The Dark Lantern
Gerri Brightwell
'This novel is both highly readable and more than usually thoughtful … a piece of high-end popular fiction full of insight into the world of masters and servants and the life of those who live on unearned money.'
Kerryn Goldsworthy (Sydney Morning Herald)'Brightwell's debut is an engrossing period piece, thickly atmospheric in its evocation of England during its colonial heyday.'
(Kirkus Reviews)'The action will keep the reader as intrigued as a parlor maid eavesdropping outside her mistress's boudoir.'
(Publishers Weekly)Set in nineteenth-century London, this page-turning mystery slowly uncovers devastating secrets and sheds light both on the genteel ‘upstairs’ of a Victorian home, as well as the darker underbelly of its servants’ quarters.
The Bentley household is in flux. The elderly matron is on her deathbed, so her son, recently returned from France, is acting as the new master of the house. He is distracted, busy developing a reputation in anthropometry, the Victorian science of identifying criminals by body measurements. Yet under his own roof no one is quite who they seem: not the mysterious woman who claims to be the bride of his dead brother, not the new maid just hired from the country, not even his own beautiful but elusive wife. It is the latter who seems to recognise Jane, the new servant girl, for the imposter that she is. However, she remains inexplicably silent, perhaps because she has her own secrets to protect.
The Dark Lantern is a suspenseful novel of mistaken identities and dangerous deceptions as well as a fascinating portrayal of nineteenth-century England.
'A fast-paced and suspenseful historical fiction and a fascinating portrayal of Victorian life.'
Ingrid Josephine (Readings Newsletter)Gerri Brightwell
Gerri Brightwell was brought up in South Devon, England. After deciding a degree in zoology was not for her, she took up literature and art history, and lived on a narrow boat in Bristol. Since then she has roamed more widely, working in Spain, Thailand, Canada and the United States. She has worked as a cleaner, ice-cream seller, sandwich-maker, pottery sponger, editor, nanny and, most recently, a teacher of writing and literature.
She has master’s degrees in creative writing from the University of East Anglia, and the University of Alaska, Fairbanks, plus a doctorate in literature from the University of Minnesota. Her novel, Cold Country, was published by Duckworth in 2003. She lives in Fairbanks, Alaska, with her husband and three sons, and teaches in the creative writing programme at the University of Alaska.
Extent: 336pp
Size: 234mm x 153mm
ISBN (13): 9781921215902
RRP: $32.95
Pub date: April 2008
ANZ, South Africa, Singapore, Malaysia
News