Title:

Fingersmith

Author:

Sarah Waters

Category:

Literature

Rating:

Date Reviewed:

October 28, 2025

ingersmith is a twisty tale set in 19th century England. Susan Tinder has been raised by a family of thieves. Mr. Ibbs is a fence, receiving stolen goods from pickpockets (called "fingersmiths"). Mrs. Sucksby runs a baby farm - raising abandoned infants, apparently to sell them off. One day a dapper conman who is nicknamed The Gentleman comes to the household with an elaborate scheme. He has discovered that Maud Lilly lives on a crumbling estate with her dour uncle. When Maud is 21, she will inherit a fortune worth £15,000. Maud is only 18 now, but if she should marry, then the inheritance will vest immediately. The Gentleman wants of convince Maud to marry him, after which he will control her finances. The Gentleman plans to have Maud declared insane and confined to a madhouse while he makes off with her money. But for the plan to work, he needs an accomplice, a maid to Maud that will subtly convince Maud that she ought to marry the Gentleman to escape the clutches of her cruel uncle. Would Susan be part of the scheme, play the part of the maid? Susan says that she will for £3,000.

Susan journeys to the gothic estate. It is dark, dreary, and sinister. Maud Lilly turns out to be partly fey. Maud has never seen London, never interacted with society. Instead Maud broods over the grave of her dead mother. Susan insinuates herself into the household, becoming Maud's trusted companion. Susan even pities Maud a bit, but for £3,000, Susan willingly abandons thoughts of justice or sympathy. The Gentleman shows up at the Lilly household, working for the uncle, but actually trying to woo Maud. The Gentleman wants to convince Maud to elope and quickly get married, but Maud's heart is not easily won.

Fingersmith is told in three parts. In part 1, told in third-person, the reader follows Susan to the dark estate, and watches the Gentleman's sinister plot unfold. There is dark atmosphere, a sense that things are not right. Indeed, the way the Gentleman's scheme unfolds is not at all how Susan expects. There is treachery in this dark story.

The second part of Fingersmith is narrated in first-person from Maud's viewpoint. We see through her eyes how confined she is on her uncle's estate, and we learn of his depraved research (he is compiling an index of Victorian pornography and forces young Maud to act as his secretary despite the content of his research.) The Gentleman enters the picture, and we see through Maud's eyes how his scheme unfolds. Unfortunately, this means that reader retreads events that were already depicted from Susan's point of view. It is true that seeing things through Maud's eyes sheds a different light on what is going on, but I still felt it slowed down the story to repeat the same scenes.

Part three returns to Susan's tale. The Gentleman's scheme has been revealed, and events play out, but not how anyone anticipated. I am being deliberately vague in this description because there are plot surprises and unexpected twists. Fingersmith is a big book, 582 pages in the trade paperback edition, so it takes a while to read. But I felt it was worth reading, even though none of the characters are sympathetic - everyone involved has secret plans and doesn't seem to mind who else gets harmed.