Scapegallows
Format:Paperback
Publisher:Little, Brown Book Group
Published:3rd Jul '08
£9.99
Available to order, but very limited on stock - if we have issues obtaining a copy, we will let you know.
* Author PR activity to include media interviews and events * Review coverage * Featured on the Virago website * Reading copies available
* A convict colony in New South Wales, Australia is the setting for Carol Birch's new novel, based on real events. Now out in paperback, Birch proves once again that she is 'a born storyteller' TIMES
This is the story of Margaret Catchpole, born into a smugglers' world in Suffolk in the late 1700s. As the valued servant of a wealthy family and a friend of criminals, Margaret leads a double life that inevitably brings about her downfall, and she is sentenced to hang not once, but twice. But she escapes the gallows and is transported with other convicts to Australia.
A wonderful adventure story, Scapegallows takes inspiration from the life of the real Margaret Catchpole. A woman who lived by her wits, she was a slip-gibbet, a scapegallows.
** 'Birch deftly tells a story spanning several decades, with an intensity that is . . . lyrical . . . . and evokes the period without compromising her complex diachronic concerns * TLS ** '[Birch has] a first class voice . . . An exciting and evocative fictional version of the life of Margaret Catchpole . . . The novel is a triumph of texture and historical detail’ *
SUNDAY TIMES * ** 'Birch deftly tells a story spanning several decades, with an intensity that is . . . lyrical . . . . and evokes the period without compromising her complex diachronic concerns’ *
TLS * ** 'A rich portrait of a shadowy world of 18th century sailors and smugglers, full of characters both charming and fatally flawed. Fans of Margaret Atwood's ALIAS GRACE will enjoy this engaging and compassionate tale’ *
PSYCHOLOGIES * ** 'Birch is a naturally literary writer who can, with a simple image, evoke the deepest emotion’ *
- Winner of EDP-Jarrold East Anglian Book Awards 2008 (UK)
ISBN: 9781844083916
Dimensions: 196mm x 130mm x 30mm
Weight: 360g
448 pages