that only some spirits of the dead choose to linger in this realm, waiting for some form of salvation. Cassias is likewise unsurprised to be asked whether he has seen any spirits of the dead when Theodora broaches the subject at Broken Oak. Such casual acknowledgment of the supernatural puts it almost so far into the background of the story that you are unsure whether or not to expect some sort of supernatural revelation at the end.
Check out The Quiet Stillness of Empty Houses if you’d like to see how well-worn Gothic plots can be made new again. You can order it now through your favorite local retailer or directly from Quill and Crow Publishing. Or you can buy it online and support The Gothic Library in the process using this Bookshop.org affiliate link. Once you’ve read it, comment below to share your thoughts!