Living in Victorian Britain - and particularly in Victorian London which, although she does not say so, is Flanders' focus - meant a constant struggle with the dark forces of dirt. Also impressive is her terrier-like grasp of physical detail: it is easy enough to write blithely about how tenement dwellers would have to carry 22 gallons of water up the stairs every day if they wanted to meet contemporary definitions of being "fairly clean", quite another to work out, as Flanders has, that this is the equivalent of carrying five and a half cases of Evian back from the supermarket. As in her previous book, A Circle of Sisters, Flanders shows herself adept at controlling the flow of information and keeping her story moving briskly forward (there is no dawdling in this house, no glancing backwards or racing on ahead). Mapping female biology on to bricks and mortar is a fine conceit and provides an excellent way of ordering material that might otherwise have become unwieldy.
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