The Miniaturist

Coming to this highly hyped book by Jessie Burton later than other keen historical fiction readers, I had to try and avoid the effusive five pages of blurbs in my edition and make my own mind about it.

Country girl, Nella Oortman, has an arranged marriage with Johannes Brandt, a successful VOC (Dutch East India Company) merchant and she moves into his house in Amsterdam. Her husband is strangely distant and seems to avoid her and she is left to struggle on her own with the house’s other inhabitants; her husband’s enigmatic sister and manager, Marin, sassy maid Cornelia and Johannes’ black manservant, Otto. Johannes gives Nella a cabinet house as a wedding present and she finds a miniaturist to make furnishings for it, but when it becomes clear the miniaturist knows about the strange secrets and undercurrents in the Brandt household, Nella is alarmed as to what her future holds.

The historical background was brilliant and I was thoroughly immersed in the atmosphere of Amsterdam during the era of the VOC and also the mores and societal strictures of the late 1600s. Likewise, I loved the concept of the cabinet house which was based on the real one in the Rijksmuseum that belonged to a woman with the same name as the leading character. Equally fascinating was the mysterious and elusive miniaturist.

Apart from Nella, and perhaps Cornelia, the other leading characters had frustrating qualities that didn’t create as much sympathy as perhaps they deserved. Johannes and Marin were both distant and spoke in riddles and their elusiveness did not combine well with certain scenes involving them which were graphic 21st Century. The practical business matters relating to sugar in the Brandt warehouse, which is a major focus of the plot, also felt out of sync with the magic realism aspects.

This a strange hybrid of a novel - absolutely brilliant for its inventiveness and on the historical side, less satisfying or convincing elsewhere. Still, a highly memorable read not easily forgotten.

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