LMA Book Group - A Pin to See the Peepshow by F. Tennyson Jesse

This read was rescheduled from earlier in the autumn, and the timing could not have been more appropriate, as 9 January 2023 marked the 100th anniversary of the execution of Edith Thompson and Frederick Bywaters, sentenced to death for their role in the murder of Edith’s husband Percy in Ilford in 1922. F. Tennyson Jesse used the basics of this notorious case for this 1934 novel, which focuses on the character of Julia Almond and the circumstances which lead to her sentencing.

This is a long novel, and much of it is devoted to the study of Julia’s situation and character, with the drama of the trial reserved for the final parts of the book. Some readers found this structure unsatisfying, and it is the case that Jesse spends more time giving us a detailed history and psychological portrait of our main character than of the plot. This is a risky move – Julia is not a likeable character, as numerous readers attested and more than one reader admitted not getting past the early chapters as a result. She is vain, conceited, and a terrible snob (despite her humble lower middle class origins) and it is one of the novel’s strengths that Jesse makes us care about her, makes us feel her plight and takes us into her suffering. One reader who has read the novel several times expressed how she started off hating Julia every time but was drawn in with each reading.

Readers who stuck with our unsympathetic protagonist were richly rewarded by the novel’s vivid progression - indeed another reader who had read the novel on numerous occasions said that rereading only enhanced the emotional resonance, even when you know what was going to happen. Julia lives in a world in which fantasy and reality are blurred.

The consequences of this are minor when as a schoolgirl she partakes in crushes on teachers and dreamy reveries, but her inability to see the consequences of her actions become more serious when she decides on her rash marriage to Herbert – a poorly considered escape from the parental home, Julia has no idea of the reality of marriage. Herbert is a controlling bully and Julia has managed to get herself into a fix, forced to assert herself by continuing to work, by insisting on sleeping alone, and by pouring her love into her dog Bobby. Ironically, in her professional life, Julia has considerable skill. She is able to read the aristocratic customers at Marian’s boutique, travelling to Paris on her own for buying trips, working long hours and receiving incremental promotions.

This is a world of divorces and love affairs, both things that are possible with the insulation of wealth. Julia has no such cushioning and when she falls in love with the young Leo – a glamourous modern airman - her ideas of their future come straight from the melodrama of early cinema, as several readers noted. But their relationship is mired from frustration; without a room of their own their relationship cannot progress beyond chance encounters. The letters Julia writes to Leo, which become crucial evidence in their later trial, see her exploring her fantasies in rich detail – they include talk of a suicide pact, of poisoning Herbert to get him out of the way. They are fictional creations where Julia can fashion her own narrative.

Unfortunately reality starts to close in on the couple, and Leo attacks Herbert in an unprovoked attack which leads to Herbert’s death. The narrative intensifies as the world starts to close in on Julia and several readers described the claustrophobia of the novel’s end. Her lack of agency becomes even more acute as she is drawn into the criminal justice system, and her world (and ours) shrinks to cells and corridors as the accusation that she was directly involved in the murder is backed up by her letters. As in the case of Edith Thompson, Julia was punished not for her involvement in the crime, for which there was no proof, but for transgressing social norms. This is the real tragedy at the heart of the novel and we cannot help but be moved by Julia’s despair during her trial. The narrative of the novel peaks in intensity as the sentence is passed, and Jesse’s portrayal of this miscarriage of justice is rightly furious.

We had a rich, rambling discussion, with some superb local knowledge of Ravenscourt Park provided by several readers – we thought that it’s use as the setting for the crime was because it was a backwater of solid Victorian values. Jesse is very good on "the orchestra" of London, we see Julia travelling by bus and by taxi and Jesse finely contrasts the glamour of "up west" in comparison to suburbia. This is a fascinating London novel that rewards the reader’s patience and shines light upon social mores and the role of women in the Edwardian city.