I’ve already read the book twice in rapid succession (it doesn’t take long because honestly, the last 250 pages demand to be read in a single sitting) and still can’t get enough of it. Sarah Waters takes the conventions of the Victorian bodice-ripper genre and turns them on their head in a way that feels fresh, subversive, and breathlessly sexy. It asks: Is it possible to fall in love with someone, even as you are secretly working to betray and destroy them utterly? The answer is yes, and reading about the tormenting conflicting desires and repressed longing between these two women was completely engrossing. But this is also a novel about love and desire. Often I can see twists coming in thrillers, but some of these were honestly mindblowing-the kind that make you want to reread everything you’ve already read, knowing what you now know. This is a book of secret identities, hidden motivations, and betrayal on betrayal on even deeper, more gutwrenching betrayal. Every time I thought I knew what was going on, something happened that threw everything into question. To say anything more would be to start giving away twists, and FINGERSMITH has them in spades.

And Maud may not be the clueless mark they expected. It seems easy, until Sue meets Maud and starts developing strong, unexpected feelings for her. Once he marries her, they will commit Maud to a madhouse and the money will be theirs. Sue is to pose as her maid and aid Gentleman in seducing her.

Their mark is Maud Lilly, a naïve, sheltered young woman who is set to inherit vast wealth as soon as she marries. So when an elegant conman known as Gentleman offers her a chance to help him swindle a rich woman out of her inheritance, Sue accepts. This engrossing, atmospheric story takes us to the slums of nineteenth-century London, where Sue Trinder is an orphan who has been raised by petty thieves-“fingersmiths.” Her beloved adoptive mother has always said that Sue will make their fortune someday, and Sue deeply wishes to be able to repay her family for taking her in. The novel is like Charles Dickens meets Gillian Flynn, mixed with a romance I still can’t stop thinking about months later, honestly. It’s broken into my lineup of top ten favorite books of all time, which is quite a feat.

I was reading PRETEND I’M DEAD by Jen Beagin, and someone is trying to convince the protagonist, Mona, to read THE ODYSSEY, but she says she’s busy reading “a Victorian homoerotic thriller called The Fingersmith. I can’t put it down.” I’d had FINGERSMITH by Sarah Waters on my shelf for years and never gotten around to it, but suddenly I had to start it immediately. I get book recommendations from a lot of places, but until recently I’d never had a novel recommended to me.

Fingersmith goodreads