THE DOLL FACTORY

By Elizabeth Macneal

When a book refuses to shy away from squalor and brutality while venerating the passionate and beautiful, it is always a memorable experience — “The Crimson Petal and the White,” by Michel Faber; “The Poisonwood Bible,” by Barbara Kingsolver; “Fingersmith,” by Sarah Waters. Joining this list of haunting novels is Elizabeth Macneal’s unapologetically lush debut, “The Doll Factory,” which will doubtless prove as much of an obsession for its readers as the art model Iris Whittle is to the men around her.



The entrancing Iris and her smallpox-disfigured twin sister, Rose, toil endlessly at painting the faces of dolls aping real children from daguerreotypes (guessing whether these children are dead or alive is one of the few games to brighten their day’s drudgery). Iris yearns to make her own way as a painter and is fast losing hope when an artist named Louis Frost begs her to become his new muse.

Iris accepts, but only after Louis agrees to tutor her. As she learns her craft — and the secrets held by her dashing new instructor — Iris imagines her life could be one of ardor and fulfillment. But when a curiosity collector named Silas Reed forms a sinister attachment to her, Iris is faced with dangers beyond the scope of her nightmares.

Silas, a taxidermist, resembles Jean-Baptiste Grenouille, the perfumer from Patrick Süskind’s 1986 novel “Perfume: The Story of a Murderer.” Both men are sadistic erotomaniacs; both are also isolated artistes who crave worship while detesting their worshipers. Jean-Baptiste comes to understand his own abhorrence of humankind only after he has fooled an entire town into performing a literal orgy of adoration for him.