Rachel Reviews: The Story Collector by Iris Costello

I really enjoyed The Story Collector. The novel follows three main characters: Edie, in the present day; Miriam, in the first world war; and Kitty, in London at the same time as Miriam.

When Edie does some home improvements to the family cottage in Cornwall, whilst trying to regroup after the untimely death of her husband, she makes a discovery. The mysterious objects look like they were placed there in order to be buried and Edie's curiosity is piqued.

Miriam is helping a linguistics professor with an academic project at a POW camp, recording accents and dialects of the captured soldiers onto wax cylinders. When she sees Prisoner X, there is an attraction between them and their lives become linked over time. Risks are taken but who is the mysterious Prisoner X?

Kitty is German, a bakery owner and a woman who likes the comfortable attire of a man and dresses as such. When her home is attacked by her neighbours, who now see her as the enemy, she is faced with a dilemma: stay and fight or run and survive? With her friend, Gillian, she makes a decision just in time.

There is a mystical feel to the novel at times with the presence of the Tarot throughout, Kitty being a reader of the cards and Edie being commissioned to design a new deck. This acts as a linking thread between the stories too and Costello is adept at holding the mystery close of how all of the stories are linked right to the end, although clues are dropped throughout as to connections that there may be between them. We go back and forth between the narratives and gradually, the stories interweave. I admired this as it takes some doing to make a narrative that jumps from character to character seem smooth but Costello makes it look easy.

Being set in war-time means that there is a lot of pain and loss in the book but there is also a lot of warmth, with friendships and staunch support being offered in the face of adversity and people standing by others despite the divisions proposed by nationality. Costello shows characters who are able to see beyond what separates us to the humanity that we all have in common.

A good read.

Rachel Rating: 4/5 stars

This review was first published on Reedsy Discovery:

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