THE INFAMOUS GILBERTS, by Angela Tomaski
Can a tragedy be cozy? Follow me, if you will, down the once-grand hallways of Thornwalk, the decrepit manor house of the sprawling, decayed Gilbert family, and we shall see. If you peek just there, through the rusted wrought-iron gate, you will glimpse an eccentric figure leading a tour of the grounds — no, no, not Angela Tomaski, the British first-time novelist who brings us the tale; we shall come to her in a moment.
Your enjoyment of “The Infamous Gilberts,” a story of the decline, fall and further fall of the eponymous homeowners, will depend heavily upon your ability to tolerate the rather intrusive docent mentioned above, one Maximus, whose own story is teased over the course of the book. If you don’t mind a narrator whose manner can shade into that of a Realtor trying to unload a house that needs a new roof (as, indeed, Thornwalk does), an oddly diverting read awaits.
We first meet the wayward Gilberts (“I think perhaps ‘infamous’ is a little strong,” Maximus concedes) in a comparatively hopeful moment between the wars. Although their father is dead, their mother vague and their Aunt Beatrice already a tyrannical presence, at least some of the five Gilbert siblings still carry the promise of youth. Early on, we learn that the middle sister, Annabel, suffers from a mysterious malady whose cure seems at least as bad as the illness itself. But then, we are quickly assured that no one will come to a very good end.
“If you feel a tremor of apprehension in your stomach,” says Maximus, “you will have judged the scene correctly.”
Any reader of the genre will understand that World War II and England’s postwar estate taxes won’t be much fun for anyone. The vibrant young Rosamund, we are informed almost at once, will end up with all the love “burned out of her like a used sparkler, which is just a stick.” Over the ensuing decades, disappointments, tragedies, indignities and degrees of madness follow — but as the narrator might say, I shall not spoil the particulars, which are the novel’s primary pleasure.
We learn about the house through the neglected Annabel’s eyes — “the difference between the smell of rosewood and the smell of mahogany,” between “old paint and new paint, foreign paint and famous paint.” We see family members leave, by choice or otherwise, while others never do. When developments shade into the lurid, the novel’s civilized, arch tone never does. Despite the air of menace that hangs overhead like encroaching ivy, the shadowy Maximus tells the Gilberts’ story with elegiac matter-of-factness. His long view encompasses the cradle and the grave.
This once-grand family in crisis has a vast literary lineage not limited to the houses of Radlett, Cazalet, Marchmain and Baudelaire. But “The Infamous Gilberts” put me in mind of no family so much as the Tenenbaums: From the way Maximus opens up Thornwalk like a swing-front dollhouse to the varied cast of misfits destined for an inevitable sadness, the admixture of preciousness and heart feels decidedly #accidentallywesanderson. In a good way, on the whole.
Tomaski manages her pastiche with rare control and evident relish. Before embracing a more pragmatic match, the young Lydia engages in an abortive romance with an artistically inclined tutor, who reads her his poem “Ode to Tuberculosis.” Her reaction is not what he wants; she corrects herself. “Not funny. I meant sad.” But when Tomaski flirts with the precious, it is on purpose — and to surprising effect.
THE INFAMOUS GILBERTS | By Angela Tomaski | Scribner | 288 pp. | $27
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