Book Review: The Nightwatch by Sarah Waters

I thought it only appropriate to kick off this blog with its namesake, the fourth novel by Sarah Waters - a writer who herself has kicked off global interest in lesbian writing (I now realise this sentence may imply some overarching scheme for global blog-domination on my part, but rest assured, my only designs for global domination would involve peace, love and gays, and let's face it, who doesn't want those things?) . So, as a self-confessed internetaholic and overworked, overlazy literature student, I barely have time to read my worrying bank statements (bummer) let alone a whole novel outside of my studies. But this Easter, I rolled up my sleeves, threw down the metaphorical gauntlet to time and decided to read a Sarah Waters novel. Instead, I ended up reading two, back to back (Affinity and The Nightwatch). It isn't hard to beat time when reading The Nightwatch; Waters' words flow, irrepressively, from the front cover to the back, sweeping you along on a current of wartime secrecy and desire. Indeed, the novel defies time itself, moving backwards from 1947 to 1941 through the London blitzes. Waters unfolds the stories of Helen, Julia, Kay, Viv and Duncan in a brutally honest account of desire, jealousy and forbidden love against the dizzying backdrop of England’s capital. In 1947, Helen and Viv spends their days together running a dating agency in post-war optimism, but little known to each other, they both have secret love affairs of their own to deal with. The intensity of Helen’s love for Julia is threatening to destroy their relationship whilst Viv’s affair with a married man seems to be running its course. Viv’s brother Duncan appears to harbour a secret of his own as he meets a face from his past. Meanwhile, the city, and the novel itself, is stalked by the figure of Kay who wanders aimlessly around the streets of London, perhaps missing a life she once had. Although the writing isn't as impressive as that of Affinity, the narrative tension Waters creates in The Nightwatch is nothing short of brilliant. It is to the characters' pasts that we are encouraged to look, learning how forbidden love emerged out of the devastation of the war and flourished in secrecy amidst blackouts and blitzes. The true beauty of this narrative, however, is that by the time you reach the end of the novel, you find yourself back at the beginning, looking to the future.