Birdcage Walk: A dazzling historical thriller

(Paperback)

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From the bestselling author of The Lie, and Exposure THE SUNDAY TIMES BESTSELLER 'Quietly brilliant ... among the best fiction of our time.' Daily Telegraph 'The finest novel Dunmore has written.' Observer 'Superb and poignant.' Guardian It is 1792 and Europe is seized by political turmoil and violence. Lizzie Fawkes has grown up in Radical circles where each step of the French Revolution is followed with eager idealism. But she has recently married John Diner Tredevant, a property developer who is heavily invested in Bristol's housing boom, and he has everything to lose from social upheaval and the prospect of war. Diner believes that Lizzie's independent, questioning spirit must be coerced and subdued. She belongs to him- law and custom confirm it, and she must live as he wants. But as Diner's passion for Lizzie darkens, she soon finds herself dangerously alone. ______________ Nominated for the 2018 Independent Booksellers Week Award Longlisted for the 2018 Walter Scott Prize for Historical Fiction

Reviews

This is the finest novel Helen Dunmore has written ... From the start, Birdcage Walk has the command of a thriller The novels cast is marvellous and vivid A novel that deserves to be cherished and to last. -- Kate Kellaway * Observer *
This powerful novel is a fine final flourish from a gifted writer The power Dunmore gives to lowly female lives is inescapably moving, their stories taking us on a remarkable journey into the visceral heart of the female experience in Georgian Britain [Dunmore is] one of the bravest and most versatile writers of her generation This fine, fiery novel will surely be remembered as one of her best. -- Melissa Katsoulis * The Times *
Like many of Dunmores novels, Birdcage Walk defies categorisation ... a blend of beauty and horror evoked with such breath-taking poetry that it haunts me still ... she has an extraordinary gift for taking the ordinary and familiar and rendering them new. When Tredevants growing unpredictability once more tightens the narrative, forcing the story back into the ominous and unsettling territory where it first began, it is easy to see why [Dunmore] has earned a place among the finest writers of historical fiction working today. * Guardian *
Helen Dunmores quietly brilliant historical novels are among the best fiction of our time. -- Jake Kerridge * Daily Telegraph *
A finely wrought psychological thriller But its ultimately a novel about the ways in which we remember and, as such, a fitting contribution to Dunmores extraordinary legacy. * Daily Mail *
Elegant prose and brilliantly researched historical detail a devastatingly good novel. * Sunday Express, S Magazine *
Part psychological thriller, part poetic exhumation of the past, its a fiery, first-rate historical novel from an author wholl be much missed * Mail on Sunday, Summer Reads *
A firecracker of a historical murder mystery story with which to leave her many admirers * Guardian, Readers Books of the Year *
Dunmore is skilled at claiming the huge canvasses of history and painting upon them exquisitely detailed human tragedies Every scene is saturated with vivid period detail but Dunmores touch is feather-light. -- Francesca Segal * Financial Times *
A very good novel indeed * Scotsman, Books of the Year *
Dunmore just writes so effortlessly. Birdcage Walk is a joy to read. * Stylist *
Marvellous Dunmore has the ability to evoke a sense of place and to write passages of thrilling and disturbing action Dunmore is a remarkable novelist who sets herself very different challenges in each new novel. She meets this one triumphantly. It will surely be a great and thoroughly deserved success. -- Allan Massie * Scotsman *

Author Bio

Helen Dunmore was an award-winning novelist, children's author and poet who will be remembered for the depth and breadth of her fiction. Rich and intricate, yet narrated with a deceptive simplicity that made all of her work accessible and heartfelt, her writing stood out for the fluidity and lyricism of her prose, and her extraordinary ability to capture the presence of the past. Her first novel, Zennor in Darkness, explored the events which led D. H. Lawrence to be expelled from Cornwall on suspicion of spying, and won the McKitterick Prize. Her third novel, A Spell of Winter, won the inaugural Orange Prize for Fiction in 1996, and she went on to become a Sunday Times bestseller with The Siege, which was described by Antony Beevor as a 'world-class novel' and was shortlisted for the Whitbread Novel of the Year and the Orange Prize. Published in 2010, her eleventh novel, The Betrayal, was longlisted for the Man Booker Prize and shortlisted for the Orwell Prize and the Commonwealth Writers Prize, and The Lie in 2014 was shortlisted for the Walter Scott Prize for Historical Fiction and the 2015 RSL Ondaatje Prize. Her final novel, Birdcage Walk, deals with legacy and recognition - what writers, especially women writers, can expect to leave behind them - and was described by the Observer as 'the finest novel Helen Dunmore has written'. Helen was known to be an inspirational and generous author, championing emerging voices and other established authors. She also gave a large amount of her time to supporting literature, independent bookshops all over the UK, and arts organisations across the world. She died in June 2017.