The Essex serpent (by Sarah Perry)

(Amazon UK link)

As is so often the case when starting a book for our local reading group, I had not heard of either the author or the title. Sarah Perry is a British writer who has had four books published so far. ‘The Essex serpent’ was her second novel, published in 2006.

It opens with rather a depressing prologue, following a young unnamed man going for a walk next to a river on New Year’s Eve. It doesn’t spell out what happens, but it’s clearly not something positive. We don’t learn more about this incident until later in the book.

The novel takes place over the course of the following year, and is set in Victorian England, towards the end of the 19th century. The main character is a woman called Cora whose husband has just died. She is somewhat sad, but also feels free at last; it’s evident that he was seriously abusive, though, thankfully, there are no gratuitous details. Cora is rather a strange character, possibly because she was married at a young age, and never really had the opportunity of developing her own style and personality.

Cora has a son, Frankie, who seems to be autistic although it’s not overtly stated. He doesn’t really interact with people, and has a lot of collections which he likes to count. He’s educated and looked after by Martha, who is Cora’s closest friend. 

And they move to Essex, to get out of London, where they meet other characters and learn about the legend of the Essex serpent. Descriptions are rather vague, but almost everyone in the village believes that there’s a dangerous monster, which is responsible for anything that goes wrong. Cora, who is interested in fossils and dinosaurs, wonders if this could be a living dinosaur. 

One of the people she meets and eventually befriends is a minister called Will, who has a frail wife and three children. I liked Will very much. He cares deeply for the people in his parish, and is also still in love with his wife, and good with his children. He and Cora have quite a few intellectual discussions about the nature of God, the age of the earth and more. He’s quite open-minded, and doesn’t criticise or shame her for being an agnostic with no interest in his faith. 

It’s essentially character-based, with the Essex serpent beliefs and apparent sightings alongside. There’s a lot of description, beautifully written, but rather too much for my tastes so I mostly skipped it. Those who know the area would probably enjoy it more. It’s quite a long book with over 400 pages, and I felt it rather dragged in places. I read it over just four days, which is probably a good thing as there are a lot of other characters and it wasn’t always easy remembering who was whom.

There are some thought-provoking themes, including the plight of the poorest Londoners, living in squalid circumstances with landlords regularly increasing the rent. There’s some political discussion, and some interesting medical scenes; I hadn’t realised that bacteria were identified and seen under microscopes a couple of centuries before this novel was set. 

The author seems to have done her research extremely well, and there’s some useful social history and background into the era. I’m not sure if the conversation was entirely authentic, however. The people feel real, if a tad caricatured at times, but their dialogue feels rather too modern. It doesn’t grate, exactly, but made me forget, at times, that it’s set a hundred and thirty years ago. 

Overall I found it quite an interesting read, but I never really related to Cora. I felt sorry for her at first, after what was evidently a most unpleasant marriage. But she’s essentially very self-centred. She doesn’t really relate to her son, or even try to do so. She speaks her mind, which can be a good trait, but she doesn’t think about when she might hurt someone badly. She doesn’t care at all what people think of her, and she expects them to do what she wants. 

Recommended in a low-key way if you like books set in this era. It's highly thought of and well-reviewed by critics. It has also, apparently been made into a TV series. However, it’s not a book I’m likely to read again.

Review copyright 2026 Sue's Book Reviews