Book Review: Pandora by Susan Stokes-Chapman

My Rating:

⭐⭐⭐⭐

Twenty-one-year-old Pandora “Dora” Blake lives and works in her late parents' antiquities shop in Georgian London. Her parents had been renowned antiquarians specializing in Grecian artifacts and had made their living excavating tombs in South-Eastern Europe. Their untimely death in a mishap during an excavation twelve years ago left Dora orphaned and under the care of her unscrupulous and corrupt uncle Hezekiah Blake who promptly took over the shop and is responsible for its present state of disrepute, dealing mostly in forgeries and objects with not much historical significance. Dora aspires to be a jewelry designer and spends time honing her craft with her faithful pet magpie Hermes by her side, despite the constant beratement and ridicule of her uncle who would rather be rid of her.

One day her uncle acquires a mysterious crate and stores it in the basement of the shop under lock and key. Hezekiah’s obsession with the object and strange sounds coming from behind the locked door of the basement fuel Dora’s curiosity and she manages to trick her uncle and enter the basement and is fascinated by what she sees. The crate contained a rare Grecian jar or “pithos” in pristine condition with images of Greek mythological figures across its surface.

“There is a sudden sigh, a hum, a fluttering. It comes not from behind but in front of her, from within the vase, and Dora hears all at once its siren call, its darkling plea. It is the hush of wind, the whisper of waves, the music of grief, and she cannot help it, she cannot resist. Dora lifts the lid.”

The intricate patterns on the artifact inspire Dora’s new designs which she hope will attract the interest of local jewelers who up until then haven't been too impressed with her sketches. To find out more about the pithos and its origins she enlists the help of bookbinder and aspiring antiquarian Edward Lawrence, who expresses a scholarly interest in the same, in hopes that his research into this mysterious artifact would earn him a place with the Society of Antiquaries, an endeavor in which he has been unsuccessful so far. It also appears that the pithos has brought with it a bout of bad luck to those involved in the acquisition- the Coombes brothers who extracted it from a shipwreck are each afflicted with strange injuries and illnesses that won’t heal and Hezekiah incurs an injury while transporting it to his shop which also seems to fester. Together as Dora and Edward dig deeper into the origin and history of the pithos and also try to figure out how it ended up in Hezekiah's possession, they uncover much about Hezekiah’s nefarious dealings as well as the secrets and myth surrounding the pithos and how it connects to Dora and her family.

Susan Stokes-Chapman's Pandora is an impressive debut novel. I thoroughly enjoyed reading this story with its historical backdrop of Georgian England, a cast of interesting characters, engaging narrative and a mystery with the Greek myth of Pandora at its core. The prose is elegant, the story is well-paced and the setting is quaint yet atmospheric. I found the segments detailing facets of the antiquarian trade and illegal practices in the sale of valuable artifacts prevalent in that era very interesting. The cover design of the physical book is stunning and worthy of display. I would definitely recommend this novel to fans of historical fiction who don't mind a bit of fantasy and myth thrown in for good measure.