Petra And The Sewer Rats

Petra And The Sewer Rats is the second of the companion novellas in G J Kemp's Acre fantasy series. The book gives us Petra's full backstory of how, as a young woman, she came to be at the school on the cliffs where, in Juno And The Lady, she is the headmistress. Although Petra And The Sewer Rats takes place earlier in time than Juno And The Lady, I would advise reading that novel before this novella because already having some of the information from Petra's past will be a spoiler for the later story.

I enjoyed seeing how Petra begins to learn about the realities of life for the majority of women in the town of Fairacre, and how this changes her perception of the rules governing this society. I was particularly interested in the point where Petra realises that her own privileged social position isn't the protection she had assumed it to be. Living an effectively free, sheltered life in her father's house had led Petra to condone and even actively support rules that suppressed women elsewhere. I appreciated Kemp's insights into how people can support something wrong if it doesn't appear to impact upon them personally, while blaming those who are directly affected rather than recognising an unfairness in the rules themselves.

All this sociology makes it sound like Petra And The Sewer Rats is a heavy read, but that is absolutely not the case and I was impressed by the way in which Kemp threads his social commentary into a pretty fast-paced story. I was a little confused as to who everyone was in the earliest chapters, but this soon resolved itself. It was fun to explore Fairacre alongside Petra, recognising locations that would become significant and I liked the depth of the lead characters in this novella. It is a quick read, but an impactful one.