The Night Watch

The Night Watch is a dark, 2006 historical fiction novel by Sarah Waters. It was shortlisted for both the 2006 Man Booker Prize and the 2006 Orange Prize. The novel, which is told backward through third-person narrative, takes place in 1940s London during and after World War II. The storyline follows the fragmented lives and the strange interconnections between Kay, Helen and Julia, three lesbians; Viv, a straight woman; and Duncan, her brother, whose sexuality is ambiguous. The war, with its never-ending night watches, serves as a horrifying backdrop and metaphor of the morbidity that surrounds life and love. Plot summary The novel begins in 1947 with Kay Langrish, a woman broken by the war. She spends her days locked in her room in London, her only human contact being with another lesbian, Mickey. One night, Viv appears and hands Kay a gold ring. Viv works as an assistant to Helen, who runs a match-making agency near Bond Street. When Helen's girlfriend Julia doesn't come home one night, Helen is overcome with worry and jealousy. After work, Viv has dinner with her brother Duncan and Duncan's roommate, an older gentleman named Mr Mundy. Helen and Viv receive an unexpected visit from Robert Fraser, Duncan’s old cellmate. Viv dismisses Fraser, feeling as though he thinks she and her father haven’t done enough to help Duncan’s situation and explains that he simply doesn’t know everything.