The Dressmaker (Bainbridge novel) The Dressmaker (Bainbridge novel) The Dressmaker (US title The Secret Glass) is a gothic psychological novel written by Beryl Bainbridge. In 1973, it was shortlisted for the Booker Prize. Like many of Bainbridge's earlier works, the novel is semi-autobiographical. In particular, the story was inspired by a relationship that she had with a soldier as a teenager. The characters of Nellie and Margo were based upon two of her paternal aunts. Set in Liverpool and Lancashire during World War II, a repressed dressmaker and her sister struggle looking after their 17-year-old niece, who is having a delusional affair with an
The Dressmaker (Ham novel) in 10,000 words, and I had 30,000 words. It was only three weeks before I realised that this was the best 'accident' that had ever occurred to me." The novel is set in a small country town of Australia. Ham, who herself was born and raised in the southern New South Wales town of Jerilderie, said that she was inspired by the fact everyone knows everything about each other and "(her) mother was a dressmaker in a small country town, and the idiosyncrasies of those two factors were the seed for the story". But she clarified that she did not