A lyrical, moving novel of the choices and confusions that face a married woman whose understanding of herself explodes on first contact with the energies of China and a Chinaman.Grace Hoffmeier is never quite sure where to invest her energies: in her dying marriage to star scientist Walter or in the possible affairs that flare so startlingly before her like fireworks; in her work or in her home; in things or in people; in the past or in the future.On an eye-opening trip to a China that has...
A national hardback bestseller in the US – another magnificently imagined and executed book of historical fiction with a contemporary twist, from one of the masters of the form. ‘These stories possess a wonderful clarity and ease, the serene authority of a writer working at the very height of her powers.' New York TimesRanging across two centuries, and from the western Himalayas to an Adirondack village, Servants of the Map travels the territories of yearning and awakening, of loss and...
Exceptional tales of emancipation and evolution at the birth of the modern era. Winner of US National Book Award.’Andrea Barrett’s work stands out for its sheer intelligence. The overall effect is quietly dazzling.’ New York TimesSet against the backdrop of the nineteenth century, this elegant collection of stories take their impulse from the world of science. Interweaving historical and fictional characters, they illuminate the secret passions of those driven by a devotion to, and an intimate...
`A great, shivery, seductive read.’ ElleIntelligent, accessible literary fiction of the highest order. Superbly dramatic and beautifully readable.A terrific tale of high endeavour and polar peril, this is the story of a scientific expedition to the Arctic in 1855 and the women the explorers left behind.A brilliant portrait of Victorian society obsessed with mapping and classifying everything under the sun – including the icy Arctic – where theemancipation of women and the evolution of species...
