Synopses & Reviews
“Harwood, master of creeping Victorian horror, does it again . . . Twisted in every sense of the word and wonderfully atmospheric.”—
Booklist Confused and disoriented, Georgina Ferrars awakens in a small room in Tregannon House, a remote asylum in England. She has no memory of the past few weeks. The doctor, Maynard Straker, tells her that she admitted herself under the name Lucy Ashton, then suffered a seizure. When she insists he has mistaken her for someone else, Dr. Straker sends a telegram to her uncle, who replies that Georgina Ferrars is at home with him in London: “Your patient must be an imposter.” Suddenly her voluntary confinement becomes involuntary. Who is the woman in her uncle’s house? Georgina’s perilous quest to free herself takes us from a cliffside cottage on the Isle of Wight to the secret passages of Tregannon House and into a web of hidden family ties on which her survival depends.
“Redolent with a sense of foreboding . . . This gothic tale will sweep you up into the very heart of Victorian England. A splendid read!”—Historical Novel Society, Editors’ Choice
“A richly textured . . . [and] masterfully constructed narrative . . . Readers are guaranteed a thoroughly diverting time in Harwood’s not-to-be-trusted hands.”—The Independent (UK)
“The crisp prose and twisty plot will encourage many to read this in one sitting.”—Publishers Weekly
Synopsis
Building on his haunting, superbly written debut, Michael Cox returns to a story of murder, love, and revenge in Victorian England. is a vividly imagined study of seduction, betrayal, and friendship between two powerful women bound together by the past.
Synopsis
Building on his haunting, superbly written debut, The Meaning of Night, Michael Cox returns to a story of murder, love, and revenge in Victorian England. The Glass of Time is a vividly imagined study of seduction, betrayal, and friendship between two powerful women bound together by the past.
Synopsis
'Like its \"beguiling\" and \"intelligent\" (New York Times Book Review) predecessor, The Glass of Timeis a page turning period mystery about identity, the nature of secrets, and what happens when past obsessions impose themselves on an unwilling present. In the autumn of 1876, nineteen year-old orphan Esperanza Gorst arrives at the great country house of Evenwood to become a lady\'s maid to the twenty-sixth Baroness Tansor. But Esperanza is no ordinary servant. She has been sent by her guardian, the mysterious Madame de l\'Orme, to uncover the secrets that her new mistress has sought to conceal, and to set right a past injustice in which Esperanza\'s own life is bound up. At Evenwood she meets Lady Tansor\'s two dashing sons, Perseus and Randolph, and finds herself enmeshed in a complicated web of seduction, intrigue, deceit, betrayal, and murder. Few writers are as gifted at evoking the sensibility of the nineteenth century as Michael Cox, who has made the world of Charles Dickens and Wilkie Collins his own.'
Synopsis
Absorbing. . . . Literary pastiche at its very best.Starred Review. Cox"s gripping second gothic thriller (after The Meaning of Night) follows the fortunes of nineteen-year-old orphan Esperanza Gorst, whose guardian charges her to go undercover as a lady"s maid.Michael Cox returns with another epic Victorian-era thriller. . . . [A] gripping tale of psychological unraveling.
Synopsis
"Entirely wonderful . . . chock-full of revenge, romance, duplicity, concealed identities and murder most frequent."--
Synopsis
"A deliciously spooky pastiche of the high and low Gothic traditions and the tender heroines who live and die by them."
—New York Times Book Review
About the Author
John Harwood is the author of two previous novels of Victorian Gothic suspense. Aside from fiction, his published work includes biography, poetry, political journalism and literary history. His acclaimed first novel, The Ghost Writer, won the International Horror Guild's First Novel Award. He lives in Hobart, Australia.