Miss Carter and the Ifrit

Miss Carter & the Ifrit / Susan Alice Kerby
London: Dean Street Press, 2019, c1945.
222 p.

I've been reading a whole lot of Dean Street books lately, and this was one of my favourites so far. It's set during WWII but it's also a bit of a fairytale. 

Miss Georgina Carter is a single woman in her late 40s, living in a comfortable though sparse flat. As the story opens, she is not so comfy, as she's lacking coal. She buys some wood blocks from a street seller to heat her flat, wood that had been part of roads long ago. As she burns them, one cracks open and an Ifrit appears to her (don't call him a genie!) He's been freed from his long imprisonment in this wood, and is ready to serve his new master. 

Miss Carter, however, is very practical and isn't quite sure what to do with this turn of events. She's embarrassed by his lavish servitude, insists he sits on the furniture as an equal with her, and nicknames him Joe. To prove his powers and willingness to serve, he magics in exotic food, cushions and colour, and other treats. When she is missing her only nephew greatly, Joe whisks her to Canada where he is training -- to the nephew's great shock. This scene is very funny, as the nephew tries to make sense of what is happening and convinces himself he is still drunk from his night out. 

But then a former flame, a friend of her brother's, shows up and Joe scents romance. Miss Carter insists it's not, but we are given glimpses of her past and his, and know that it will be. 

The joy of the book is the relationship between Miss Carter and the Ifrit. When Joe first appears, he is traditional, bound to his habits. So is Miss Carter - stuck in a British spinster's life with a constricted view of the world. Joe becomes fascinated with the modern world and is absorbing and learning at an exponential rate. And Miss Carter begins to learn and grow alongside him. They have conversations about ethics, wishes, morals, and meaning, and it's really engaging to read along. Joe even visits an old nemesis, another Ifrit who has chosen to go the opposite way to Joe, the way of power and corruption; this Ifrit is in thrall to none other than Hitler. (this book was published in 1945, so it was all still going when she wrote this). They free one another through their relationship; Joe quite literally, and Miss Carter from her small life.

I thought this was a delight, a mix between fantastical and really ordinary things - Miss Carter still goes to work in her office every day, for example, once wearing a beautiful dress that Joe has got for her, to the suspicious and jealous eyes of her coworkers. I thought the writing was light and entertaining, and the story certainly unusual, both funny and touching. Lots to think about here, and a happy ending for a 47 year old heroine. Really great read.