A Panacea Society Tale

The Rapture by Claire McGlasson

My rating: 4 of 5 stars

There is something chilling about that space where belief, pretense and psychosis begin to overlap.

This book, as can largely be expected from a book about a British religion/cult in the early 1900s, was a gentle journey. Things change and unfold slowly. But, perhaps because of this, the stark effect of where I landed felt rather extraordinary.

For the majority of the tale I was, as the reader, carried along with Dilys, the protagonist. I travelled alongside her while she questioned her own motives and those of everyone around her, as she began to see a few cracks in the education she’d been given to believe her whole life. I was on her side and in her mind as desire, love and affection all built and crumbled around the characters in Dilys’ world. As is to be expected, her story became my story and my story became hers. That’s what books do. It’s the expectation. It’s why we read (if I dare speak for the general fiction reading populace).

I’m not sure exactly when it happen, but there comes a point at which that reader-protagonist relationship was broken in The Rapture. It was subtly done, but there was a genuine sense of dread and mistrust and then a sudden realisation that I had become a reader who understood the protagonist better than the protagonist understood herself. And, perhaps because of the slow pace at which the story unfolds, or perhaps because of the gentle unravelling of fact and fiction within the lives of all the characters within the story itself, but when it dawned on me that I was no longer standing with Dilys, that I was now ‘othered’ from her, it created a pretty powerful sense of empathy.

I greatly respect the author for making this experience possible.

I also genuinely appreciate the very real history and society this story is based on and the research that went into creating the scene, setting and people. The Author’s Note, too, was a joy to read, lending just a bit more insight into a society I’d never heard of before this.

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