Kathleen Stewart: The Red Room [2000] paperback

'Written in a jocularly sinister tone reminiscent of Elizabeth Jolley's earlier fiction.' -Debra Adelaide, Sydney Morning Herald The deadly inertia of suburban Lemonhurst sets the scene for a mother-daughter relationship from hell. Bound together by past secrets, Elizabeth and her daughter Eleanora co-exist in a truce of needling resentment. Until Jasper moves in. Jasper Pease, the lodger, with 'glistening fish-pale skin', ingratiates himself with Elizabeth while covertly watching Eleanora. The atmosphere becomes explosive with deceit, secrets and suspicions until the borders of sanity and madness are fully tested. The Red Room is richly Gothic and blackly humorous as Kathleen Stewart's incisive prose leads the way through a mire of obsession, compulsion and religious fervour.