The Great Stink

It is 1855, and engineer William May has returned home to London and his beloved wife from the horrors of the Crimean War. When he secures a job trans­forming the citys sewer system, he believes that he will be able to find salvation in the subterranean world beneath the city. But the peace of the tunnels is shattered by a murder, and William is implicated as the killer. Could he truly have committed the crime? How will he bring the truth above-ground? 

"In rich Dickensian detail, Clark creates the whole city teeming with life and decay, but she keeps the focus on a few fascinating characters in desperate straits . . . it's a rich work of history and a gripping exploration of the unmentionable currents that run beneath the surface of our lives--and it reeks of talent."--Washington Post Book World

"Who knew that drainage could be so captivating? And, more to the point, that excrement could be so, well, lyrically malleable? The Great Stink is a trove of olfactory poetry . . . The Great Stink is a crackerjack historical novel that combines the creepy intrigue of Caleb Carr, the sensory overload of Peter Ackroyd and the academic curiosity of A.S. Byatt."--Los Angeles Times

CLARE CLARK was born in London in 1967. A Senior Scholar at Trinity College Cambridge, she graduated with a Double First in History. THE GREAT STINK, her first novel, won the Quality Paperback Book Clubs New Voices Fiction Award. She is married with two children and lives in London.

Long Arm Tom is a tosher who scavenges for anything of value in the old sewers, always accompanied by his beloved dog Lady. It is this business that brings him into contact with "The Captain," a wealthy businessman with a weakness for gambling who asks Tom to use his knowledge of London's underworld for an even less savory purpose. But Tom is also William's only hope of salvation. Will he help William bring the truth aboveground?

With richly atmospheric prose of almost visceral power, The Great Stink transports us behind (and below) the glittering façades of Victorian England. Seamlessly combining fact with fiction, it marks the debut of an outstandingly talented writer in the tradition of the very best of historical novelists.

CLARE CLARK is the author of The Great Stink, a Washington Post Best Book of the Year, and The Nature of Monsters.