The Lamplighter
Set in a 19th-century New England whaling community, this novel is a supernatural horror story with frighteningly evil elements that build to a conclusion that is both surprising and suspenseful.
The novel develops as its main character develops: Temperance, a young, untried lamplighter, is also the first-person narrator. At the beginning of the story, she is a serious but insecure woman who is trying to prove herself in a traditional man’s job while grieving for her father, the former lamplighter, who presumably committed suicide. In her personal life, she has several competing concerns: her sickly mother, her younger sister, who wants to marry a suspicious older man, her appealing suitor, and the people in the community whom she wishes to protect from any harm.
The unexplained and sudden disappearance of young women in her town distresses Temperance, who believes she has discovered some clues that may explain what has happened to them. She is intelligent enough and brave enough to follow these clues in spite of the fact that she has no support from anyone—either in her family, from the townspeople, or from the local constabulary. Her careful, persistent reflections about the reasons for her suspicions and actions, even her honest self-doubt at times, make for a wonderfully taut plot, one that keeps the reader rooting for Temperance’s success.
Bell successfully creates a picture of a heroic young woman in a physically and psychologically graphic environment. Young adult.
