Faber & Faber first edition - 2023
In her Acknowledgements at the end of her novel, the author pays tribute to a considerable number of non-fiction books: autobiographies, biographies, Hollywood movie accounts and two books on the famous ocean liner the Queen Mary. The fruits of her research are clear throughout the book.
There is a compelling opening chapter (the text all in italics) dated Summer 1917, which describes the ten year-old Daphne du Maurier's visit and stay at a fine country mansion, Milton in East Anglia. Du Maurier later wrote that it was partly the inspiration for the famous Manderley in her best-seller Rebecca. Moreover, Upson argues that the formidable, dressed-in-black housekeeper is the model for the sinister Danvers in both book and movie.
The reader is then transported to 1939, with Josephine Tey embarking from Southampton for a trip to America (this never happened to the real-life Tey). Seen off by her close friend, the detective Archie Penrose (modelled on Tey's fictional detective in her novels, Alan Grant), she meets up with Alma Reville, Alfred Hitchcock's wife, who is travelling with her daughter Pat back to the States. She had met the Hitchcocks three years earlier in North Wales (in a previous story of Upson's, Fear in the Sunlight), when the director was filming her A Shilling for Candles. She had just about forgiven him for his Young and Innocent film - a travesty of her novel. The links between the 1917 episode and the rest of the story quickly become clear. This is not a plot spoiler, so it is suffice to say that the two murders (one had been a delayed reaction to a smothering) committed 22 years earlier, are solved by some fairly basic sleuthing by Penrose and a rather mild case of insight by Tey - the former at Milton, the latter in California.
Positives? I enjoyed the detailed account of the problems faced by Hitchcock with the shooting of Rebecca. Upson uses her research material to portray the very real tensions between Hitchcock, the director, and David Selznick, the producer; and between the experienced Laurence Olivier and the fawn-like, ingenue, Joan Fontaine. I even warmed to Judith Anderson's insecurities over her 'fire' scene in Manderley. A pity there was no room for a portrayal of George Sanders. There is a very natural interchange between Penrose and du Maurier in London, when he is trying to get her to recall the events of two decades ago. I also liked the final, short chapter dated February 1940, (again in italics) when du Maurier returns to Milton with daffodils for a grave in the nearby churchyard. I found the overall structure of Upson's novel quite skilfully put together. She has now settled into a comfortable narration of Tey's 'life', fact and fiction melded together effectively.
Tey's fictitious 'girlfriend' (and lover in every sense) Marta is not really necessary to the plotline, but this is the 21st century and the author does appear to have a personal agenda to push here. It matters not. Similarly, it is clear from the outset that James and Matthew's predilection lies in their love of Housman's A Shropshire Lad.
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