Book Discussion: The Seventh Bride by T. Kingfisher

Several of us have read The Seventh Bride in the last couple of weeks (one of us is still working on it, I believe) and we thought one place to talk about it might be a good option. Please hide any spoilers for now.

I found the ways in which the surviving wives had each been harmed or mutilated both repulsive and striking. The imagery Kingfisher uses to describe the wife who lost her voice was horrific, and the blinded wife was just depressing. It brought to mind the three monkeys*, and I was waiting to be introduced to a bride who had her hearing stolen, but that would have been too simple. The scarecrow wife was the most unsettling of all to me, as she had lost her will to do anything. I found the clock wife the hardest to wrap my head around as she wasn't human and had some mystical powers.

But the biggest issue the book addressed for me was the powerlessness of both poorer working class people and females. Rhea was given no say when Lord Crevan (nice dyslexic spelling of craven) decides to marry her. He will simply ruin her father's livelihood (or worse) if they don't hand her over. In some parts of the world I imagine this hasn't changed as much as it should have.

I hope any of you have that have read this one will join in when you get the chance.

*Hear no Evil, See no Evil, Speak no Evil.

First of all, let me say that I have always been a bit bemused by the fascination people have with the story of Bluebeard and his various slain wives. Not a happy childhood tale, by and large. But based on what’s said about it just on Wikipedia, this tale with the marital serial killer is much beloved as source material in the creative arts.

I had thought Kingfisher would bring much needed humor to a retelling of the old folk tale which she did but the story in The Seventh Bride was still quite unnerving. Thank heaven for the hedgehog! Come to think of it, thank heaven for the bear.

Kingfisher makes use of certain familiar motifs – the three tasks or tests that the traditional fairy tale wife is always expected to satisfy. (She doesn’t do as much with the locked door that is usually part of Bluebeard.) But she does so well in reusing magic and

In terms of stating the theme, one might say that Kingfisher is saying that sisterhood is important. (Just as with the original version, given the interaction between Bluebeard, the bride, and sister Anne…) I appreciated the novelty the author brought to the stories of the individual wives, not one of which I anticipated. Another bit of novelty – I honestly had thought that the hedgehog would turn out to be something different from a witch’s familiar – an enchanted king or something.

Still processing the narrative and I want to go back over it again tomorrow. But I think that in some ways The Seventh Bride is superior to Thornhedge. It's far different from Angela Carter's story of the Bloody Chamber.

>2 jillmwo: I don't think I've ever actually read any other books or stories based on the Bluebeard tale, and I had meant to go to Wikipedia to brush up on the lore before I read this book, but I completely forgot.

I did love the hedgehog. And the return of the bear was a pleasant surprise.

>3 clamairy: I have only read one Bluebeard retelling before this (a story in an anthology of fairy tale retellings, it was creepy and the name escapes me at the moment).

Besides the theme of sisterhood, I thought about the helplessness of people in a patriarchy -women without power (Maria), women without a voice (Ingeth), women who are not allowed to see and learn (Sylvie).

I loved the hedgehog! And who but Kingfisher would have hedgehogs singing to the moon to call slugs? This made me squeal in delight :)))

Well, I rummaged about in my old reading thread and the basic Bluebeard story was this: An innocent young woman weds a man who charges his wife with a set of keys to all the rooms in his castle, save one. That one she is forbidden to enter. Of course, an entirely human curiosity drives her to disobey and when she does (at least in the original) she discovers all of her spouse’s murdered, predecessor wives. He returns home, discovers her transgression and is about to cut off her head with his scimitar or cutlass, but the young wife begs her sister, Anne, to signal to her brothers to make haste to the castle and prevent her execution. Loyal sister Anne does so, the brothers arrive in time and the wicked murderous spouse is himself done away with.

The most famous contemporary retelling of that legend is Angela Carter's The Bloody Chamber. Was that the one you were thinking of, Alexandra? Carter set it up as being all about the loss of sexual innocence and discovery of the darker side of things. Her version stirred things up.

Kingfisher plays much more with pagan beliefs and festivals (the grain harvest, the scarecrows, etc.) but then she also goes off and plays with time in much the same way as Madeleine L'Engle did with A Wrinkle in Time. Honestly, some aspects put me in mind of Dr. Who.

And of course, there's this quote:

Half her mind gibbered about the floor—everyone knew to expect little touches of magic in their lives, but the world was not a place where the floor just fell away and then came back two minutes later—and the other half had smelled bacon and was ravenously hungry and felt the floor could wait.

And one could go on for hours about the wives. You (the reader) begin to suspect everyone, even the most trustworthy. Like Carter, on one level, Kingfisher treats the story as something of a coming of age, a loss of innocence. Is it possible that only the hedgehog is our friend?

I also liked this quote: ...gremlins really were a problem. If you ground one into flour on accident, the bread had a tendency to explode in the oven, or bleed when you cut into it, or turn into a flock of starlings that would tear around the cottage, shrieking, and then people came around and had words with the miller, and many of the words had only four letters and involved hand gestures..

She writes with a sound grip on human behaviors. Without being truly vulgar in writing for an adolescent audience, she gets her point across. They know EXACTLY what she means.

>4 Alexandra_book_life: Well, it is through the solidarity of female sisterhood that we overthrow the patriarchy. (Over a great length of time, which again may have been part of what Kingfisher was getting at!! All that twisting of time)

>6 jillmwo: I thought I had saved this bit, but went to I went to look at my Kindle notes there was nothing there. This kind of writing has made her one of my new favorite writers.

The first book of Kingfisher's I read was A Wizard's Guide to Defensive Baking And love how she takes something quite common and makes it special. She sort of does that in Seventh Bride given how they find ways to use the limited circumstances in which they are caught to form a united front to fight for their freedom.

>5 jillmwo: It wasn't an Angela Carter story, and I still can't remember which one it was. Annoying. I am sure it will come to me once I stop thinking about it ;)

>7 jillmwo: Amen to that!

>6 jillmwo: She writes with a sound grip on human behaviors.

Her characters are always real people, and I love that.

>10 Alexandra_book_life: Might it be one of these?: Reactor

Or, perhaps the one you are trying to remember gets a mention in the comments?

>13 ScoLgo: Ah, thank you! It was Glass Bottle Trick by Nalo Hopkinson

I just encountered the 2015 review by NPR of this particular title. (Spoiler: They liked it!) https://www.npr.org/2015/11/26/456821825/the-seventh-bride-faces-horror-and-stil...

...it also makes old tropes feel new again, with a little ingenuity, a lot of personality, and a dogged determination to see that the biscuits get made, no matter how implausible and impossible the world becomes.

And like clam up there in #8, I like Kingfisher; checking my list, I see I have read more than one title by her this year.

>15 jillmwo: Thanks for sharing! I enjoyed reading it.

It turns out that I have read five books by Kingfisher this year (so far? ;)) - books 1,2,3 in the Paladin series, Thornhedge and The Seventh Bride. Nice :)))

This thread prompted me to re-read it! It seems I never posted a review when I originally read it - I suspect I'd not read it on my Kobo - either via a Kindle app or via Calibre.

Yes, I do like Vernon's pared down writing style and sense of humour. A literary writing style has it's place; the previous book I read was The Bone Harp which was very literary and had echoes of Tolkein, so re-reading The Seventh Bride was a welcome contrast with the down-to-earth heroine.

I had wondered about the absence of slugs in my garden! We are on a hedgehog trail and we have one or two visiting in the evenings seeking their breakfast. Himself puts food out when he gets back from work and they spend the evening diving into the plate at intervals. He gets annoyed when he goes out to collect the plate before bed and finds someone with their snout in there - they've had 4 hours to eat! I haven't heard them singing to the moon though...

One thing that struck me: if Lord Crevan is using the marriage contract to steal from his brides, is the contract for a new wife invalid if previous wives are still alive? Or does the society permit polygamy?

>18 Maddz: I've thought about it! Since nobody knows he has many wives, there aren't any lawyers that can challenge the contracts. Could that make sense? Imagine lawyers descending upon the manor, and Lord Crevan losing his powers one after the other, as well as people he granted them to - pop, pop, pop.

*Off-topic: The Bone Harp was so, so wonderful :)))*

>19 Alexandra_book_life: I was going to ask if >17 Maddz: enjoyed the Victoria Goddard as well.

>19 Alexandra_book_life: Yes, but if he's using the contract for magical theft, the fact that there is an earlier active contract should mean the later contract is invalid magically speaking if an earlier wife remains alive. No lawyers needed; they would only be needed for mundane reasons. I suppose it depends on how the marriage contract works in the world!

>20 clamairy: Loved it, slow, but oh so lyrical! Overtones of Tolkein's Legendarium, Jacqueline Carey's dark lord, and Ardath Mayhar's use of language.

>21 Maddz: True! This would all depend on how the contracts were written and the intricacies of law in this universe. Kingfisher doesn't address this, though ;) Have we fallen into a plot hole?

>22 Alexandra_book_life: I rather think we have!

>21 Maddz: Victoria Goddard and T. Kingfisher are two of my favorite (somewhat) recently discovered writers. Both of them I only found because of people raving about them here on LT.

I'm just here for the hedgehog chat.

>25 MrAndrew: It's an intriguing element, I agree. Plus the hedgehog is (insofar as I can tell) nekkid. Unlike Beatrix Potter's Mrs. Tiggy-Winkle who you will remember is always fully clothed.

>26 jillmwo: Well, we do find the reason for the hedgehog at the end...

I've just found my copy and started reading it, so I will join the discussion soon. I love the narrative tone so far.

>28 Sakerfalcon: Nice! Happy reading :)

I finished the book over the weekend. What a dark but delightful read!

>1 clamairy: The class issues struck me too. No need for a far-fetched explanation of how such a marriage could take place when the social system enables it

>5 jillmwo: Half her mind gibbered about the floor—everyone knew to expect little touches of magic in their lives, but the world was not a place where the floor just fell away and then came back two minutes later—and the other half had smelled bacon and was ravenously hungry and felt the floor could wait.
This is such a great quote! This and the one in >6 jillmwo: reminded me of Robin McKinley's writing.

>7 jillmwo:, >9 majkia: I loved the solidarity and sisterhood. There was something of a found family vibe. But it wasn't perfect or saccharine - Ingeth represented a very different response to oppression and disempowerment.

>15 jillmwo: Yes! I love the juxtaposition of the magical and (fairly) epic with the everyday. Another similarity with McKinley.

Of course I loved the hedgehog and the bear!

>30 Sakerfalcon: What to think of Ingeth?We don't get to see what she was like before Crevan stole her voice, but instead of it bringing her closer to the other wives she turns on them even more. One of the few victims I have encountered in literature that I felt sympathy for but still hated.

>31 clamairy: I agree. We are told something of her past from Maria, but she only knew a little. I guess there are always people who would rather try to appease the enemy rather than stand with fellow victims, either in hopes of getting a better outcome for themself, or because they refuse to see themself as a victim - "I'm not like them".

>32 Sakerfalcon: Exactly!

>31 clamairy: and >32 Sakerfalcon:. Interesting that she's the wife you find most memorable (and your reasons for that being the case). I felt most for Hester the thirsty scarecrow wife.

All of which brings up the question of how you think Kingfisher wanted the reader to respond to the various wives. And/or what she intended them to mean for Rhea's growth. Any thoughts?