The Vet's Daughter

"I’m not sure. Stephen King, to me, means horror . And though there are awful things that happen in The Vet’s Daughter , it’s not written like a horror novel. I’d say instead that there are echoes of Shirley Jackson, maybe, especially We Have Always Lived in the Castle . Support Five Books Five Books interviews are expensive to produce. If you're enjoying this interview, please support us by donating a small amount . Anyway, let me tell you what it’s about. The vet’s daughter is Alice and she lives with her father in Edwardian London. He’s a horrible man. He’s very cruel to her and to his wife, who is more or less bedridden. They have lots of animals in their house that he’s also cruel to, and he euthanises quite a few of them. Alice longs for a different life. She longs for a husband, a baby, for lovely things. After her mother dies, her father brings a woman who is possibly his mistress, into the house. And Alice, at the same time, is abused by a man. After she escapes, at home that evening, she starts to levitate. This is where Comyns just throws in a curveball, you know? It’s like, what? This is also written completely straight. So, Alice is thinking, ‘why am I above my bed levitating?’ but she doesn’t have an answer. She leaves London to become housekeeper to a woman who lives in a burnt house, levitates there some more, and eventually goes back to her father. Then he begins to take advantage of these strange powers to make some money. It all ends very badly. It’s quite fairytale-like. Comyns writes in a simplistic, beautiful way. Alice is a very naïve character and yet she is in control of what she wants by the end of the book, although she doesn’t quite get it. I really recommend it. Apparently Comyns came up with the idea when she was on honeymoon with her husband. And, just a weird fact, they were honeymooning in a cottage in Wales that had been lent to them by Kim Philby, the spy."