Elizabeth

Much of my current reading is under the unhealthy influence of Grady Hendrix. He is the author of the irresistible study, Paperbacks from Hell: The Twisted History of 70's and 80's Horror Fiction. Fortunately for both my time and my mental health, 90% of what he writes about sounds about as unreadable as it is impossible to find decades after it graced spinner racks in books shops and grocery stores. But when he recommends an author or a book, I'm finding him to be a reliable guide to the least respectable backwaters of popular fiction.

A case in point: Elizabeth, Jessica Hamilton's 1977 novel described by the Library Journal as a "whirlwind of horror." Within the first twenty pages, Elizabeth Cuttner, while vacationing with her admittedly unappealing wealthy parents at their cabin on Lake George, has adopted a toad as her familiar spirit; met Frances, a witch who lives in her mirror; arranged for the drowning of her parents; and, made time for one of her frequent round of sex games with her uncle James.

Elizabeth is fourteen years old.

The action moves to the Cuttner mansion on Coenties Slip in Lower Manhattan. The Cuttner's have been ships chandlers since emigrating from England in the 17th century. They are rich and very weird, their home an historic relic now surrounded by glass skyscrapers erected on the landfill that has replaced the harbor they faced for centuries. Expect no spoilers here. Just remember that promised "whirlwind of horror," enlivened by Elizabeth's coldblooded, merciless, and spot-on commentary on everything and everybody from her family, to the people who take public transportation, to the jewel-encrusted audience at the Metropolitan Opera.

I have read other novels as perverse of Elizabeth, but they usually take the form of sophisticated, literary exercises in European modernism. Hamilton's short work drops such pretences and takes its place in the narrow, very American genre of the Well-Written, Trashy Paperback Original.

(Jessica Hamilton was the pseudonym used by the prolific author Ken Greenhall when he wanted a female narrator. Greenhall's novels are now being reprinted by Valancourt Books, but first try searching out the original mass-market editions in public libraries and used bookstores--the grimier the better.)