The Mermaid and Mrs. Hancock - Softcover

Críticas

"Wonderful... completely transporting."--Madeline Miller, author of Circe and The Song of Achilles

"Gowar's debut delivers... anchored by Angelica, who contains an incredible complexity to her identity as a sex worker, as a wife and as a woman just trying to survive.... Gowar brings her story to life with lush, immersive descriptions."--USA Today

"Concerned with the issue of women's freedom, Gowar offers a panoramic view of Georgian society, from its coffeehouses and street life to class distinctions and multicultural populace.... A sumptuous historical feast."--Booklist, starred review

"The richness and rhythm of the writing is irresistible."--Emma Healey, author of Elizabeth is Missing and Whistle in the Dark

"A swift, rollicking read.... Richly descriptive.... Like the recent historical-fiction hits Francis Spufford's Golden Hill, Sarah Perry's The Essex Serpent, and Jessie Burton's The Miniaturist, this is a novel pungent in historical detail."--Sunday Times (London)

"A story of obsession and curiosity, this book is all the better for its rich detail, thanks to Hermes Gowar's impeccable research."--Stylist (London)

"From the first page of this dazzling debut novel, you are pitched into a sumptuously detailed adventure set in the bustle and swagger of 18th century London.... The result is a wonderfully written and richly descriptive novel, its brilliantly drawn characters driven by heady and dangerous desires."--Sunday Express (London), 5/5 stars

"Splendid.... One of the delights of this knowingly preposterous story is the dialectic it constructs between the real and the fantastic.... Each quality... infects the other: The real world of 18th-century London seems both lavish and perishable, and the fantastic world of mermaids feels deadly real."--John Vernon, New York Times Book Review

"This glittering debut novel examines every rung of 18th-century London's social ladder with keen wit and in delicious detail."--People

"Set in 18th-century England, with characters you might meet in a Jane Austen novel.... Gowar writes rounded, believable personalities. Her language crackles with ingenuity and grace, and she has an eye for the everyday particulars."--Chicago Tribune

Reseña del editor

Shortlisted for the Baileys Women's Prize for Fiction · A Refinery 29 Favorite Book of the Year · A Booklist Top 10 First Novels of the Year · A People Best Book of the Fall

“Wonderful... completely transporting.”  —Madeline Miller, New York Times bestselling author of Circe and The Song of Achilles

In 1780s London, a prosperous merchant finds his quiet life upended when he unexpectedly receives a most unusual creature—and meets a most extraordinary woman—in this much-lauded, atmospheric debut that examines our capacity for wonder, obsession, and desire with all the magnetism, originality, and literary magic of The Essex Serpent.

One September evening in 1785, Jonah Hancock hears an urgent knocking on his front door near the docks of London. The captain of one of Jonah’s trading vessels is waiting eagerly on the front step, bearing shocking news. On a voyage to the Far East, he sold the Jonah’s ship for something rare and far more precious: a mermaid. Jonah is stunned—the object the captain presents him is brown and wizened, as small as an infant, with vicious teeth and claws, and a torso that ends in the tail of a fish. It is also dead.

As gossip spreads through the docks, coffee shops, parlors and brothels, all of London is curious to see this marvel in Jonah Hancock’s possession. Thrust from his ordinary existence, somber Jonah finds himself moving from the city’s seedy underbelly to the finest drawing rooms of high society. At an opulent party, he makes the acquaintance of the coquettish Angelica Neal, the most desirable woman he has ever laid eyes on—and a shrewd courtesan of great accomplishment. This meeting sparks a perilous liaison that steers both their lives onto a dangerous new course as they come to realize that priceless things often come at the greatest cost.

Imogen Hermes Gowar, Britain’s most-heralded new literary talent, makes her debut with this spellbinding novel of a merchant, a mermaid, and a madam—an unforgettable confection that explores obsession, wonder, and the deepest desires of the heart with bawdy wit, intrigue, and a touch of magic.