When crime and historical fiction meet, the results are often gripping and this 18th century London romp delivers splendidly. In a society in which abject poverty and wealth precariously coexist, we follow the rise and fall and loves of a young rake reminiscent of Tom Jones and Roderick Random as he allies himself with a sinister protector who wishes to experience all that the dark side of the city can offer. Naturally no good can come of this but the journey is breathless, colourful and a mile a minute read.
Michael Irwin's The Skull and the Nightingale is a chilling and deliciously dark, literary novel of manipulation and sex, intrigue and seduction, set in 18th-century England.
When Richard Fenwick returns to London, his wealthy godfather, James Gilbert, has an unexpected proposition. Gilbert has led a sedate life in Worcestershire, but feels the urge to experience, even vicariously, the extremes of human feeling: love, passion, and something much more sinister.
It becomes apparent that Gilbert desires news filled with tales of carousing, flirtation, excess, and London's more salacious side. But Gilbert's elaborate and manipulative "experiments" into the workings of human behavior soon drag Richard into a Faustian vortex of betrayal and danger where lives are ruined and tragedy is only a step away.
With echoes of Dangerous Liaisons, Michael Irwin's The Skull and the Nightingale is an urgent period drama that seduces the senses.
'This is a surprising and thrilling Rake's Progress. I enjoyed every word' Diana Athill, author of Stet
'An atmospheric portrait of the Georgian world' Sunday Times
'Rollickingly enjoyable' Literary Review
'Part crime thriller, part historical novel - with a heady dose of women, wine and weird company to boot - Irwin's epistolary novel is entirely captivating' We Love This Book
'A splendid novel: immaculately researched, morally fascinating and strangely troubling. It kept surprising me and delighting me in equal measure' Andrew Taylor, author of The American Boy
Author
About Michael Irwin
After teaching at the Catholic University of Lublin and the University of Lodz, both in Poland, at the University of Tokyo and at Smith College in the United States, Michael Irwin moved to the University of Kent, in Canterbury, where he became Professor of English, specialising in eighteenth and nineteenth-century literature. His published eighteenth-century work includes a full-length study of Fielding and essays that take in Defoe, Richardson, Sterne, Smollett, Johnson and Pope.
