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Private Rites
From the award-winning author of Our Wives Under the Sea, a speculative reimagining of King Lear, centering three sisters navigating queer love and loss in a drowning world
It’s been raining for a long time now, so long that the land has reshaped itself and arcane rituals and religions are creeping back into practice. Sisters Isla, Irene, and Agnes have not spoken in some time when their father dies. An architect as cruel as he was revered, his death offers an opportunity for the sisters to come together in a new way. In the grand glass house they grew up in, their father’s most famous creation, the sisters sort through the secrets and memories he left behind, until their fragile bond is shattered by a revelation in his will.
More estranged than ever, the sisters’ lives spin out of control: Irene’s relationship is straining at the seams; Isla’s ex-wife keeps calling; and cynical Agnes is falling in love for the first time. But something even more sinister might be unfolding, something related to their mother’s long-ago disappearance and the strangers who have always seemed unusually interested in the sisters’ lives. Soon, it becomes clear that the sisters have been chosen for a very particular purpose, one with shattering implications for their family and their imperiled world.
It’s been raining for a long time now, so long that the land has reshaped itself and arcane rituals and religions are creeping back into practice. Sisters Isla, Irene, and Agnes have not spoken in some time when their father dies. An architect as cruel as he was revered, his death offers an opportunity for the sisters to come together in a new way. In the grand glass house they grew up in, their father’s most famous creation, the sisters sort through the secrets and memories he left behind, until their fragile bond is shattered by a revelation in his will.
More estranged than ever, the sisters’ lives spin out of control: Irene’s relationship is straining at the seams; Isla’s ex-wife keeps calling; and cynical Agnes is falling in love for the first time. But something even more sinister might be unfolding, something related to their mother’s long-ago disappearance and the strangers who have always seemed unusually interested in the sisters’ lives. Soon, it becomes clear that the sisters have been chosen for a very particular purpose, one with shattering implications for their family and their imperiled world.
291 pages, Hardcover
First published June 11, 2024
1303 people are currently reading
About the author
Julia Armfield
9 books2,548 followersJulia Armfield was born in London in 1990. She is a fiction writer and occasional playwright with a Masters in Victorian Art and Literature from Royal Holloway University. She was shortlisted for the Sunday Times Young Writer of the Year in 2019. She was commended in the Moth Short Story Prize 2017, longlisted for the Deborah Rogers Award 2018, and won the White Review short story prize 2018. Her first book, salt slow, is a collection of short stories about bodies and the bodily, mapping the skin and bones of its characters through their experiences of isolation, obsession and love. She won the Pushcart Prize in 2020. Julia Armfield lives and works in London.
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Displaying 1 - 30 of 2,873 reviews
September 4, 2025
as long as julia armfield writes spooky gay literary horror, i will be reading.
most of this is not a horror novel, except in the way that daily life in the modern sense is horrifying: the creeping intensity of climate change, the constant witnessing of tragedies and then going on with your life, the futility of either working to make things better or working to make them stay the same.
but that's pretty spooky in and of itself!
i think this book could have done a better job of carrying through the eerieness it was aiming to convey, and of making these three sisters and their dynamic more full or shifting or interesting.
but for some reason, i did find this book, in which little to nothing happens for most if not all of the book, borderline unputdownable.
hate the ending, though.
bottom line: not what i wanted it to be or thought it would be or knew its genre to be and yet i still liked it.
(thanks to the publisher for the e-arc)
most of this is not a horror novel, except in the way that daily life in the modern sense is horrifying: the creeping intensity of climate change, the constant witnessing of tragedies and then going on with your life, the futility of either working to make things better or working to make them stay the same.
but that's pretty spooky in and of itself!
i think this book could have done a better job of carrying through the eerieness it was aiming to convey, and of making these three sisters and their dynamic more full or shifting or interesting.
but for some reason, i did find this book, in which little to nothing happens for most if not all of the book, borderline unputdownable.
hate the ending, though.
bottom line: not what i wanted it to be or thought it would be or knew its genre to be and yet i still liked it.
(thanks to the publisher for the e-arc)
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June 17, 2025
To be burnt out and drowning in anxieties and familial dysfunction is one thing but if the world is quite literally drowning in the endless rains of climate catastrophe you better hold on tight to the ones you love. Such is the case in Julia Armfield’s Private Rites, a feverishly haunting tale loosely modeled as a queer retelling of William Shakespeare’s King Lear with the passing of an estate to the three daughters of a celebrity architect in a water-logged near future teetering on the brink of utter collapse. Armfield delivers her signature blend of literary horror that truly sinks under your skin through jittery examinations of grief, love and family in a society seemingly resigned to its own extinction. It’s a sort of catastrophe apathy that aches with the dull yet distressing pain of a bruise, one that conjures up memories of society haphazardly attempting to be the same as it always was amidst the recent pandemic, with Armfield keeping much of the calamity in the background and scene setting of taking ferries to work over sunken portions of the city or the endless chaos of closures due to rain. Much like her previous novel, the extraordinary Our Wives Under the Sea, Armfield always resonates deeply with me in a way that reminds me of Jeanette Winterson using horror to shine a light on concepts of love and loss instead of fairy tales as Winterson does. With a disquieting gaze at a society resigned to its own destruction, the violent reactions in those overwhelmed by such loss, fraught interpersonal relations that juxtapose the hardships of fixing a breaking world with the difficulties of love, Private Rites hits high notes of anxiety and trauma both past and present in a story utterly drenched in dread.
‘What happened, then? Two mothers and a father. Three sisters and a house. A house which, once invaded, could not be closed again, was left open to the elements, to whomever wished to come inside.’
The famous passage from King Lear, ‘We that are young, Shall never see so much, nor live so long,’ takes on an eerie new layer of meaning in Armfield’s reconfigured Lear tale as the young sisters at the center of the story live under the growing dread that the number of possible tomorrows is rapidly reaching an end. It is a slow burn apocalypse of rain as ‘seasons and weather patterns blur into one,’ something that becomes so steady it seeps into normalcy. It remains a constant tone soaking every passage, omnipresent like a thorn in the mind yet left to fester as an overwhelming problem to hide behind a bandage of carrying on instead of addressing. ‘The great washout of the world and no sense that it might have been otherwise.’ Like in a western this watery landscape becomes a character in its own right with Armfield even giving “the city” its own perspective to chronicle the slow collapse and resignation of society in the face of impending doom.
In the overbearing hopelessness we find ‘Archaic practices resurfacing the way trends will,’ and cult behavior and erratic interactions begin to infest society. One might think of the ways society pushed to return during the recent pandemic and all the rhetoric of the “new normal”. In interview with Country Town & House, Armfield addresses her ideas around this:
The concept of drowning in the overwhelming weight of it all is expertly metaphor as literal drowning, with oceans and water being a common theme in Armfield’s works. ‘I looked around and realised how prevalent the ocean and the water is in a lot of really formative lesbian media,’ she explains. She has previously spoken on this in an interview with Them Magazine while discussing Our Wives Under the Sea with water as ‘a symbol of something forbidden,’ that functions as ‘a very natural setting for coming-out narratives…the sea
can be very calm on the surface, and something can be going on underneath. That speaks to the way that we as queer people have to be so many different things to so many different people.’ Such imagery permeates Private Rites as the turmoil beneath the surface of everyone begins to boil over under the constant stress of the world.
‘Death, after all, puts an end to the argument, but it also prolongs the silence forever.’
At the center of this is the Carmichael family, who’s patriarch, Stephen Carmichael, passes away as the story sets out. Praised as a ‘true genius’ for his architectural marvels that make him ‘the hero of the domestic space…snatching homes from sites grown uninhabitable and lifting them up out of harm's way.’ He is like a Frank Lloyd Wright responding to climate crisis, yet creating homes with a price sticker that cannot act as a life raft to the average person. Left behind are three sisters, Isla, Irene and Agnes, the latter born from a second wife who arrived after the tragic end of the elder sisters’ mother and quickly vanished after Agnes’ birth. It is a family where resentment has grown in the absence of trust and love and each plays out the role of a villain in the minds of the other. ‘Sisterhood, [Irene] thinks, is a trap. You all get stuck in certain roles forever.’ Yet as the world becomes increasingly hostile, each seeks to fill the wound left by a lost mother and frequently finds only disappointment.
‘The rain falls, the night continues–black horizon and the pull of what’s beneath.’
An aspect that hit hard are the ways problems seems to compound upon problems and avoidance only worsens them. ‘The problem is’ becomes nearly a mantra amidst the prose, each exposing another facet of issues, each amalgamating towards apocalyptic distress.
The novel is effectively anxiety inducing as it speaks exactly to the growing issues in our own time. Working a library, for instance, one can see the ways for-profit privatization erodes public goods and grows a class divide where private services become more expensive and public services, like Jude’s job, are understaffed and underfunded. And we consider it all just the way things are and dismiss any attempt at deconstructing or attempting sustainable alternatives.
The problem is, hardships are easier to ignore and hope they go away. Global catastrophe feels beyond a singular person and easier to hope for a miracle. Cults appear who have ideas around sacrifice, for instance, and little beyond magical thinking seems to be occurring. To fix the world is hard, yet to live in a failing world is harder.
‘We love people before we notice we love them, but the act of naming the love makes it different, drags it out into different light.’
Something Armfield does so effectively, however, is examine love in the light of all these hardships. With each sister, Armfield examines relationships—Irene has recently separated from a partner, Isla’s Jude (they are possibly the best character in the book) remains calm and loves her despite her rather thorny personality, and Agnes is slipping into a partnership with Stephanie who provides a stability in an unstable world. But love is hard.
Despite the hardships, love is viewed as being worth it, something that could be applied to the world itself. To save the world would require great sacrifices and a lot of effort but, like love, it could be worthwhile. I’ve always believed love makes it all bearable, a bad day of crisis washes away when you see the one you love, when they show they care by bringing you food (like Jude), when they hold you as you break down and keep your pieces together (like Stephanie). Love gets you through. ‘I could be good with this, if I could have this,’ thinks Agnes, ‘I don’t think it would matter if things had been different or we’d had a different world or more to hope for. I could be happy here.’
‘Any horror story could be said to work in two pieces: the fear of being wholly alone and of realizing that one has company.’
Private Rites is, ultimately, a horror novel though one that keeps the horror pushed aside until it becomes too much and bursts upon everyone. ‘This is the wrong genre’ Agnes thinks as the dramatic conclusion begins, which perfectly mirrors the horror faced by society as the terror of collapse bursts in after decades of trying to push climate crisis out of their minds. The violence of the ending is shocking and alarming because we see it enacted by the long plans of people and at their hands, however is the climate collapse not also the slow work of human hands either actively bringing about the violence or passively allowing it? Armfield juxtaposes the two for sharp, searing effect and while it arrives as rather jarring it is a reminder that the problems we push aside never vanish. They fester and, eventually, attack.
‘You can hear it if you listen; the slow dissolution, the panic becoming something else.’
A slow burn of a novel spiraling between perspectives and giving the city a space to chronicle its own decay, Private Rites slowly seeps into the reader and shakes them to the core. Haunting and hellishly relevant, it is a tale of family, of resentment, of collapse and consequences. But at the heart of matters, it is a story about love. Endlessly engaging and eerily compelling, Armfield has delivered another masterful novel.
4.5/5
**Easily a top favorite of 2024 and I was oh so thrilled to discover this:
***
‘What happened, then? Two mothers and a father. Three sisters and a house. A house which, once invaded, could not be closed again, was left open to the elements, to whomever wished to come inside.’
The famous passage from King Lear, ‘We that are young, Shall never see so much, nor live so long,’ takes on an eerie new layer of meaning in Armfield’s reconfigured Lear tale as the young sisters at the center of the story live under the growing dread that the number of possible tomorrows is rapidly reaching an end. It is a slow burn apocalypse of rain as ‘seasons and weather patterns blur into one,’ something that becomes so steady it seeps into normalcy. It remains a constant tone soaking every passage, omnipresent like a thorn in the mind yet left to fester as an overwhelming problem to hide behind a bandage of carrying on instead of addressing. ‘The great washout of the world and no sense that it might have been otherwise.’ Like in a western this watery landscape becomes a character in its own right with Armfield even giving “the city” its own perspective to chronicle the slow collapse and resignation of society in the face of impending doom.
‘It is difficult, these days, to know how to be. Not a new phenomenon, of course, but one lent a certain urgency by the situation. People protest, or forget to protest. People hoard food, medical supplies, use them up and hoard them again…they suspect that there is less time than predicted, throw parties to celebrate the endless ending, pretend the coming on of something new. It’s always been this way, always worsening. A contradiction: the fact of something always being the case and yet that case being flux, deterioration.’
In the overbearing hopelessness we find ‘Archaic practices resurfacing the way trends will,’ and cult behavior and erratic interactions begin to infest society. One might think of the ways society pushed to return during the recent pandemic and all the rhetoric of the “new normal”. In interview with Country Town & House, Armfield addresses her ideas around this:
‘Something I’ve been preoccupied with throughout my career is the concept of a pervasive norm – the way that banality and dailiness always assert themselves no matter the extremes people find themselves in. This can be a good thing, inasmuch as it shows how adaptable people can be, but it also signifies a kind of apathy and powerlessness in the face of an overriding system, and I’m extremely interested in that.’
The concept of drowning in the overwhelming weight of it all is expertly metaphor as literal drowning, with oceans and water being a common theme in Armfield’s works. ‘I looked around and realised how prevalent the ocean and the water is in a lot of really formative lesbian media,’ she explains. She has previously spoken on this in an interview with Them Magazine while discussing Our Wives Under the Sea with water as ‘a symbol of something forbidden,’ that functions as ‘a very natural setting for coming-out narratives…the sea
can be very calm on the surface, and something can be going on underneath. That speaks to the way that we as queer people have to be so many different things to so many different people.’ Such imagery permeates Private Rites as the turmoil beneath the surface of everyone begins to boil over under the constant stress of the world.
‘Death, after all, puts an end to the argument, but it also prolongs the silence forever.’
At the center of this is the Carmichael family, who’s patriarch, Stephen Carmichael, passes away as the story sets out. Praised as a ‘true genius’ for his architectural marvels that make him ‘the hero of the domestic space…snatching homes from sites grown uninhabitable and lifting them up out of harm's way.’ He is like a Frank Lloyd Wright responding to climate crisis, yet creating homes with a price sticker that cannot act as a life raft to the average person. Left behind are three sisters, Isla, Irene and Agnes, the latter born from a second wife who arrived after the tragic end of the elder sisters’ mother and quickly vanished after Agnes’ birth. It is a family where resentment has grown in the absence of trust and love and each plays out the role of a villain in the minds of the other. ‘Sisterhood, [Irene] thinks, is a trap. You all get stuck in certain roles forever.’ Yet as the world becomes increasingly hostile, each seeks to fill the wound left by a lost mother and frequently finds only disappointment.
‘The rain falls, the night continues–black horizon and the pull of what’s beneath.’
An aspect that hit hard are the ways problems seems to compound upon problems and avoidance only worsens them. ‘The problem is’ becomes nearly a mantra amidst the prose, each exposing another facet of issues, each amalgamating towards apocalyptic distress.
‘The problem, of course, is the general worsening of things—things being housing, and the weather, and The State Of It All. The problem is private companies springing up every other week to mishandle the business of dealing with it and siphon off funding in the process. The problem is the fact that there’s no money, and nowhere to put people, and the fact that they’re working on a skeleton staff with no time and no way to do more than they’re already doing…They are, as Jude reflects, a ship being mended as it sails, except that they aren’t really being mended and their sailing has become less a smooth progress and more the basic act of staying afloat.’
The novel is effectively anxiety inducing as it speaks exactly to the growing issues in our own time. Working a library, for instance, one can see the ways for-profit privatization erodes public goods and grows a class divide where private services become more expensive and public services, like Jude’s job, are understaffed and underfunded. And we consider it all just the way things are and dismiss any attempt at deconstructing or attempting sustainable alternatives.
‘The problem, of course, is that there’s always something, and it can be easier on occasion to ignore it and take your partner back to bed.’
The problem is, hardships are easier to ignore and hope they go away. Global catastrophe feels beyond a singular person and easier to hope for a miracle. Cults appear who have ideas around sacrifice, for instance, and little beyond magical thinking seems to be occurring. To fix the world is hard, yet to live in a failing world is harder.
‘We love people before we notice we love them, but the act of naming the love makes it different, drags it out into different light.’
Something Armfield does so effectively, however, is examine love in the light of all these hardships. With each sister, Armfield examines relationships—Irene has recently separated from a partner, Isla’s Jude (they are possibly the best character in the book) remains calm and loves her despite her rather thorny personality, and Agnes is slipping into a partnership with Stephanie who provides a stability in an unstable world. But love is hard.
‘The problem with love, of course, is that it frequently asks too much of unlovable people. It can be hard, on even the best of days, to compel oneself to be selfless and patient and undemanding or even halfway reasonable when one is not given to any of those behaviours. But these are nonetheless the qualities that love demands.
Despite the hardships, love is viewed as being worth it, something that could be applied to the world itself. To save the world would require great sacrifices and a lot of effort but, like love, it could be worthwhile. I’ve always believed love makes it all bearable, a bad day of crisis washes away when you see the one you love, when they show they care by bringing you food (like Jude), when they hold you as you break down and keep your pieces together (like Stephanie). Love gets you through. ‘I could be good with this, if I could have this,’ thinks Agnes, ‘I don’t think it would matter if things had been different or we’d had a different world or more to hope for. I could be happy here.’
‘Any horror story could be said to work in two pieces: the fear of being wholly alone and of realizing that one has company.’
Private Rites is, ultimately, a horror novel though one that keeps the horror pushed aside until it becomes too much and bursts upon everyone. ‘This is the wrong genre’ Agnes thinks as the dramatic conclusion begins, which perfectly mirrors the horror faced by society as the terror of collapse bursts in after decades of trying to push climate crisis out of their minds. The violence of the ending is shocking and alarming because we see it enacted by the long plans of people and at their hands, however is the climate collapse not also the slow work of human hands either actively bringing about the violence or passively allowing it? Armfield juxtaposes the two for sharp, searing effect and while it arrives as rather jarring it is a reminder that the problems we push aside never vanish. They fester and, eventually, attack.
‘You can hear it if you listen; the slow dissolution, the panic becoming something else.’
A slow burn of a novel spiraling between perspectives and giving the city a space to chronicle its own decay, Private Rites slowly seeps into the reader and shakes them to the core. Haunting and hellishly relevant, it is a tale of family, of resentment, of collapse and consequences. But at the heart of matters, it is a story about love. Endlessly engaging and eerily compelling, Armfield has delivered another masterful novel.
4.5/5
**Easily a top favorite of 2024 and I was oh so thrilled to discover this:
***
May 23, 2024
It's no secret that this was my most anticipated book of the year and that I had expected it to be my favourite book ever... was it? no. were my expectations too high? I fear they were.
Julia Armfield is an incredible novelist and writes about grief, sisterhood, womanhood and melancholy in a way that resonates with me so deeply; that was no different with this book. So much of this was eloquent, heart wrenching and painfully relatable and I did underline SO MANY quotes as my favourites.
As a novel though, I felt like so much of the apocalypse and end of the world state that the premise promised was missing. This book was incredibly quiet and subtle and whilst (from a narrative POV) I can understand why, it didn't make it any more of an enjoyable read. Dare I say I felt myself dragging my feet with it slightly. The last 50 pages for me were PERFECT and exactly what I wanted from this book ~ pretending that the rest was exactly like that, it would've been all I wanted and more.
Saying this though, I can acknowledge that my expectations were VERY high and perhaps that impacted my reading experience slightly. I would still definitely recommend this, especially if you have already established that you like Julia Armfield's writing!
(3.5 stars)
Julia Armfield is an incredible novelist and writes about grief, sisterhood, womanhood and melancholy in a way that resonates with me so deeply; that was no different with this book. So much of this was eloquent, heart wrenching and painfully relatable and I did underline SO MANY quotes as my favourites.
As a novel though, I felt like so much of the apocalypse and end of the world state that the premise promised was missing. This book was incredibly quiet and subtle and whilst (from a narrative POV) I can understand why, it didn't make it any more of an enjoyable read. Dare I say I felt myself dragging my feet with it slightly. The last 50 pages for me were PERFECT and exactly what I wanted from this book ~ pretending that the rest was exactly like that, it would've been all I wanted and more.
Saying this though, I can acknowledge that my expectations were VERY high and perhaps that impacted my reading experience slightly. I would still definitely recommend this, especially if you have already established that you like Julia Armfield's writing!
(3.5 stars)
January 8, 2025
this was so no plot just vibes until the last like ??? CHAPTER ??? and then it was like surprise there was a secret plot and also this is an a24 film actually
March 25, 2025
“Any horror story could be said to work in two pieces: the fear of being wholly alone and of realizing that one has company.”
julia armfield is just a new all time favorite author for me, both of her full length books, and her short story collection, were just perfection to me. her writing is just so haunting and her characters are so impactful and this book was just a masterpiece to me and my reading tastes.
private rites is a modern king lear reimagining, where all three daughters are queer, and living in a world that has been so impacted by climate change that the world is mostly underwater and humans are forced to build up. the father in this story was a luxury architect that helped build luxury living in the form of skyrises, while others were forced to live in a world that is always raining and the water levels are getting higher and higher. and the three daughters are forced back together after leaving their abusive palace in the sky, because their father has passed away, but maybe the family secrets not being laid to rest alongside him.
i loved these three daughters, and how different their worlds forged them into being. I read in a goodreads interview where the author talks about how even though she knew she was writing what the world would deem “unlovable characters” she wanted to show that they are still deserving of love and partners who show up for them. i loved that, i felt that on every page, during all three povs. and how, because of capitalism, these women are forced to wake up in a drowned world and go to work like everything is normal. i feel like it would be impossible for you to read this in 2024 and not think of the comparisons to the 2020 pandemic and how most of us are still really trying to process that immense trauma, while many of us were still forced to clock in every day, and not everyone lucky enough to do so safely.
but if you know how king lear ends, well… this really is a reimaging, with a clifi setting, that is talking about capitalism and abuse and how those things go very much hand in hand - especially in our current day society, and upon finishing you will also realize that this is a true horror story. i loved every page and i recommend with my whole heart to everyone.
trigger + content warnings: blood, loss of a father (mention of stroke and heart attack), loss of mother in past talk of cults, child abuse in past, vomit, panic attacks, sleep issues, talk of bad dreams, abandonment, anxiety, pica mention in past, suicide attempt // self harm in past, some hospital setting, drowning, mention of infidelity in past (parents), drinking, smoking, brief mention of dementia, one sentence homophobia mention (in negative light), unwanted touching
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March 26, 2024
Julia Armfield’s “lesbian Lear” takes three queer sisters and places them in the middle of - what she’s called - a “mundane apocalypse.” The sisters inhabit a drowned world, a place of unceasing rain which is slowly but inexorably wearing away its very foundations. Coastal regions have long ago disappeared, as have things like cars and plane travel, most people live in cities since these are the only areas that retain some semblance of what was formally normality. Government’s largely absent and when it does intervene incompetent. The wealthy inhabit custom-made houses in the higher-most regions while ordinary people are mainly confined to the upper reaches of crumbling high-rises. It’s a similar scenario to the ones that writers like Ballard found fascinating but, unlike Ballard’s work, there are few crescendos here, no violent rupture in the fabric of society. Instead, everything’s dying off by degrees: some people have joined end-of-the-world cults with their obscure rituals; a few gather together to stage futile protests; others simply choose to vanish. But the mass of the population lives in a kind of stupefied denial, too fearful to look directly into the face of disaster. They cling to old routines, commuting to work, moaning about their bosses or colleagues or flatmates. They come together with one another but just as often drift apart.
Armfield’s vivid descriptions of rain seeping into every corner of daily life owes a partial debt to Arthur Machen, a favourite writer of Armfield’s, particularly the emphasis on its impact on mental as much as physical space. Amidst this simmering discontent, siblings Isla, Irene and half-sister Agnes are intent on maintaining a careful distance from one another. Although Isla and Irene are united in their contempt for younger, half-sister Agnes. Agnes meanwhile takes pleasure in small acts of subversion from mislabelling coffee cups in the café where she works to fucking random women in changing rooms. But the siblings’ awkward stalemate’s disrupted by their father’s death, a once-revered architect and an exacting, sadistic parent. His death brings the sisters back to the house he built for them, stirring up long-buried emotions and unsettling childhood memories, conjuring an atmosphere of growing, Jacksonian unease. Then weird things start to happen all of which appear to be converging on Agnes.
Armfield’s prose is impressively sinuous, her imagery striking, and her vision of a blighted future created by climate change all too convincing. But as a novel I found this unbalanced, difficult to place. On one level it’s an unusual blend of folk horror and speculative fiction but the bulk of the actual narrative’s caught up in detailing the fractured interactions between the three sisters and the aftermath of early trauma – which wasn’t always that appealing to me. There are some pleasing folkloric and mythic elements woven into Armfield’s story but they’re oddly underdeveloped, and I thought the final reveal was too heavily signposted – perhaps because I’m overly familiar with the classic horror movies Armfield loves and directly/indirectly references throughout. But perhaps that’s the point? That conventional horror plots are less than scary when compared to the sheer scale of the environmental blight that lies ahead. Armfield’s story hints at alternative ways of tackling this looming disaster but her ultimate message seems less about concrete solutions than it is emotional responses: the importance of empathy, of making and sustaining meaningful connections.
Thanks to Netgalley and to publisher 4th Estate
Rating: 3 to 3.5
Armfield’s vivid descriptions of rain seeping into every corner of daily life owes a partial debt to Arthur Machen, a favourite writer of Armfield’s, particularly the emphasis on its impact on mental as much as physical space. Amidst this simmering discontent, siblings Isla, Irene and half-sister Agnes are intent on maintaining a careful distance from one another. Although Isla and Irene are united in their contempt for younger, half-sister Agnes. Agnes meanwhile takes pleasure in small acts of subversion from mislabelling coffee cups in the café where she works to fucking random women in changing rooms. But the siblings’ awkward stalemate’s disrupted by their father’s death, a once-revered architect and an exacting, sadistic parent. His death brings the sisters back to the house he built for them, stirring up long-buried emotions and unsettling childhood memories, conjuring an atmosphere of growing, Jacksonian unease. Then weird things start to happen all of which appear to be converging on Agnes.
Armfield’s prose is impressively sinuous, her imagery striking, and her vision of a blighted future created by climate change all too convincing. But as a novel I found this unbalanced, difficult to place. On one level it’s an unusual blend of folk horror and speculative fiction but the bulk of the actual narrative’s caught up in detailing the fractured interactions between the three sisters and the aftermath of early trauma – which wasn’t always that appealing to me. There are some pleasing folkloric and mythic elements woven into Armfield’s story but they’re oddly underdeveloped, and I thought the final reveal was too heavily signposted – perhaps because I’m overly familiar with the classic horror movies Armfield loves and directly/indirectly references throughout. But perhaps that’s the point? That conventional horror plots are less than scary when compared to the sheer scale of the environmental blight that lies ahead. Armfield’s story hints at alternative ways of tackling this looming disaster but her ultimate message seems less about concrete solutions than it is emotional responses: the importance of empathy, of making and sustaining meaningful connections.
Thanks to Netgalley and to publisher 4th Estate
Rating: 3 to 3.5
May 30, 2025
This stunning book plunges readers into a world where relentless rain has reshaped both the landscape and the lives of its inhabitants. At the heart of the story are three estranged sisters—Isla, Irene, and Agnes—whose fragile bond is tested by the death of their domineering, abusive father. In the grand glass house he designed, the sisters must confront not only the physical remnants of his legacy but also the emotional scars he left behind. As they sort through old memories and the secrets buried in his will, the tension between them begins to unravel, revealing long-standing resentments and unresolved grief.
The novel excels at weaving together personal and environmental crises. The never-ending rain that submerges the city mirrors the emotional drowning each sister faces—Isla’s unresolved feelings for her ex-wife, Irene’s strained relationship with her nonbinary partner, and Agnes’s unexpected encounter with love for the first time. As the water rises, so does the sense of impending doom, not just for their world but for their tenuous connection to one another. Armfield masterfully blends themes of family dysfunction, queer identity, and the looming threat of climate disaster, crafting a story that is as much about personal survival as it is about the collapsing world around them.
The atmosphere in "Private Rites" is palpable, with Armfield’s prose creating a sense of foreboding that builds slowly but relentlessly. The constant rain becomes a character in itself, shaping not only the setting but also the sisters’ state of mind, trapping them in a suffocating loop of time where past traumas and present challenges blur together. The narrative’s nonlinear structure enhances this disorientation, giving readers a feeling of being unmoored, much like the characters who are struggling to find solid ground in both their relationships and their sense of self.
What sets Private Rites apart is its quiet, unsettling intensity. The novel doesn’t rely on traditional horror but instead taps into a more existential fear—the fear of losing control, of being unable to change one’s fate, and of drowning in both a literal and metaphorical sense. Armfield’s exploration of sisterhood is both tender and raw, depicting the complexities of familial love and the ways in which it can both bind and suffocate. The novel’s climax offers a twist that is both surprising and inevitable, driving home the idea that in a world collapsing under the weight of its own decay, the only thing left to salvage is the truth of who we are and what we mean to each other.
Though the pacing can feel uneven at times, with some sections meandering before accelerating to a rapid conclusion, Private Rites delivers a powerful meditation on family, identity, and the environmental crisis. Fans of Armfield’s previous work, as well as readers who appreciate speculative fiction with a strong emotional core, will find themselves absorbed in this dark, atmospheric tale. Armfield’s ability to blend the surreal with the intimate ensures that Private Rites will linger with readers long after they’ve turned the final page.
Many thanks to NetGalley and Flatiron Books for sharing this stunning book's digital reviewer copy in exchange for my honest thoughts.
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The novel excels at weaving together personal and environmental crises. The never-ending rain that submerges the city mirrors the emotional drowning each sister faces—Isla’s unresolved feelings for her ex-wife, Irene’s strained relationship with her nonbinary partner, and Agnes’s unexpected encounter with love for the first time. As the water rises, so does the sense of impending doom, not just for their world but for their tenuous connection to one another. Armfield masterfully blends themes of family dysfunction, queer identity, and the looming threat of climate disaster, crafting a story that is as much about personal survival as it is about the collapsing world around them.
The atmosphere in "Private Rites" is palpable, with Armfield’s prose creating a sense of foreboding that builds slowly but relentlessly. The constant rain becomes a character in itself, shaping not only the setting but also the sisters’ state of mind, trapping them in a suffocating loop of time where past traumas and present challenges blur together. The narrative’s nonlinear structure enhances this disorientation, giving readers a feeling of being unmoored, much like the characters who are struggling to find solid ground in both their relationships and their sense of self.
What sets Private Rites apart is its quiet, unsettling intensity. The novel doesn’t rely on traditional horror but instead taps into a more existential fear—the fear of losing control, of being unable to change one’s fate, and of drowning in both a literal and metaphorical sense. Armfield’s exploration of sisterhood is both tender and raw, depicting the complexities of familial love and the ways in which it can both bind and suffocate. The novel’s climax offers a twist that is both surprising and inevitable, driving home the idea that in a world collapsing under the weight of its own decay, the only thing left to salvage is the truth of who we are and what we mean to each other.
Though the pacing can feel uneven at times, with some sections meandering before accelerating to a rapid conclusion, Private Rites delivers a powerful meditation on family, identity, and the environmental crisis. Fans of Armfield’s previous work, as well as readers who appreciate speculative fiction with a strong emotional core, will find themselves absorbed in this dark, atmospheric tale. Armfield’s ability to blend the surreal with the intimate ensures that Private Rites will linger with readers long after they’ve turned the final page.
Many thanks to NetGalley and Flatiron Books for sharing this stunning book's digital reviewer copy in exchange for my honest thoughts.
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March 21, 2024
Armfield is such an artful poet of wateriness. Set amidst a visceral imagining of climate catastrophe, this depicts with uncanny foresight what it might be like to live in a city like London when the waters rise: there are ramshackle jetties and water taxis trying to compensate for the fact that the outer edges of train lines are under water; outages of power are commonplace; alarms and sirens go off but no-one knows what they signify or what to do; and seals, pelicans and eels are moving into homes.
In the foreground are the archetypal three sisters - Isla, Irene and Agnes - all struggling in their own ways. The text references King Lear and Macbeth for necessary allusions to conflict and inheritance, a wayward and troubling father, absent mothers, from the former; and something more uncanny, weird and superstitious from the latter. For one of the outcomes of this end of days scenario is the rise of neo-religions and cults.
In some ways I found this narrative less definitive than Our Wives Under the Sea: the momentum is more blurred, less directional, more... watery and undefined. The denouement is, perhaps, a bit more dramatic with slightly less of a logical build-up. But those are small niggles.
What this succeeds in doing brilliantly is to delineate the nuanced relationships between the three sisters, the ways they simultaneously resent and cling to each other, the impact of parental troubles that shadow their growth and haunt their present. The febrile nature of their connections, and those they share with their wives and partners, is as brittle, enthreatened and undefined as the water in which this book is seeped. Their passivity, their hovering between safety, endurance and defiance is reflected more widely: Isla and Irene's cocooning is contrasted with Isla's ex-wife's determination to seek a better way to live - or, at least, see what's left of the world before it drowns. At the same time, the snarky, resentful, embittered yet, ultimately, strong sisterly bond feels tangible.
Atmospheric and controlled, this is a horrifying book delivered with a light touch. There have been other novelistic depictions of where our continued evasions of climate policies could lead but this feels like one of the best imagined to me precisely because it's not overly dramatic: the slow slide into disaster feels oddly realistic as is the idea of a population essentially abandoned by a government: it's the small touches that make this work - chicory coffee (presumably because the beans can't be grown or imported), the way life continues with people getting to work as far as they can (with only an off-stage mention of an anti-work protest), houses that either collapse or those, for the wealthy, that can lift themselves above the saturated earth.
The interdependencies between the personal story of the sisters and the wider one of climate catastrophe play off each other in a lovely mutuality. It's a bit of a wrench - and a relief! - to look up from this book and realise that it's not raining, that the water isn't rising in the basement... and that it's sunny outside my window!
Immersive, thoughtful and lyrical.
Many thanks to 4th Estate for an ARC via NetGalley
In the foreground are the archetypal three sisters - Isla, Irene and Agnes - all struggling in their own ways. The text references King Lear and Macbeth for necessary allusions to conflict and inheritance, a wayward and troubling father, absent mothers, from the former; and something more uncanny, weird and superstitious from the latter. For one of the outcomes of this end of days scenario is the rise of neo-religions and cults.
In some ways I found this narrative less definitive than Our Wives Under the Sea: the momentum is more blurred, less directional, more... watery and undefined. The denouement is, perhaps, a bit more dramatic with slightly less of a logical build-up. But those are small niggles.
What this succeeds in doing brilliantly is to delineate the nuanced relationships between the three sisters, the ways they simultaneously resent and cling to each other, the impact of parental troubles that shadow their growth and haunt their present. The febrile nature of their connections, and those they share with their wives and partners, is as brittle, enthreatened and undefined as the water in which this book is seeped. Their passivity, their hovering between safety, endurance and defiance is reflected more widely: Isla and Irene's cocooning is contrasted with Isla's ex-wife's determination to seek a better way to live - or, at least, see what's left of the world before it drowns. At the same time, the snarky, resentful, embittered yet, ultimately, strong sisterly bond feels tangible.
Atmospheric and controlled, this is a horrifying book delivered with a light touch. There have been other novelistic depictions of where our continued evasions of climate policies could lead but this feels like one of the best imagined to me precisely because it's not overly dramatic: the slow slide into disaster feels oddly realistic as is the idea of a population essentially abandoned by a government: it's the small touches that make this work - chicory coffee (presumably because the beans can't be grown or imported), the way life continues with people getting to work as far as they can (with only an off-stage mention of an anti-work protest), houses that either collapse or those, for the wealthy, that can lift themselves above the saturated earth.
The interdependencies between the personal story of the sisters and the wider one of climate catastrophe play off each other in a lovely mutuality. It's a bit of a wrench - and a relief! - to look up from this book and realise that it's not raining, that the water isn't rising in the basement... and that it's sunny outside my window!
Immersive, thoughtful and lyrical.
Many thanks to 4th Estate for an ARC via NetGalley
August 21, 2024
This is pitched as a queer King Lear, but it strikes me more as a reboot of J.G. Ballard. The Drowned World, but anxious 21st-century lesbians instead of debonair mid-20th-century straight men. Both novels drown the world not to see it drowned, but rather to throw into relief their characters’ inner consciousness; metaphor, but also psychological experiment. Neither novel has much at all to do with global warming—which is frankly, in both cases, a huge relief.
Private Rites is a swampy, steamy, damp novel, that feels not unlike having sex while crying. It is overwritten, especially early on—always two or three images where one would suffice, extra clauses in service of extra adjectives. But as in Armfield’s equally watery first novel, Our Wives Under the Sea, stylistic excess serves the book’s conceit; the prose, like the world, waterlogged and dripping. The novel is badly guilty of one of contemporary storytelling’s worst habits: the substitution of childhood trauma for genuine inner life. And yet, Armfield evades the trap even as she steps in it. She refuses to let trauma explain; is uninterested (as Ballard, and for that matter Shakespeare, were uninterested) in any kind of easy psychological legibility. Is up to something more interesting.
“Any horror story could be said to work in two pieces: the fear of being wholly alone and of realizing that one has company.”
Private Rites is far better than Our Wives Under the Sea, and Our Wives Under the Sea was quite good. Everything about Armfield’s second novel is richer and more specific than in her first—the characters, the worldbuilding, the symbolism. The novel’s shifts in timeline and point-of-view are beautifully done. Armfield has little interest in giving her three sisters distinct voices; rather, she lets each sisters' perspective glance off the others, so that the novel seems almost to spin or swirl in place. Sentences unspool in flurries of commas, too artful for their own good—except that as they whirl and pool like rainwater, prose that should be ponderous shows itself light, flexible, even funny, the pleasurable excess of it all in delicious tension with the novel’s endless gray rain.
Sometimes, even my five-star reviews can read a little ambiguously. So I will be clear: this is one of my favorite books I’ve read this year. I recommend it without reservation.
Private Rites is a swampy, steamy, damp novel, that feels not unlike having sex while crying. It is overwritten, especially early on—always two or three images where one would suffice, extra clauses in service of extra adjectives. But as in Armfield’s equally watery first novel, Our Wives Under the Sea, stylistic excess serves the book’s conceit; the prose, like the world, waterlogged and dripping. The novel is badly guilty of one of contemporary storytelling’s worst habits: the substitution of childhood trauma for genuine inner life. And yet, Armfield evades the trap even as she steps in it. She refuses to let trauma explain; is uninterested (as Ballard, and for that matter Shakespeare, were uninterested) in any kind of easy psychological legibility. Is up to something more interesting.
“Any horror story could be said to work in two pieces: the fear of being wholly alone and of realizing that one has company.”
Private Rites is far better than Our Wives Under the Sea, and Our Wives Under the Sea was quite good. Everything about Armfield’s second novel is richer and more specific than in her first—the characters, the worldbuilding, the symbolism. The novel’s shifts in timeline and point-of-view are beautifully done. Armfield has little interest in giving her three sisters distinct voices; rather, she lets each sisters' perspective glance off the others, so that the novel seems almost to spin or swirl in place. Sentences unspool in flurries of commas, too artful for their own good—except that as they whirl and pool like rainwater, prose that should be ponderous shows itself light, flexible, even funny, the pleasurable excess of it all in delicious tension with the novel’s endless gray rain.
Sometimes, even my five-star reviews can read a little ambiguously. So I will be clear: this is one of my favorite books I’ve read this year. I recommend it without reservation.
September 18, 2024
pretty prose but oh man was i bored out of my mind the entire time
the relationships did not feel fleshed-out enough for the characters’ actions and reactions to be believable, the vague mentions of culty behavior came off as too heavy handed and sporadic, & i was really craving some more depth like… all around
the relationships did not feel fleshed-out enough for the characters’ actions and reactions to be believable, the vague mentions of culty behavior came off as too heavy handed and sporadic, & i was really craving some more depth like… all around
January 28, 2025
“Life, she understands, is a collapsing down, a succession of memories held not in sequence but together, occurring and recurring all at once.”
After falling head over heels for Armfield’s Our Wives Under the Sea a little while back, I was totally stoked for the release of this novel. I’m sorry to say, I feel a bit disappointed this time around. Maybe my expectations were too high, but I couldn’t quite muster up the same level of enthusiasm for it! As far as the prose, on a sentence level this was equally masterful. The story itself is what left me feeling kind of enervated. A bit limp. Maybe it was all that rain and dreariness that did it. After all, the book is set during a dystopian world where rain dominates everything.
“It rains constantly and the fact of the rain, of the rain’s whole great impending somethingness, runs parallel to the day-to-day of work and sleep and lottery tickets, of yoga challenges, of buying fruit and paying taxes, of mopping floors and taking drugs on weekends and reading books and wondering what to do on dates. It’s exhausting, as it always was, to live with such a breadth of things to take up one’s attention – exhausting, the way there can be too much world, even in its final stages. Exhausting, to be so busy and so bored with no time left for either.”
See what I mean about the writing – yes! It's the stuff about memory (like that first quote above) and family and sisterhood that jazzed me up the most. The gist of this story is that three sisters are left to deal with the death of their father. And the three sisters aren’t all too warm and fuzzy – with one another or with the reader. And good ole pop wasn’t exactly the poster boy for fatherhood either. That’s okay though. I didn’t mind that part. Family dynamics always intrigue me. Armfield alternates points of view between Irene, Isla and Agnes. Oh, even the City has a little voice interspersed here and there. I liked that quite a lot. There’s an underlying current of something eerie, and the rain adds to that feeling. I did like the interplay between distorted memory and distorted view due to that excess of water. Even the people seem to have transformed due to the constant deluge.
“Irene often feels she can detect a certain amphibious quality in the people with whom she shares transportation, shares offices, shares the ingrown cramp of city space.”
Throughout the entirety of the novel, I was expecting this to go somewhere and knock me for a loop. Instead, my kneejerk reaction at the end was “Oh, come on. Really?!” Well, I can’t tell you why. It might be just your thing, but it wasn’t mine. I was a bit relieved when it was all over. Enough of that rain! I happily basked in a small patch of sunlight that managed to creep through the picture window in the living room. It’s warming my back on this frigid, snowy day as I type this review, too. Read Our Wives Under the Sea if you want the perfect introduction to Julia Armfield!
Here are a few of my favorite quotes, because like I said, many of her sentences captivated me!
“How, she wondered, was one supposed to grieve an absence when that absence was familiar? What, she wondered, was grief without a clear departure to regret?”
“The first time you lose a parent, a part of you gets trapped there, trapped less in the moment of grief than in the knowledge of the end of childhood, the inevitable dwindling of the days.”
“Sisterhood, she thinks, is a trap. You all get stuck in certain roles forever.”
“The problem with love, of course, is that it frequently asks too much of unlovable people. It can be hard,on even the best of days, to compel oneself to be selfless and patient and undemanding or even halfway reasonable when one is not given to any of those behaviors. But these are nonetheless the qualities that love demands.”
“Love, it seems, is bizarre in its moment of realization, too blatant to speak aloud.”
“At what point, she wanted to say, do we stop being the direct product of our parents? At what point does it start being our fault?”
After falling head over heels for Armfield’s Our Wives Under the Sea a little while back, I was totally stoked for the release of this novel. I’m sorry to say, I feel a bit disappointed this time around. Maybe my expectations were too high, but I couldn’t quite muster up the same level of enthusiasm for it! As far as the prose, on a sentence level this was equally masterful. The story itself is what left me feeling kind of enervated. A bit limp. Maybe it was all that rain and dreariness that did it. After all, the book is set during a dystopian world where rain dominates everything.
“It rains constantly and the fact of the rain, of the rain’s whole great impending somethingness, runs parallel to the day-to-day of work and sleep and lottery tickets, of yoga challenges, of buying fruit and paying taxes, of mopping floors and taking drugs on weekends and reading books and wondering what to do on dates. It’s exhausting, as it always was, to live with such a breadth of things to take up one’s attention – exhausting, the way there can be too much world, even in its final stages. Exhausting, to be so busy and so bored with no time left for either.”
See what I mean about the writing – yes! It's the stuff about memory (like that first quote above) and family and sisterhood that jazzed me up the most. The gist of this story is that three sisters are left to deal with the death of their father. And the three sisters aren’t all too warm and fuzzy – with one another or with the reader. And good ole pop wasn’t exactly the poster boy for fatherhood either. That’s okay though. I didn’t mind that part. Family dynamics always intrigue me. Armfield alternates points of view between Irene, Isla and Agnes. Oh, even the City has a little voice interspersed here and there. I liked that quite a lot. There’s an underlying current of something eerie, and the rain adds to that feeling. I did like the interplay between distorted memory and distorted view due to that excess of water. Even the people seem to have transformed due to the constant deluge.
“Irene often feels she can detect a certain amphibious quality in the people with whom she shares transportation, shares offices, shares the ingrown cramp of city space.”
Throughout the entirety of the novel, I was expecting this to go somewhere and knock me for a loop. Instead, my kneejerk reaction at the end was “Oh, come on. Really?!” Well, I can’t tell you why. It might be just your thing, but it wasn’t mine. I was a bit relieved when it was all over. Enough of that rain! I happily basked in a small patch of sunlight that managed to creep through the picture window in the living room. It’s warming my back on this frigid, snowy day as I type this review, too. Read Our Wives Under the Sea if you want the perfect introduction to Julia Armfield!
Here are a few of my favorite quotes, because like I said, many of her sentences captivated me!
“How, she wondered, was one supposed to grieve an absence when that absence was familiar? What, she wondered, was grief without a clear departure to regret?”
“The first time you lose a parent, a part of you gets trapped there, trapped less in the moment of grief than in the knowledge of the end of childhood, the inevitable dwindling of the days.”
“Sisterhood, she thinks, is a trap. You all get stuck in certain roles forever.”
“The problem with love, of course, is that it frequently asks too much of unlovable people. It can be hard,on even the best of days, to compel oneself to be selfless and patient and undemanding or even halfway reasonable when one is not given to any of those behaviors. But these are nonetheless the qualities that love demands.”
“Love, it seems, is bizarre in its moment of realization, too blatant to speak aloud.”
“At what point, she wanted to say, do we stop being the direct product of our parents? At what point does it start being our fault?”
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January 23, 2025A total heartbreaker, what a privilege to still be able to eat eggs and feel the sun and do laundry and swim. I know the end is coming and this made it feel closer :(
October 8, 2023
Fucking get in! Julia Armfield is cemented as one of the best contemporary writers with this brilliant follow up to Salt Slow and Our Wives. More misery, more sex, more water - if somehow there are better books in 2024, it’ll be a mad year.
November 10, 2024
"It is an accepted belief that things fall apart. The question of whether or not the falling apart is necessary is separate and usually secondary. People still discuss this, of course: the fact of the turn, the moment a warning mutated into the only possible outcome."
Isla, Irene and Agnes Carmicheal are three somewhat estranged, or at least not close, sisters leading separate lives as adults in a dying city. All three are still holding onto old wounds and resentments inflicted during their childhoods under their cold and cruel father, a celebrated architect whose work helped the wealthy literally rise above a world reeling from environmental catastrophe. Upon the death of the Carmichael patriarch, the sisters are forced to face each other and finally confront old mysteries and traumas, as well as the crumbling reality of the world around them.
The dystopian elements are in evidence from the first pages of Private Rites but in the beginning, the unfolding family dynamics and the lives of the three Carmichael sisters seemed to take center stage. I think many people might say this isn't really a horror book. But as the story progresses, the literal end of the world as we know it moves to the forefront and becomes the central focus of the novel. Honestly, dystopian isn't a sub-genre of horror I generally like, but it really worked for me here and actually unsettled me because the end of times as Armfield presents it is so...familiar, certainly plausible. If we're being honest, actually probable and perhaps not too far away.
And the horror really picks up as the end of the book nears, particularly the final 30 pages or so. I found the ending very satisfying.
Armfield's writing, as usual, is exceptionally beautiful throughout this bleak book. Water seems to be her motif of choice, and I love it. Her characters are complex but also seem detached in a certain sense, in the case of Private Rites both from each other and the world around them. I think what will stay with me the most from this book, though, is the depiction of what remains of life in a crumbling society finally reckoning with its own demise. The book is told from the POVs of all three Carmichael sisters, but I think it is the sections related from the POV "City" that will stay with me the longest.
"Disaster movies, after all, come complete with pending resolution: the dash up the hill to avoid the falling rubble, the turning tide, the core of the slowing earth ignited at the cost of six courageous lives...The rescue is the point, or at least the idea that reversal is still imminent. There is little the imagination can do with an ending that is already assured."
Scary stuff, if you ask me.
Isla, Irene and Agnes Carmicheal are three somewhat estranged, or at least not close, sisters leading separate lives as adults in a dying city. All three are still holding onto old wounds and resentments inflicted during their childhoods under their cold and cruel father, a celebrated architect whose work helped the wealthy literally rise above a world reeling from environmental catastrophe. Upon the death of the Carmichael patriarch, the sisters are forced to face each other and finally confront old mysteries and traumas, as well as the crumbling reality of the world around them.
The dystopian elements are in evidence from the first pages of Private Rites but in the beginning, the unfolding family dynamics and the lives of the three Carmichael sisters seemed to take center stage. I think many people might say this isn't really a horror book. But as the story progresses, the literal end of the world as we know it moves to the forefront and becomes the central focus of the novel. Honestly, dystopian isn't a sub-genre of horror I generally like, but it really worked for me here and actually unsettled me because the end of times as Armfield presents it is so...familiar, certainly plausible. If we're being honest, actually probable and perhaps not too far away.
And the horror really picks up as the end of the book nears, particularly the final 30 pages or so. I found the ending very satisfying.
Armfield's writing, as usual, is exceptionally beautiful throughout this bleak book. Water seems to be her motif of choice, and I love it. Her characters are complex but also seem detached in a certain sense, in the case of Private Rites both from each other and the world around them. I think what will stay with me the most from this book, though, is the depiction of what remains of life in a crumbling society finally reckoning with its own demise. The book is told from the POVs of all three Carmichael sisters, but I think it is the sections related from the POV "City" that will stay with me the longest.
"Disaster movies, after all, come complete with pending resolution: the dash up the hill to avoid the falling rubble, the turning tide, the core of the slowing earth ignited at the cost of six courageous lives...The rescue is the point, or at least the idea that reversal is still imminent. There is little the imagination can do with an ending that is already assured."
Scary stuff, if you ask me.
January 8, 2025
3.5/5 stars. What the fuck just happened??
December 4, 2024
"Isla had picked at the cuticle of her thumb with her ring finger and nodded dumbly along with this, tried to remember the sequence of a poem she’d wanted to quote to a patient earlier in the week, about Old Masters and suffering: how it takes place while someone else is eating or opening a window or just walking dully along. The point, of course, being the whole bright dailiness of agony, the way Icarus in the Bruegel painting could crash to earth as little but a background detail while the bland spool of life went on in the foreground; the ploughman at his plough and the fabric of the day untouched, uninterrupted."
Private Rites is, to me, a novel about the question of the everyday within the disastrous. That is, how do we continue to live our everyday lives while in the midst of an ongoing disaster? How can something that is catastrophic, life-altering on a global scale, become subsumed into, or sit alongside, everyday life?
Wherever you are in Private Rites, you are, just like the characters, forced to reckon with the inexorable, immovable, undeniable reality of its central disaster: it will not stop raining. There is rain everywhere, water everywhere, whole cities flooded, their infrastructure long gone. This is the world the characters of the novel must live in, and what makes the novel so compelling, I think, is that simple fact: that they need to continue to live in it, despite the fact that it is slowly becoming uninhabitable. I think sometimes the tendency with these dystopian settings is to Provide Commentary on a disaster, to explain it by pointing to any number of factors (Capitalism, Technology, Oligarchy, etc.), but it can be so much harder to just have your characters live in it, to suffer its daily degradations and deprivations--to experience, day by day, the gradual worsening of an already bad situation, and to have to live through it anyway, because what other choice is there? Despite everything, there is still an everyday to be gotten through: groceries, jobs, commutes, meals, family. (Though--and the novel is very aware of this--the characters are very privileged to even have this semblance of an everyday life.)
But as much as Private Rites is a climate disaster novel, it's also very much a family drama novel. We have three sisters--Isla, Irene, and Agnes--and an abusive father who, we find out on page one, has just died. From there, the sisters are forced to come together and reckon with how their father's abuse has affected--and continues to affect--not just their own selves, but also their fraught relationships with each other. There are, of course, the material realities of the novel's climate disaster, but I think water is, in a way, also an apt motif for a book whose characters have absorbed these ways of being from their childhoods--been steeped in that abuse such that now, as adults, its traumatic aftereffects seep into their adult lives and relationships. And seep they do: Armfield doesn't give us any big flashbacks to illuminate this past, but rather flashes of memory that constantly intrude on the sisters when they're alone and together. We don't get the full picture, but we get bits and pieces of it, and the effect is all the more powerful for this restraint.
Climate disaster + childhood trauma--Private Rites seems maybe like an unrelentingly bleak novel, but it's really not. It's not an upbeat novel by any means, but despite the bleak circumstances, it never feels one-note. The characters are fleshed out, shown to us in both their worst and most vulnerable moments; and even as the novel's climate disaster rages on, its characters still manage to have faith, even if just a little, in something--be it a person, a relationship, an act, a belief.
Private Rites is definitely (and unexpectedly) one of my favourite reads of the year, and such a different novel from Armfield's debut: longer, more ambitious, and, I think, ultimately more satisfying.
(thank you to 4th estate for the eARC!)
June 30, 2024
Private Rites follows the story of three queer sisters after their father's death, a strange architect who helped re-shape the world after constant rains started eroding geography. In what I assume (having read her debut Our Wives Under the Sea) is her signature style of beautiful prose, a focus on character study and water as a literary motif Armfield delicately handles themes such as estrangement, coping with grief and the complexity of family dynamics, especially between siblings.
As a background for her characters, who are all quite distanced, not very likable and really complex, the author chose an interesting setting – a quasi apocalyptic world about to go under water, about to drown. An apt analogy for the three sisters', or their whole family's, state, described in little interlude-chapters titled “City”.
The horror, the disturbing in this story is nothing explicit, it merely creeps in and out of the maybe a little monotonous story, but not being able to hide at the very harrowing ending, plops out of the water.
I can't say the ending makes up for the lengthy but gorgeous writing from the point of view of a horror enthusiast, it probably does not to the extend this was the case in her previous book, where the foreboding, the uncanny was much more present and resulted in a horrific explosion. This was similar but different. Still, for the reader who can put those expectations aside, a very worthwhile read nevertheless.
As a background for her characters, who are all quite distanced, not very likable and really complex, the author chose an interesting setting – a quasi apocalyptic world about to go under water, about to drown. An apt analogy for the three sisters', or their whole family's, state, described in little interlude-chapters titled “City”.
The horror, the disturbing in this story is nothing explicit, it merely creeps in and out of the maybe a little monotonous story, but not being able to hide at the very harrowing ending, plops out of the water.
I can't say the ending makes up for the lengthy but gorgeous writing from the point of view of a horror enthusiast, it probably does not to the extend this was the case in her previous book, where the foreboding, the uncanny was much more present and resulted in a horrific explosion. This was similar but different. Still, for the reader who can put those expectations aside, a very worthwhile read nevertheless.
February 12, 2025
A quiet family drama plays out against a backdrop of a climate apocalypse. When Isla finds out her father, a renowned architect, has died, she’s not exactly devastated. He was a cold and mostly unloving man. But his death profoundly changes her life. It forces her to reconnect with her sisters, neither of whom she’s close to…and there are big surprises in his will. Meanwhile, the earth is slowly being devoured by floodwaters, and Isla, a therapist, must help her clients cope with the destruction of the planet.
I absolutely loved this book. What struck me the most was how very real the reactions to the climate catastrophe felt. Despite entire neighborhoods now being underwater, life goes on. People fight with their families, watch boring TV and commute to work (although now many do so by boat). The rich retreat to palatial apartments high in the sky, while other people run away to cult-like communes on higher ground. Some turn to ancient and archaic forms of religion, performing exorcisms and sacrifices. I love that all of this plays out as a backdrop behind what is at its heart a very quiet story about a family.
The ending was absolutely bonkers and will for sure be polarizing but I was 100% here for it. I’m going to be thinking about this book for a very long time.
I absolutely loved this book. What struck me the most was how very real the reactions to the climate catastrophe felt. Despite entire neighborhoods now being underwater, life goes on. People fight with their families, watch boring TV and commute to work (although now many do so by boat). The rich retreat to palatial apartments high in the sky, while other people run away to cult-like communes on higher ground. Some turn to ancient and archaic forms of religion, performing exorcisms and sacrifices. I love that all of this plays out as a backdrop behind what is at its heart a very quiet story about a family.
The ending was absolutely bonkers and will for sure be polarizing but I was 100% here for it. I’m going to be thinking about this book for a very long time.
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January 26, 2025That's one hell of an ending. 😯
"There was dry land, once, and also the concept of drowning as emergency, a thing to be thrashed against."
After their architect father's passing, estranged sisters Isla, Irene, and Agnes gather in his most famous creation: a grand glass house capable of adjusting its height to remain standing in a world imperiled by rising waters.
With a deft hand, Armfield portrays the battered and blistered relationships of three sisters whose father was a cruel, scorching sun. With derisive and hurtful comments, he cut them down and spoiled their chances of ever being close. And even after his passing, his legacy of division continues, exacerbated by a shocking revelation in his will.
Private Rites suggests that siblings raised by an abusive father sometimes sacrifice each other on the altar of survival (in my experience, this is true). The characters are flawed and human, the setting is damp, and the plot is as slow and unyielding as an endless, endless rain.
On a line by line level, this is exceptional writing, but the story left me wanting more. Armfield introduces so many alluring elements—ceaseless rain and flooding, a sparkling glass house, whispers of a cult—that she ultimately does very little with.
Reading Private Rites is like watching The Usual Suspects; the story plods along slowly—uneventful, unmoving—until BAM! a prize-worthy final chapter brings the novel to an explosive conclusion (one I suspect I'll be thinking about for a long time to come).
Would recommend to fans of quiet literary fiction that explore dysfunctional family relationships.
"There was dry land, once, and also the concept of drowning as emergency, a thing to be thrashed against."
After their architect father's passing, estranged sisters Isla, Irene, and Agnes gather in his most famous creation: a grand glass house capable of adjusting its height to remain standing in a world imperiled by rising waters.
With a deft hand, Armfield portrays the battered and blistered relationships of three sisters whose father was a cruel, scorching sun. With derisive and hurtful comments, he cut them down and spoiled their chances of ever being close. And even after his passing, his legacy of division continues, exacerbated by a shocking revelation in his will.
Private Rites suggests that siblings raised by an abusive father sometimes sacrifice each other on the altar of survival (in my experience, this is true). The characters are flawed and human, the setting is damp, and the plot is as slow and unyielding as an endless, endless rain.
On a line by line level, this is exceptional writing, but the story left me wanting more. Armfield introduces so many alluring elements—ceaseless rain and flooding, a sparkling glass house, whispers of a cult—that she ultimately does very little with.
Reading Private Rites is like watching The Usual Suspects; the story plods along slowly—uneventful, unmoving—until BAM! a prize-worthy final chapter brings the novel to an explosive conclusion (one I suspect I'll be thinking about for a long time to come).
Would recommend to fans of quiet literary fiction that explore dysfunctional family relationships.
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June 15, 2024Following the enormous success of her debut novel, Our Wives Under the Sea, Julia Armfield's Private Rites is a more subtle and literary affair, yet one that is also far larger in scope. This is an apocalypse novel set in a Britain that has been flooded by rising sea levels and endless rainfall. Yet, unlike many apocalypse stories, this one depicts a slow, almost dull collapse, and there is something so chilling and bleak in that.
Capitalism remains; people still commute and work their day jobs, only they must do so with difficulty. Everything is too expensive now, and travel is almost impossible. Our protagonists are three queer sisters from a King Lear-inspired family. Their father—an architect who designed homes that can adapt to the changing climate—has died, and that death forces these near-estranged sisters back together.
Family drama meets apocalyptic tale, Private Rites is a deeply bleak tale that settles into your bones. Written with heft and poetic consideration, it is a novel that will surely be studied in the future.
My full thoughts: https://booksandbao.com/essential-lit...
Capitalism remains; people still commute and work their day jobs, only they must do so with difficulty. Everything is too expensive now, and travel is almost impossible. Our protagonists are three queer sisters from a King Lear-inspired family. Their father—an architect who designed homes that can adapt to the changing climate—has died, and that death forces these near-estranged sisters back together.
Family drama meets apocalyptic tale, Private Rites is a deeply bleak tale that settles into your bones. Written with heft and poetic consideration, it is a novel that will surely be studied in the future.
My full thoughts: https://booksandbao.com/essential-lit...
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November 8, 2024At the end of the prologue I had no mental image whatsoever of the scene I'd just read. A doll on a staircase, maybe. A child in bed with the covers over her head, maybe. In between those flashes of maybe-things-that-happened, something violent might have happened. But what it was, I have no idea. Did a woman upchuck another woman, maybe? Did a woman give birth through her mouth? Or something? I girded my metaphorical loins and read on intrepidly. I told myself it would probably come clear soon enough. The feeling of having no idea what was going on, I mean, really no idea, I'm not exaggerating on this point, believe me, never went away. I'd get to the end of a scene or a segment and I'd ask myself: what just happened? and then I'd answer myself "wow, uh, you got me." I persevered because in a way I enjoyed that baffled feeling, that "huh, what just happened" feeling. It never got clearer. I came to the end.
June 13, 2024
Dysfunctional sibling relationships residing in the messy liminal space of hate and love.
I loved Our Wives Under the Sea by this author so maybe my expectations for this new book of hers was too high, but anyways, Private Rites follows three sisters in the panopticon of an eroding, dystopian-esque environment. Society and the climate is at the precipice of decay, though most of its denizens seem to be in denial. The sisters have a stale relationship which has to be awkwardly confronted after their father’s death, bringing them to his house (which emanates unease). Familial dysfunction and navigating the dynamic complexity of relationships is at the forefront of this novel.
There’s a sense of urgency about the climate and the restless discomfort of capitalist existence that the melancholic, melodious fervour of Armfield’s writing reflects really well. There was depth in the sisters’ interactions, but the sisters individually didn’t feel well-rounded to me in their POVs.
The story lacked forward momentum for me, because I was somehow bereft of the desire to unveil the layers of this dysfunctional familial dynamic even though that should have been intriguing in theory. The themes around sisterhood and maladjusted families are not ones I personally care for, so those who love exploring complex family dynamics in its entire messy breadth would probably have a blast with this.
The pacing was somewhat uneven with buildup to the ending that seemed staccato, which felt like a wall between my ability to feel fully immersed in the rhythm of Armfield’s writing.
So this was a miss for me, but I’d happily recommend this to those who love exploring messy family dynamics (particularly those between siblings), well-rounded queer representation, and eerie atmospheres that have a sense of malaise.
Rating: 2 stars
I loved Our Wives Under the Sea by this author so maybe my expectations for this new book of hers was too high, but anyways, Private Rites follows three sisters in the panopticon of an eroding, dystopian-esque environment. Society and the climate is at the precipice of decay, though most of its denizens seem to be in denial. The sisters have a stale relationship which has to be awkwardly confronted after their father’s death, bringing them to his house (which emanates unease). Familial dysfunction and navigating the dynamic complexity of relationships is at the forefront of this novel.
There’s a sense of urgency about the climate and the restless discomfort of capitalist existence that the melancholic, melodious fervour of Armfield’s writing reflects really well. There was depth in the sisters’ interactions, but the sisters individually didn’t feel well-rounded to me in their POVs.
The story lacked forward momentum for me, because I was somehow bereft of the desire to unveil the layers of this dysfunctional familial dynamic even though that should have been intriguing in theory. The themes around sisterhood and maladjusted families are not ones I personally care for, so those who love exploring complex family dynamics in its entire messy breadth would probably have a blast with this.
The pacing was somewhat uneven with buildup to the ending that seemed staccato, which felt like a wall between my ability to feel fully immersed in the rhythm of Armfield’s writing.
So this was a miss for me, but I’d happily recommend this to those who love exploring messy family dynamics (particularly those between siblings), well-rounded queer representation, and eerie atmospheres that have a sense of malaise.
Rating: 2 stars
September 17, 2024
2.5. Thank you to Netgalley and the publishers for a copy of this book.
This is the first book by Julia Armfield that I've read. I requested an ARC because of all the glowing pre reviews on Goodreads and everyone's excitement about this future release. However, it was not what I was expecting. Although this is a well written novel, it didn't entertain me.
This is the first book by Julia Armfield that I've read. I requested an ARC because of all the glowing pre reviews on Goodreads and everyone's excitement about this future release. However, it was not what I was expecting. Although this is a well written novel, it didn't entertain me.
August 4, 2024
In one word, this book was unnecessary. In two words, it was largely disappointing.
In many more words: I was greatly looking forward to this book after loving Our Wives Under the Sea. I enjoyed Armfield’s writing and the slow sense of literary horror she created around a solid central metaphor. Here, however, she wrote a book that was a slow sense of… nothing. There was only a weak semblance at a plot, with very little tension aside from the final 10 pages. I found myself uncaring about any of the characters or their relationships, even barely being able to finish this book. I’m left at the end of Private Rites with apathy and frustration at the time I wasted.
In many more words: I was greatly looking forward to this book after loving Our Wives Under the Sea. I enjoyed Armfield’s writing and the slow sense of literary horror she created around a solid central metaphor. Here, however, she wrote a book that was a slow sense of… nothing. There was only a weak semblance at a plot, with very little tension aside from the final 10 pages. I found myself uncaring about any of the characters or their relationships, even barely being able to finish this book. I’m left at the end of Private Rites with apathy and frustration at the time I wasted.
February 21, 2025
3.75 no one loves and fears water the way julia armfield loves and fears water
certainly her weakest work but still enjoyable. i think she was trying way too hard to find her authorial voice and there were some very overused quirks in the writing that absolutely grated on me.
it was slow for sure but i felt really compelled by it. quite dense language and little to no plot but intriguing and frustrating characters and dynamics that kept me moving through it
certainly her weakest work but still enjoyable. i think she was trying way too hard to find her authorial voice and there were some very overused quirks in the writing that absolutely grated on me.
it was slow for sure but i felt really compelled by it. quite dense language and little to no plot but intriguing and frustrating characters and dynamics that kept me moving through it
December 17, 2024
I was SO incredibly happy to receive an ARC of this from Armfield and her publishing team after reading Our Wives Under the Sea! I’m happy to report that it exceeded how much I loved her last book!
The fact that this was better than Our Wives Under the Sea is a feat in itself. I enjoy stories that make me think, resonate long after and give an in depth exploration of certain types of relationships. In the case of Private Rites - the exploration of sisterhood was absolute perfection. It’s hard to even put into words how good this was because I was greedily slurping every page down and trying desperately to find a way to understand and make it all right.
I really don’t want to spoil it but it’s a must read! If you like semi-apocalyptic tales and explorations of sisterhood, you’ll love Armfields latest!
**Thank you to Flatiron Books for the advanced reader copy. I received this book for free, but all thoughts are my own. – SLR 🖤
Follow me on Instagram for honest reviews! 🦋
The fact that this was better than Our Wives Under the Sea is a feat in itself. I enjoy stories that make me think, resonate long after and give an in depth exploration of certain types of relationships. In the case of Private Rites - the exploration of sisterhood was absolute perfection. It’s hard to even put into words how good this was because I was greedily slurping every page down and trying desperately to find a way to understand and make it all right.
I really don’t want to spoil it but it’s a must read! If you like semi-apocalyptic tales and explorations of sisterhood, you’ll love Armfields latest!
**Thank you to Flatiron Books for the advanced reader copy. I received this book for free, but all thoughts are my own. – SLR 🖤
Follow me on Instagram for honest reviews! 🦋
January 9, 2025
Julia Armfield is the queen of unsettling wet lit fic and I can’t get enough.
Read if you’re looking for/enjoy:
- beautiful & clever prose that will gut punch you
- apocalyptic
- sister dynamics/relationships
- wet, rainy, stormy, atmospheric
- a sloooow burn
- queer
- ambiguous ending
Read if you’re looking for/enjoy:
- beautiful & clever prose that will gut punch you
- apocalyptic
- sister dynamics/relationships
- wet, rainy, stormy, atmospheric
- a sloooow burn
- queer
- ambiguous ending
June 13, 2024
I adore Julia Armfield’s writing style and her writing was just as incredible in Private Rites. I enjoyed the reading experience and spending time with the characters, and I loved the ending. It has stuck with me.
However, I do feel the blurb miss-sells the book to be something a bit different to what it is. The unsettling vibes that Julia Armfield is an absolute master of, don’t really come into play until towards the end of the book and I was really hoping more of that would seep in throughout the entire story.
I would still 100% recommend Private Rites but just don’t expect the same vibe as our wives under the sea.
January 19, 2025
3 things to consider while reading my review:
1) this is my first from Armfield
2) I'm discovering I'm much more of a litfic girlie than general fic
3) my family experienced a loss recently that caused a similar inheritance-related riff, this could have tempered some of the novel's power for me
Since I was provided with an ALC I'll start with our narrator, Hannah van der Westhuysen. Hers is a name I'm always happy to see when choosing audiobooks. Her accent is so enjoyable, and I'm still able to understand what's being said at 2x speed. That isn't usually the case with accents I'm not hearing daily (so, anything other than plain 'ol Midwestern American. I know, smh). Not only would I recommend Private Rites narrated by her, but anything else you're interested in reading that she's lent her voice to.
Private Rites itself... felt lackluster. Good? Yes. But there wasn't anything that stood out to me as profound.
The way Julia explored grief and the difficulty coming to terms with losing someone who, on the surface, doesn't feel like much of a loss. It's above my paygrade, but I'm going to venture to that say the girls are emotionally abused throughout their childhoods. While the hands doling out the punishment and the methods of carrying out said abuse varies, all 3 daughters are left to grapple with who their parents really are - and have been their entire lives. Once such a polarizing member of their families is no longer a viable option for scapegoat, the stories they've been told - and told themselves - must be reconsidered before/while moving forward.
My biggest problem with Private Rites was the ending, it just...didn't fit. I don't know how else to put it. Too haphazard? Too abrupt? I don't even know. I love the themes here and the variance of perspective brought to them, but this isn't something I'd read again.
Salt Slow & Our Wives Under The Sea are on my physical TBR shelf, so wish me better luck w those, plz!
{Thank you bunches to NetGalley, Julia Armfield, Hannah van der Westhuysen, Macmillan Audio and Flatiron books for the ALC in exchange for my honest review!}
1) this is my first from Armfield
2) I'm discovering I'm much more of a litfic girlie than general fic
3) my family experienced a loss recently that caused a similar inheritance-related riff, this could have tempered some of the novel's power for me
Since I was provided with an ALC I'll start with our narrator, Hannah van der Westhuysen. Hers is a name I'm always happy to see when choosing audiobooks. Her accent is so enjoyable, and I'm still able to understand what's being said at 2x speed. That isn't usually the case with accents I'm not hearing daily (so, anything other than plain 'ol Midwestern American. I know, smh). Not only would I recommend Private Rites narrated by her, but anything else you're interested in reading that she's lent her voice to.
Private Rites itself... felt lackluster. Good? Yes. But there wasn't anything that stood out to me as profound.
The way Julia explored grief and the difficulty coming to terms with losing someone who, on the surface, doesn't feel like much of a loss. It's above my paygrade, but I'm going to venture to that say the girls are emotionally abused throughout their childhoods. While the hands doling out the punishment and the methods of carrying out said abuse varies, all 3 daughters are left to grapple with who their parents really are - and have been their entire lives. Once such a polarizing member of their families is no longer a viable option for scapegoat, the stories they've been told - and told themselves - must be reconsidered before/while moving forward.
My biggest problem with Private Rites was the ending, it just...didn't fit. I don't know how else to put it. Too haphazard? Too abrupt? I don't even know. I love the themes here and the variance of perspective brought to them, but this isn't something I'd read again.
Salt Slow & Our Wives Under The Sea are on my physical TBR shelf, so wish me better luck w those, plz!
{Thank you bunches to NetGalley, Julia Armfield, Hannah van der Westhuysen, Macmillan Audio and Flatiron books for the ALC in exchange for my honest review!}
June 28, 2024
I was so engrossed in the story of Private Rites that I read it in under 24 hours, barely pausing for breaks. I adored every single aspect of this book, and it pretty much immediately became a new favourite as soon as I finished! Although it is set against the backdrop of a climate catastrophe signalling the end of the world, the apocalyptic setting is diminished, becoming a mundane triviality rather than a disaster of utmost urgency, which I found to be a highly intriguing and unique twist on the dystopian and speculative genres. Instead, the conflict between the characters, three sisters navigating the death of their father amid a slow burning crisis, takes centre stage, and I utterly adored the explorations of grief, as well as the themes of queerness and desire that are interwoven throughout the narrative in such a detailed and nuanced way. Armfield excels at creating a melancholic tone through her vivid descriptions of the endless rain seeping through and pervading every aspect of life, conjuring an atmosphere of quiet but unsettling tragedy. Furthermore, I found her depictions of everyday life fascinating as, with the central three characters dealing with relationships colleagues, flatmates and family at work and home, she presents a world that, despite the vastly different situations, is not so different from our own.
I would highly recommend this book, and I would be very keen to read anything Julia Armfield writes in the future.
Thank you to NetGalley and the publisher for the early review copy!
I would highly recommend this book, and I would be very keen to read anything Julia Armfield writes in the future.
Thank you to NetGalley and the publisher for the early review copy!
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