''Mrs. God'' is a

fantasy novel Fantasy literature is literature set in an imaginary universe, often but not always without any locations, events, or people from the real world. Magic, the supernatural and magical creatures are common in many of these imaginary worlds. Fa ...

by American writer

Peter Straub Peter may refer to: People * List of people named Peter, a list of people and fictional characters with the given name * Peter (given name) ** Saint Peter (died 60s), apostle of Jesus, leader of the early Christian Church * Peter (surname), a sur ...

. It was first published in

1990 File:1990 Events Collage.png, From left, clockwise: The 1990 FIFA World Cup is played in Italy; The Human Genome Project is launched; Voyager I takes the famous Pale Blue Dot image- speaking on the fragility of Humankind, humanity on Earth, Astroph ...

Donald M. Grant, Publisher, Inc. Donald M. Grant, Publisher, Inc. is a fantasy and science fiction small press publisher in New Hampshire that was founded in 1964. It is notable for publishing fantasy and horror novels with lavish illustrations, most notably Stephen King's Th ...

in an edition of 1,350 copies, of which 600 copies were signed by the author and the artist, bound in quarter leather and slipcased as a deluxe edition. The novel is expanded from the

short novel A novella is a narrative prose fiction whose length is shorter than most novels, but longer than most short stories. The English word ''novella'' derives from the Italian ''novella'' meaning a short story related to true (or apparently so) fact ...

of the same name that appeared in Straub's collection ''Houses Without Doors''. A trade edition hardcover was issued later.

Summary

The novel, a modern

Gothic Gothic or Gothics may refer to: People and languages *Goths or Gothic people, the ethnonym of a group of East Germanic tribes **Gothic language, an extinct East Germanic language spoken by the Goths **Crimean Gothic, the Gothic language spoken b ...

, concerns an American professor, William Standish, who is researching the poems of his grandmother Isobel Standish at an English manor, Esswood House, home and estate of the Seneschal family, aristocratic patrons of the literary arts for well over a hundred years.

D. H. Lawrence David Herbert Lawrence (11 September 1885 – 2 March 1930) was an English writer, novelist, poet and essayist. His works reflect on modernity, industrialization, sexuality, emotional health, vitality, spontaneity and instinct. His best-k ...

T. S. Eliot Thomas Stearns Eliot (26 September 18884 January 1965) was a poet, essayist, publisher, playwright, literary critic and editor.Bush, Ronald. "T. S. Eliot's Life and Career", in John A Garraty and Mark C. Carnes (eds), ''American National Biogr ...

Ford Madox Ford Ford Madox Ford (né Joseph Leopold Ford Hermann Madox Hueffer ( ); 17 December 1873 – 26 June 1939) was an English novelist, poet, critic and editor whose journals ''The English Review'' and ''The Transatlantic Review'' were instrumental in ...

, and

Henry James Henry James ( – ) was an American-British author. He is regarded as a key transitional figure between literary realism and literary modernism, and is considered by many to be among the greatest novelists in the English language. He was the ...

were amongst those privileged to call themselves guests and Esswood Fellows. We learn that Isobel Standish found in Esswood a respite from the outer world, and in its refined atmosphere an inspiration for her work. There was always talk of a hidden secret in Esswoods past, and the Seneschal children were often pale and sickly. For Prof William Standish, fleeing the unfaithfulness of his wife and her previous abortion, and her second pregnancy, which he believes is the result of an affair she had with an academic rival, Esswood offers him the chance to study Isobel's private manuscripts at close hand, which thrills him beyond his wildest ambitions. At the same time, he finds himself at sea in England with its different customs, and especially at Esswood, a grand Gothic pile, with its meals served by invisible servants, its rococo library, its hidden basements containing bones and giant dollhouses. Drawn into a nightmarish landscape where he is pursued by dead babies, or births of various kinds (one of Isobel's manuscripts is titled 'B.P.' which he interprets as 'Birth of the Past'), he hears faint laughter in the halls, the pitter-pattering of small feet in the night; strange faces appear in the windows of the library. Standish is increasingly unable to distinguish fact from reality as, caught in a vortex of hallucinatory images, he is subject to the unfolding of the dark secrets of Esswood.

Sources

* * * {{DEFAULTSORT:Mrs. God (Novel) 1990 American novels American fantasy novels Donald M. Grant, Publisher books