Private Rites by Julia Armfield Summary, Characters and Themes

Private Rites by Julia Armfield is a gothic, speculative reimagining of King Lear, following three estranged sisters—Isla, Irene, and Agnes—as they navigate grief, queer love, and the haunting weight of their past in a world that won’t stop drowning. 

After the death of their father, a revered but cruel architect, the sisters are forced to reunite in the eerie glass house they grew up in. As they sort through his legacy, old wounds resurface, and a sinister undercurrent emerges—one tied to their mother’s disappearance and a mysterious purpose they seem to have been chosen for. Blurring the lines between horror, mythology, and psychological tension, Private Rites is a chilling meditation on family, loss, and the inescapability of the past.

Summary

The world is drowning. The rain has been falling for so long that cities have adapted—living spaces now stretch upwards, streets are swallowed by water, and an atmosphere of slow, inevitable decay lingers. Against this backdrop, three estranged sisters—Isla, Irene, and Agnes—are forced back into each other’s lives when their father, a famous but emotionally distant architect, dies. His passing is not a cause for mourning, but a disruption—one that reopens wounds they’ve long tried to ignore.

Isla, the eldest, is a therapist who prides herself on control, yet struggles with her own emotions. Irene, the middle sister, is fiercely independent, politically outspoken, and deeply resentful of their family’s dysfunction. Agnes, the youngest, lives a detached, unstructured life, seeking solace in fleeting connections. None of them have spoken in some time, and none of them particularly want to. But their father’s death forces them together, confronting both his legacy and their shared trauma.

As they learn about his will, they discover a shocking revelation that further drives them apart. But something stranger is at play—unsettling memories surface, strange figures seem to be watching them, and the house they grew up in, a towering glass relic of their father’s design, feels more like a haunted monument than a home.

As they navigate their grief—or their lack of it—the world around them mirrors their turmoil. The city, forever drenched in rain, is sinking. People protest against the failing infrastructure, against the cruelty of a world that seems to be collapsing in slow motion. Their father’s architectural projects, once symbols of prestige, now stand as hollow, unfeeling structures—monuments to his detachment, just as his own children were.

Each sister wrestles with their own struggles. Isla, despite her carefully managed composure, is forced to confront the ghosts of their childhood. Irene, already distanced from her family, begins to question whether her anger has become its own kind of cage. Agnes, always the outsider, starts to feel the creeping presence of something bigger—something lurking just beneath the surface of their history.

When they finally return to their father’s house—a masterpiece of glass, angles, and cold perfection—the past refuses to stay buried.

The house is filled with artifacts of their childhood, but also something darker: flickering shadows, locked rooms that seem to open on their own, and a sense that they are being watched. Their mother’s long-ago disappearance becomes an open wound again, as they uncover unsettling clues about what really happened to her.

Memories blur with nightmares, reality distorts, and as tensions between the sisters explode into full-blown confrontation, the house itself seems to react. It is as though their father’s presence lingers—not just metaphorically, but as something real, something waiting.

In the final stretch, the novel leans into the surreal, the supernatural. The sisters realize they have been chosen for something—something ancient, something beyond their understanding. The truth about their father’s work, their mother’s fate, and their own purpose unfolds in unsettling ways, leaving them forever changed.

But Private Rites offers no neat resolutions.

The past does not simply let go, and the sisters do not reconcile in a way that feels easy or comforting. Instead, they are left with the weight of what has happened, with a future as uncertain as the drowning world around them. The novel ends in ambiguity—grief remains, wounds still fester, and the rain keeps falling.

A gothic, psychological horror filled with eerie beauty and quiet terror, Private Rites is an exploration of inheritance, trauma, and the ways in which we are shaped—sometimes unwillingly—by the ghosts of those who came before us.

Characters

Isla

Isla is the eldest sister and the most emotionally controlled of the three. As a therapist, she strives to maintain a sense of order and composure, both professionally and in her personal life.

Her relationship with her father is fraught with tension, marked by feelings of neglect and resentment. Though she was the most responsible sibling, Isla carries the weight of a failed marriage and an estranged relationship with her family.

Throughout the novel, her emotional repression becomes evident as she tries to mediate conflicts between her sisters, even though she resents this role. The arrival of their father’s death and the subsequent return to their childhood home force Isla to confront deep-seated emotions.

She struggles with grief and the unresolved trauma of her past, especially her complicated relationship with her father. Although Isla does not reach complete closure by the novel’s end, her arc represents reluctant self-awareness, as she begins to acknowledge her emotions rather than suppress them.

Irene

Irene, the middle sister, is the most politically involved and emotionally charged of the three. Her anger, fueled by past family dynamics and a sense of abandonment, defines much of her relationship with her sisters.

At the beginning of the story, Irene is grappling with apathy and frustration, having abandoned her past activism for a more passive resentment. The death of their father reignites old tensions, with Irene rejecting the idea of nostalgia or the need to revisit painful memories.

She is quick to lash out at her sisters, expressing her anger about their father’s legacy and her own disillusionment with familial obligations. Throughout the novel, Irene’s arc revolves around coming to terms with her past and the ways in which it shapes her present.

By the end of the book, Irene doesn’t reconcile fully with her sisters, but she gains some perspective. She acknowledges that their shared history has shaped them in different ways, though the emotional distance between them remains.

Agnes

Agnes, the youngest sister, is emotionally distant and avoids deep, meaningful connections. She seems the least affected by the death of her father, choosing instead to maintain a carefree lifestyle and distance herself from the pain of family obligations.

Agnes’s arc is defined by her struggle to suppress the emotional scars of her past, particularly the absence of their mother and the coldness of their father. While Isla tries to maintain control and Irene confronts her anger, Agnes adopts a more passive stance, avoiding engagement with her sisters and their shared trauma.

However, as the novel progresses, Agnes is forced to reckon with the truth of her own emotions, especially after viewing their father’s body and revisiting their childhood home. The experience unsettles her and begins to erode her emotional detachment.

Though she doesn’t fully express her emotions, there is a sense that Agnes starts to acknowledge the long-lasting impact of her father’s neglect and her own suppressed grief.

Themes

The Interplay Between Grief, Estrangement, and Unresolved Family Trauma

The central theme of Private Rites revolves around the complexities of grief, estrangement, and unresolved family trauma. The three sisters—Isla, Irene, and Agnes—are all forced to confront not only their father’s death but also the weight of their shared history.

The novel masterfully explores how grief manifests differently for each sister: Isla, the eldest, grapples with the burden of responsibility and control, while Irene’s bitterness toward her family only deepens with their father’s death. Agnes, in contrast, tries to keep her emotions at bay, distancing herself from the past entirely.

These differing approaches to grief highlight the deep divisions in their relationships, making it clear that no amount of time or distance can easily erase the scars of childhood. The death of their father doesn’t bring the expected closure; instead, it stirs up old wounds, forcing the sisters to confront not only their fractured relationships with each other but also the trauma they endured growing up in a household dominated by an emotionally distant and cruel father.

The theme of grief is not linear or easily resolved; rather, it is a continuous, spiraling force that ties them all to their past.

The Erosion of Identity in the Face of Familial and Societal Expectations

Another dominant theme in Private Rites is the erosion of personal identity due to the pressures of both familial and societal expectations. The novel illustrates how each sister has internalized the burdens placed on them by their father and, to some extent, by society.

Isla, for example, has become a therapist—a profession that requires her to project control and stability, traits that mask the emotional turmoil she struggles to keep hidden. She is constantly in conflict with herself, torn between her role as the responsible one and her unresolved desire to break free from her father’s shadow.

Irene, on the other hand, has become politically active but is simultaneously consumed by apathy and resentment. She resents Isla’s attempts to mediate the family’s issues and finds herself increasingly detached from the world she once fought to change.

Agnes, who has lived the most detached and emotionally unmoored existence, avoids both family ties and intimacy, pushing away those who seek to understand her. This disconnection from both family and society points to the profound struggle to maintain one’s sense of self in a world where identities are often shaped by external expectations.

The sisters’ estrangement reflects a deeper, more universal fear of being defined by others’ perceptions—be it through familial duty or societal roles—rather than by one’s true desires and emotions.

The Psychological and Physical Reclamation of Power Through Queer Love and Desire

One of the novel’s most compelling explorations is the psychological and physical reclamation of power through queer love and desire. This theme is deeply intertwined with the sisters’ complex emotional lives.

While the novel doesn’t foreground the sisters’ queer identities in the traditional sense, their relationships with love and desire are colored by an exploration of queer dynamics in their personal lives. Agnes’s newfound capacity for love, the first she has ever truly experienced, stands out as a moment of profound transformation, though it is complicated by her deep-seated fear of attachment.

Her emotional isolation mirrors the disconnection she has always felt from her family and the larger world. In contrast, Irene’s strained relationship with her partner, Jude, is a constant tug-of-war between personal ambition and the fear of losing oneself to love.

While Isla is a therapist whose work involves helping others reclaim emotional and psychological control, she herself is stuck in a cycle of repression, unable to reconcile her emotions with the roles she has adopted. Through these characters and their queer desires, the novel explores the idea of power being reclaimed not just through physical intimacy but through the ability to engage with love and desire on one’s own terms.

This power, however, is precarious and fraught with contradictions, as love often offers a sense of connection that only exacerbates feelings of vulnerability.

The Ghostly Influence of the Past Via Architecture, Memory, and Supernatural Hauntings

The theme of the supernatural in Private Rites is intricately connected to the idea of the past’s ghostly influence. The house where the sisters grew up, a cold and imposing structure designed by their father, acts as a character in its own right, symbolizing both the father’s oppressive legacy and the haunting memories of their childhood.

The house is not only a physical space but a site where memories and trauma are embedded in every corner. As the sisters return to the house, they are not only faced with the physical remnants of their father’s architecture but also with the emotional echoes of their past, which manifest in strange and unsettling occurrences.

These supernatural elements serve as metaphors for the lingering presence of their father’s control, a control that continues to shape their identities even after his death. The house’s refusal to let the sisters escape unscathed represents the impossibility of severing ties with the past.

Every creaking door, flickering shadow, and unsettling sound forces the sisters to confront the ways in which their father’s emotional neglect and cruelty have imprinted on them. The supernatural is not necessarily external but emerges from within, reflecting the ongoing, unresolved trauma that haunts them all.

The Inescapability of the Past and the Futility of Closure in Trauma’s Wake

A final theme that threads through Private Rites is the inescapability of the past and the futility of closure in the wake of trauma. Throughout the novel, the sisters attempt to reconcile with their father’s death, but each moment of confrontation only deepens their sense of entrapment.

The idea that one can achieve full closure is continually questioned, as their emotional entanglements with each other and their father remain unresolved. The act of returning to their father’s home becomes symbolic of their inability to escape the past, no matter how much they try to detach from it.

The house itself serves as a representation of this psychological confinement, as it is both a place of origin and a place of haunting. The sisters may have left the house physically, but they are never able to leave the ghosts of their childhood behind.

The novel ends with ambiguity, deliberately withholding resolution, as if to underscore the notion that some traumas cannot be fully healed. The past remains a lingering presence, and the search for closure becomes an impossible endeavor—one that continues to shape the characters’ lives, even as they try to move forward.