The Cloisters by Katy Hays

 

The Cloisters

by Katy Hays

Perhaps the time has come to recognise “dark academia” not just as an “aesthetic”, but also as a specific literary sub-genre of the Gothic, with its own distinctive themes and tropes. This might spare us having Gothic works featuring academics continually compared to Donna Tartt’s iconic The Secret History, a comparison which tends to create heightened expectations and, frankly, is no longer very helpful when the market now has so much to offer in terms of Tartt-like books.

This mini-rant has been occasioned by my recent reading of The Cloisters by Katy Hays, a debut novel described in the blurb as “The Secret History meets Ninth House”.  The truth is that I found this a satisfying and atmospheric novel, which can hold its own without using these invocations of other novels as a prop. Its protagonist and narrator is Ann Stilwell, a Renaissance scholar from a provincial college, who arrives in New York City eager to make her mark as a curatorial associate at the Metropolitan Museum of Art. It seems she’s in for a massive disappointment, as the place is no longer available for her. However, she is unexpectedly snapped up by Patrick Roland, the curator of The Cloisters, a museum and garden which incorporates Gothic cloisters dismantled from Europe and rebuilt around herb gardens overlooking the Hudson River. Patrick and his glamorous research assistant Rachel are studying the history of tarot and the use of cards in divination in early Renaissance Italy. It quickly becomes evident that the “research” is not purely academic, but also involves actual dabbling in occultism using antique tarot decks.  Ann is quickly drawn into this dark, elite, esoteric world. And like Fox Mulder in X-Files, she might have her own reasons for “wanting to believe”.  After a murder at The Cloisters in which she is a potential suspect, Ann must navigate dangerous territory, seeking academic success while trying to save her skin and her reputation.

The Cloisters is an atmospheric read and, although some readers have criticized it as rather slow-moving, I actually found its mix of mystery and “occult thriller” quite gripping.  Yes, The Secret History does come to mind, but so do, for instance, some of the “supernatural mystery” novels of Arturo Perez-Reverte.  There is also a coming-of-age vibe in this story of a withdrawn student from the “backwaters” trying to make it big in the city.  One sometimes needs to suspend disbelief – and, ironically, here I’m not referring to the more supernatural aspects of the novel but more to the triangular relationship which develops between Ann, Rachel and Patricki which, for some reason, did not particularly convince me.  Yet this is a small quibble, and The Cloisters was a really enjoyable debut.

 

320 pages, Kindle Edition

Expected publication November 1, 2022 by Transworld Digital, Random House, Bantam Press