The Dazzle of the Light
When we first meet Ruby Mills with her black bob and movie star looks, she is so dazzling that a young clerk in one of London’s smartest department stores cannot see the theft about to take place. Ruby is good at what she does, which is to steal (or hoist), pickpocket, and swindle at every opportunity. When we first meet Harriet Littlemore, she is alone in the newsroom of The Evening Gazette, having recently bribed a shop girl to explain how she lost her job when a young woman walked out with a mink coat, a sable muff, jewelry, and some silk scarves.
Thus begins Harriet’s fascination with Ruby, a member of the notorious (real-life) all-female gang, the Forty Thieves. Clarke’s book, set in 1920, is a marvelous study in contrasts. The squalor and brutality of Ruby’s life are never glossed over. She’s ignored by the man she cares about, coerced into sex by brutes, and beaten up by those who should have her back. Through it all, she never loses her spirit. Even prison cannot break her. Harriet’s life is filled with comfort and luxury. However, she is as much a pawn in other people’s games as Ruby, perhaps more so. She is browbeaten by her mother, lied to and cheated on by her fiancé, and dismissed by her boss. Ruby is hobbled by poverty while Harriet is hobbled by privilege.
While the subject may sound depressing, it is not. Adroitly capturing class distinctions, moving with ease from the highest echelons to the lowest, Clarke immerses the reader in a society trying to regain its equilibrium after the devastation of war and a world-wide pandemic. Best of all, the writing is terrific.
