Book 5 of 52: The Thirteenth Tale by Diane Setterfield

This book begins a group of books that I'm really excited about--books about books (yes, I have fully accepted that I am a major reading nerd).  It's also the first medium length book I've read this year.

I loved this book.  I thought it was very well written and I fell deep into the mystery of the book.  The premise of the novel is that a very reclusive author who has never told her true life's story invites a young woman (who loves 19th century literature and has written a few biographies about obscure authors of the time period) to come and hear her life story and write it.  This book has everything a good 19th century romance would have: love, madness, mystery, deaths, old creaking houses falling apart.  It reminded me a bit of Jane Eyre (which plays a big part in this novel). 

As I was reading this book, I kept thinking about what a great book this could be for a creative writing class or an Introduction to the Novel class.  The author uses so many different writing devices to make her story flow together.  There's great use of symbols, foreshadowing, allusions, etc. that are fairly easy to see and define as different things.

I'd be really interested to read more by this author to see if she has other books similar to this one.

Is it worth reading?  Yes.  Especially if you enjoyed Jane Eyre or other 19th century literature (Jane Austen, the Bronte sisters, Charles Dickens, etc).