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Shadowplay: The gripping international bestseller from the author of Star of the Sea
Joseph O´connor
FREE Delivery in Ireland
Description for Shadowplay: The gripping international bestseller from the author of Star of the Sea
Paperback.
Discover the enthralling Richard & Judy Book Club pick from international bestseller Joseph O'Connor.
'The best novel that I've read in the last twenty years... It's fantastic' RICHARD MADELEY
'Breathtaking... A hugely entertaining book about the grand scope of friendship and love' Sadie Jones, Guardian
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London, 1878. Three extraordinary people begin their life together - and the idea for Dracula is born.
Fresh from life in Dublin, Bram Stoker - now manager of the Lyceum Theatre - is wrestling with dark demons in a new city, in a new marriage, and with his own literary ... Read moreaspirations. As he walks the streets at night, streets haunted by the Ripper and the gossip which swirls around his friend Oscar Wilde, he finds new inspiration. Soon, the eerie tale of Dracula begins to emerge.
But Henry Irving, volcanic leading man and impresario, is determined that nothing will get in the way of Bram's dedication to the Lyceum. And both men are growing ever more enchanted by the beauty and boldness of Ellen Terry, the most celebrated actress of her generation.
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Shortlisted for the Costa Novel Award 2019
Winner of the Irish Book Awards Novel of the Year
'A colourful tale of secret love and public performance...in a romantic, lost London' The Times
'Hugely entertaining and atmospheric' DEBORAH MOGGACH
'Extraordinary' SEBASTIAN BARRY
'A novel I'd recommend to anyone: a rollicking and moving story' James Naughtie, Radio Times
'Fabulous... A truly great book you simply cannot put down' JUDY FINNIGAN
'Rich, sad, funny, and a beautiful read. You'll LOVE it' RICHARD MADELEY
'Ingenious...hugely impressive and utterly haunting' Sunday Mirror
*JOSEPH O'CONNOR'S STUNNING NEW NOVEL, MY FATHER'S HOUSE, IS AVAILABLE TO PRE-ORDER NOW*
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Product Details
Publisher
Vintage Publishing
Place of Publication
London, United Kingdom
Shipping Time
Usually ships in 2 to 4 working days
About Joseph O´connor
Joseph O’Connor’s fiction has been published in forty languages. His twenty books include eleven novels, among them the million-selling Star of the Sea, Ghost Light, Shadowplay and My Father’s House, a Washington Post Book of the Year. His work has been shortlisted for the LA Times Book Award, twice for the Whitbread/Costa and twice for the Walter Scott Prize for ... Read moreHistorical Fiction and has won the Nielsen Bookscan Golden Book Award, France’s Prix Millepages, Italy’s Premio Acerbi and Premio Napoli, an American Library Association Award, the American Ireland Fund Literary Award, the Hennessy Writer of the Year and Hall of Fame Awards, the Eason/An Post Novel of the Year Award, a Cullman Fellowship at the New York Public Library, the Irish Pen Award for Outstanding Achievement and the Prix Madeline Zepter for European Novel of the Year. He is Frank McCourt Chair of Creative Writing at the University of Limerick. www.josephoconnorauthor.com Show Less
Reviews for Shadowplay: The gripping international bestseller from the author of Star of the Sea
Dazzling...the panache and subtlety of his prose perfectly match that gusto and creative finesse of the High Victorian world his novel wonderfully evokes
Sunday Times
A novel I'd recommend to anyone: a rollicking and moving story... Delicious and clever late-Victorian gothic
James Naughtie
Radio Times
An ingenious novel… O’Connor’s work is hugely impressive and utterly ... Read morehaunting
Sunday Mirror
Joseph O’Connor is a very great artist and storyteller. The quotient of enjoyment in his extraordinary new novel is stupendous
Sebastian Barry A hugely entertaining book about the grand scope of friendship and love, it is also, movingly – at times, astonishingly – a story of transience, loss and true loyalty
Sadie Jones
Guardian
A work of Gothic splendour...O'Connor's writing is always intensely atmospheric. As a romp through Ripper-ravaged London, Shadowplay is mightily entertaining. But as a meditation on hidden sexuality, it is powerful and poignant
Literary Review
A fabulous novel that tells the otherwise largely unknown story of the man behind Gothic horror's most enduring character… The narrative stretches decades, and throbs with theatrical vigour. This is writing at its most immersive, full of Dickensian pulchritude and pathos. It should, and might well, win prizes
Nick Duerden
i
A rollicking tale… an affecting depiction of artistic and social emancipation… O’Connor’s well-researched theatrical caper offers total immersion in a romantic, lost London... be nourished by a colourful tale of secret love and public performance
The Times
There are few living writers who can take us back in time so assuredly, with such sensual density, through such gorgeous sentences. Joseph O’Connor is a wonder, and Shadowplay is a triumph.
Peter Carey, twice winner of the Booker Prize Gorgeously dark… Shadowplay is an accomplished, compelling read
Herald
A hugely entertaining and atmospheric novel, one can almost smell the greasepaint
Deborah Moggach A mesmerising read, meticulously researched, with beautiful prose...O'Connor has the gift of conjuring up any location....Wonderful suspense a la Wilkie Collins
Sunday Independent
Wonderful. The writing is beautiful.
Derek Jacobi This is a marvellous novel: at once freewheeling, exultant, fully inhabiting the momentary, transitory nature of its world; and intensely aware of the limitations – too frequently self-imposed – of our painfully fleeting lives.
Dublin Review of Books
One of Ireland's finest writers
John Boyne
Washington Post
Three famous Victorians carry this sparkling historical novel: Sir Henry Irving, the great actor-manager; Ellen Terry, his leading lady; and Bram Stoker, the young Irishman who worked for Irving as a theatre manager before writing Dracula. From their entangled lives Joseph O’Connor weaves a story of love and loyalty, rich in wit and imagination.
100 Sizzling Summer Books
Daily Mail
One of the best writers working today
Alice Walker In gorgeous sentences, Joseph O’Connor captures the essence of three very different artistic temperaments in all their nobility and glorious absurdity
Jake Kerridge
Sunday Express
Joseph O'Connor is the only writer I know who can make you laugh and cry in the same sentence.
Lawrence Norfolk Joseph O'Connor is the only writer I know who can make you laugh and cry in the same sentence.
Lawrence Norfolk Magnificent
John Boyne A virtuoso act of literary ventriloquism. Shadowplay is funny, smart, tender, wise and written with inch-perfect precision
Colum McCann A thrilling novel, exquisitely contrived to show the characters whose loves and lives inspired Dracula. A great tribute, and a work of art. Deeply affecting.
Essie Fox As fascinating and memorable as anything O'Connor has done. The writing, too, as thrilling as ever. A great writer performing Olympian literary storytelling.
Sir Bob Geldof O’Connor is a true master of historical fiction, able to illuminate a bygone age with skill, wit and imagination
Max Davidson
Mail on Sunday
A lushly enjoyable pastiche of fin-de-siècle prose, in which Victorian euphemism is an authenticating stamp that double as a source of humour
Anthony Cummins
Observer
A luminous and masterly depiction of Bram Stoker’s time at the Lyceum, this wonderful book explores the complex nature of love and creativity. Utterly captivating.
Sophia Tobin Beautifully written. O’Connor creates a vivid and vigorous world of his own
Andrew Taylor
Spectator
Beautifully written and gorgeously atmospheric
Best
A beautifully written masterpiece
SHEmazing!
A vividly written and atmospheric meditation on the creative process
Elizabeth Buchan
Daily Mail
O’Connor is masterly at evoking the late Victorian era; its train journeys, street scenes, formality and banter… O’Connor is masterly at evoking the late Victorian era; its train journeys, street scenes, formality and banter
Suzi Feay
Financial Times
Rich and vivid
Daily Telegraph
Joseph O'Connor has written an entertaining novel that combines narrative with transcripts of recordings, diary entries and other notes. It steeps viewers in the theatre of Irving and Terry in the late 1870s and beyond, providing much informative colour at the same time as delving deeply and frankly into a series of relationships that are generally convincing.
Philip Fisher
British Theatre Guide
O’Connor tells his story in rich and stylish prose
Times Literary Supplement
A rousing story about a remarkable woman
Mail on Sunday,
Summer reads of 2019
Joseph O’Connor’s vivid descriptive writing evokes Stoker’s memories of the post-famine Ireland of his youth and of Irving’s company’s fraught tours of America… [his] fine writing, his wit and sympathy create a richly enjoyable backdrop for some familiar characters
Tablet,
Novel of the Week
Enthralling… Brings to teeming life the London of the late Victorian and Edwardian eras
Irish Times
Brilliant... alternately deeply moving and laugh-aloud funny
Peter Marshall
History Today
O'Connor's gift is to weave whimsical moments in between the complexity of relationships and people... a beautiful story
Tracey Steel
People's Friend
An ambitious celebration of friendship, theatre and the power of darkness, Shadowplay is chilling and dramatic in equal measure
Jane Shilling
Daily Mail
A wonderfully evocative tale within a tale
Ben East
Observer
A thrilling novel, exquisitely contrived to show the characters whose loves and lives inspired Dracula. A great tribute, and a work of art. Deeply affecting.
Essie Fox Show Less
