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Mary and the Birth of Frankenstein
Switzerland, 1816. A volcanic eruption in Indonesia envelopes the whole of Europe in ash and cloud. Amid this “year without a summer,” eighteen-year-old Mary Shelley and her lover Percy Bysshe Shelley arrive at Lake Geneva to visit Lord Byron and his companion John Polidori. Anguished by the recent loss of her child, Mary spends her days in strife. But come nightfall, the friends while away rainy wine-soaked evenings gathered around the fireplace, exchanging stories. One famous evening, Byron issues a challenge to write the best ghost story. Contemplating what to write, Mary recalls another summer, when she was fourteen…
Scotland, 1812. A guest of the Baxter family, Mary arrives in Dundee, befriending young Isabella Baxter. The girls soon spend hours together wandering through fields and forests, concocting tales about mythical Scottish creatures, ghosts and monsters roaming the lowlands. As their bond deepens, Mary and Isabella’s feelings for each other intensify. But someone has been watching them—the charismatic and vaguely sinister Mr. Booth, Isabella's older brother-in-law, who may not be as benevolent as he purports to be…
With gripping mastery and verve, Anne Eekhout brings to life a defining moment in Mary Shelley’s youth: the creative wellspring for one of the most original, thrilling, and timeless pieces of literature ever written. Provocative, wonderfully atmospheric and pulsing with emotion, Mary and the Birth of Frankenstein is a hypnotic ode to the power of imagination.
Translated from the Dutch by Laura Watkinson
This discussion guide was shared and sponsored in partnership with HarperCollins/HarperVia.
Book club questions for Mary and the Birth of Frankenstein by Anne Eekhout
Use these discussion questions to guide your next book club meeting.
Early in the novel, Albe ponders whether ‘the difference between the real and not real [is] truly that great?’ With historical fiction, an author blends historical fact with their imagination. What draws you as a reader to this genre and why is it unique?
How does the anxiety of coming-of-age affect Isabella and Mary differently? How does it bring them together?
Is this novel a ghost story? What ghosts haunt each of its characters? And how do they differ from conventional ghosts?
Mary and Isabella find themselves both captivated by the myths, legends and folktales of their nearby vicinity. Choose an urban myth or story you heard as a child. Did you believe them? What made them so frightening?
The novel shines an insightful light on the act of creation itself. How does the creative process affect the way Mary and others perceive the world? Does it help them make sense of it, re-interpret it, or even accept it?
How does Mary’s sense of the imaginary evolve between adolescence and adulthood? Choose an example from both sections to illustrate your point.
If you’ve read Frankenstein, how does Mary’s inner life as presented here reflect its preoccupations and themes? How do they enhance or build on the novel?
Mary and the Birth of Frankenstein Book Club Questions PDF
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"A beautiful, hallucinatory dream of a novel, Anne Eekhout's Mary and the Birth of Frankenstein brings Mary Shelley back to life with a brilliant intensity. This is a marvelous book about desire, and love, and the dark mysteries of the creative act."
— J.M. Miro, author of the National Bestseller Ordinary Monsters
“A fantastically moody, unsettling novel, with a teasing, enigmatic atmosphere entirely its own.”
— Sarah Waters, New York Times bestselling author of The Paying Guests and Fingersmith
"Rich, intricate and beguiling, this is a novel of enormous insight, great heart and incredible skill. Mary and the Birth of Frankenstein has so much to tell us about grief, fear, love and imagination. I will return to it often."
— Nell Stevens, author of Briefly, A Delicious Life
“Mary and the Birth of Frankenstein is a nuanced, beautifully atmospheric portrayal of a young woman’s intense inner life, foreshadowing Frankenstein's themes of grief, loneliness, and the desire for love.
— Booklist
"A novel that tiptoes and whispers, woos and caresses like the darkest of fairytales. Laudanum and love, wild imaginations and haunted hearts; I was bewitched by this profound and pleasurable imagining of Mary Shelley and the Birth of Frankenstein"
— Joanne Burn, author of The Hemlock Cure