Review: Remarkable Creatures by Tracy Chevalier

Have you noticed how children like to chat to you when you’re standing at the kitchen sink up to your elbows in bubbles? This was one of those intimate occasions when I was audience and confidante.

My granddaughter asked me if  I knew about a little girl called Mary Anning, who had been struck by lightning as a baby, and then grew up to find the first dinosaur?  And… did I know … that she’d lived in Lyme Regis...?  She then told me about her geography trip to hunt for fossils on the same beach on which Mary Anning had found some, and … (huge breath) … an enormous dinosaur!  Her eyes were alight with excitement and curiosity.  Surely her Nana could never know these facts… only children of a certain age would understand.

That day, when we swopped knowledge, I gained credence as a Nana who knew everything worth knowing.  Whilst basking in our togetherness, I silently thanked Tracy Chevalier for writing her brilliant book Remarkable Creatures.

To me Tracy is a remarkable author. She can take an interesting historical fact, and with her fertile imagination weave a story, using believable characters and situations, to fit exactly that factual time and place.  A remarkable talent indeed, as you’ll see…

Remarkable Creatures

From the moment Mary Anning survives being struck by lightning as a baby, she has an energy and curiosity which appears unusual.  She knows she is different.  From a poor background with hunger a regular visitor in their home, selling the curies she finds on the beach just about keeps them alive. 

At that time a spinster lady comes to Lyme Regis with her unmarried sisters.  Through their characters, life in Lyme at that time is revealed. Our author weaves the trials and tribulations of husband-hunting into the social life in Lyme Regis and London in the mid-1800s. The status of the unmarried daughter or sister, is not a happy one.   Elizabeth Philpot needed a hobby whilst waiting for a potential husband to come along, and makes the most of what life has bestowed on her. An intelligent woman who sees interesting potential in fossils, she becomes a respected collector with a enviable collection of ‘fishes’.

Mary, a young girl, already a committed fossil hunter, and her family find life hard. Landslips and storms are foes for Mary and Elizabeth to overcome. Friendships, jealousy and misinterpretation of the truth feature in this story, keeping the reader engaged with all these lives. Mary also experiences longing and disappointment with the man she loves.  Neither of these women marry the man of their desires.


Remarkable Creatures is fiction, but many of the characters in this specialised field did exist. The French almost claimed credit for this phenomenal discovery for themselves. It was indeed hard, nay impossible, for women making scientific discoveries at that time to gain their due recognition, as it was believed they lacked the intellectual rigour to engage in scientific study.  The Geological Society did not accept female Fellows until 1919.   Our author, through the experiences of her characters, has shown how difficult it was for Mary to achieve recognition. Elizabeth was her friend, her ally and through her defiant hard work, gained the due respect and reputation for Mary that we accept today.
I won’t spoil your enjoyment of this novel by going into the depths of detail and intrigue, but I would hugely recommend it to anyone who enjoys well researched facts imaginatively spun into an unable-to-put-down novel.

Since reading this book I have become an ardent fan of Tracy’s writing.  After reading Girl with the Pearl Earring; a story woven around the life of the Dutch artist Vermeer, I have recently read her latest novel The Runaway.  Once you have found this brilliant writer who, for a lot of the year, is based in Dorset which has become a continuing inspiration for her writing, you’ll become hungry for her next literary offering.

Tracy Chevalier was the novel category judge for the 2013 Yeovil Literary Prize.  It was a pleasure and privilege to work with her.


Liz Pike is Secretary of the Yeovil Community Arts Association.  She is also a member of the Yeovil Cre8ive Writers and Yeovil Art Group.    The YCAA administers the annual, international writing competition The Yeovil Literary Prize. Liz is passionate about the written word, having had success writing short stories, and enjoys two reading groups, one of which is the YCAA Lunchtime Book Group.