The Mistress of Nothing by Kate Pullinger (published by McArthur & Company) is a historical fiction / literary non-fiction.
Sally Naldrett is our stalwart protagonist, and an equally sturdy lady’s maid to Lady Lucie Duff Gordon. The two 19th-century women are off to Egypt in an attempt to prolong the Lady’s life. She’s rather sickly. Despite decades of service, Sally is banished from service.
Lady Duff Gordon is a historical figure , a 19th-century writer whose biography is used to form the general plot , but little is known about her maid Sally Naldrett, and it is this story that Pullinger unravels for us through imagination and Duff Gordon’s letters from Egypt.
I won’t spoil the novel by revealing the exact cause of Sally’s disgrace but I will say it’s a Romeo & Juliet tale of star-crossed lovers with equal amounts of spite and disdain, love and compassion.
Some of the novel’s events are based on fact, but really what I love about historical fiction (or literary non-fiction) is the deftness of the writing, the imagination that completes a small puzzle for us and the fact that we don’t really know what is “true.”
Erika Ritter’s review in the Globe and Mail addresses the “burden of factuality” and the compilation of a story from a myriad of facts, biographical works, historical tidbits and personal letters.
Having been to Egypt recently, I had a vivid mental image of what a 19th-century Egypt could look like and I loved the passages of the two women travelling in Egypt. I was equally impressed that both learn Arabic and adopt certain local customs. I think I had an easier time imagining 19th-century Egypt than 19th-century British women in Egypt. But that is the wonderful thing about novels.
Enjoyable, quick read.
The Mistress of Nothing by Kate Pullinger
published by McArthur & Company