Galilee - Softcover

Barker, Clive

Softcover

ISBN 10: 000225798X ISBN 13: 9780002257985

Publisher: HarperCollins, 1998

Synopsis

Erotic, exotic: classic Clive Barker.

Two great dynasties dominate modern America: the Geary family – possessors of a wealthy, powerful political empire founded on a history of corruption and criminality; and the Barbarossa family – elegant, beautiful, and not entirely human.

This is a story of a young woman who enters the glittering Geary clan; and discovers the profound, dark enigma that lies at its heart.

Raised in humble circumstances in North Carolina, Amy Honeycutt never dreamed she would marry anyone so glamorous, rich or wonderful as Mitchell Geary, one of America’s most eligible bachelors. But in the months that follow her fairytale wedding she comes to realize that the clan exists to hide a terrible secret: Galilee.

Galilee – 200 years old and by no means human – was captured by the Gearys during the Civil War. Now he exists as their slave. It is not his sexual services (though they are remarkable) nor his powers as an assassin that will precipitate the downfall of the Geary empire, however: it is the passion he will come to share with Amy that will bring about an eruption of violence and horror that could devastate the Geary family’s Presidential ambitions for ever...

About this title

Review:

Over many years and through many books Clive Barker has earned a reputation as the thinking person's horror writer. His novels have mixed fantasy, psychology and sheer creepiness in almost equal quantities, and while the gore quotient remains relatively low the tension always runs high. However, in Galilee Barker tones down the ghoulish in favour of the gothic. His novel (or as the author would have it, "romance") tells the tale of two warring families caught up in a disastrous web of corruption, illicit sexuality and star-crossed love, with a soupçon of the supernatural thrown in as well. On one side are the wealthy Gearys--a fictional stand-in for the Kennedys--and on the other are the Barbarossas, a mysterious black clan that has been around--quite literally--since the time of Adam. Galilee chronicles the twisted course of this centuries- old family feud which centres around the magical Barbarossa matriarch Cesaria and her son Galilee. Indeed, it's the latter figure--one part Heathcliff to one part Christ--whose relationship with the Geary women sets a match to the entire powder keg of hostility and resentment. Mixing standard clichés of romance with his own peculiarly deep-fried version of the Southern gothic, Baker has come up with an intelligent and shamelessly amusing potboiler.

Review:

Praise for Clive Barker:

‘An invocation of both magic and the imagination... A majestic maze of mythmaking’
WASHINGTON TIMES

‘Passionate and ingenious... A ride with remarkable views’
TIMES LITERARY SUPPLEMENT

‘Barker dislocates your mind’
MAIL ON SUNDAY

About this edition

• Publisher: HarperCollins
• Publication date: 1998
• ISBN 10: 000225798X
• ISBN 13: 9780002257985
• Binding: Paperback