The London Satyr

(Paperback)

Publishing Details

Classifications

Physical Properties

Description

The astonishing new historical novel from one of the UK's most talented literary writers 1891. London is simmering in the oppressive summer heat, the air thick with sexual repression. But a wave of morality is about to rock the capital as the puritans of the London Vigilance Committee seek out perversion and aberrant behaviour in all its forms. Charles Webster, an impoverished photographer working at the Lyceum Theatre, has been sucked into a shadowy demi-monde which exists beneath the surface of civilized society. It is a world of pornographers and prostitutes, orchestrated by master manipulator Marlow, for whom Webster illicitly provides theatrical costumes for pornographic shoots. But knowledge of this enterprise has somehow reached the Lyceum's upright theatre manager, Bram Stoker, who suspects Webster's involvement. As the net tightens around Marlow and his cohorts and public outrage sweeps the city, a member of the aristocracy is accused of killing a child prostitute...

Reviews

A clever, intriguing and very well-written novel about the moral landscape of late-Victorian London * The Times *
Edric mixes a potent brew... The ending is a masterstroke of the ironic and macabre * Daily Mail *
Sharply written, wholly engrossing... not just an Edric novel, but the Edric novel * Guardian *
Place, time and atmosphere are conjured with impeccable lightness of touch * Spectator *
Gripping and entertaining read... well told and absorbing * Eastern Daily Press *

Author Bio

Robert Edric was born in 1956. His novels include Winter Garden (1985 James Tait Black Prize winner), A New Ice Age (1986 runner-up for the 1986 Guardian Fiction Prize), The Book of the Heathen (shortlisted for the 2001 WH Smith Literary Award), Peacetime (longlisted for the Booker Prize 2002), Gathering the Water (longlisted for the Booker Prize 2006) and In Zodiac Light, which was shortlisted for the Dublin Impac Prize 2010. He lives in Yorkshire