The Empress Of The Last Days - Hardcover

Stevenson, Jane

Hardcover

ISBN 10: 0224061429 ISBN 13: 9780224061421

Publisher: Jonathan Cape Ltd, 2003

Synopsis

The triumphant conclusion to Stevenson's trilogy of historical novels. The Empress of the Last Days is the final volume of the remarkable trilogy that began with Astraea and The Pretender. Whereas the events of those novels occurred in the seventeenth century, those of this novel take place now, in the twenty-first. A series of documents come to light in Middelburg and London. They touch upon the events described in Astraea and The Pretender. A group of friends, Corinne, Theodoor and Michael, bring together their talents and knowledge to uncover the hidden story of Pelagius's royal marriage. The lives which readers of the first two books have known as lived experience have been reduced to information, guesses based on dusty scraps of paper. As a result of their investigations, Michael finds himself journeying to Barbados to meet the last descendant of the marriage of Pelagius and Elizabeth of Bohemia - a young black scientist who, unknown to herself, has a serious claim to be considered the rightful queen of England. This meeting, and the discoveries which result from it, changes both their lives, and forces them to re-examine their assumptions and the terms on which they live. The Empress of the Last Days is set in Middelburg, Utrecht, London, Silloth on the coast of Cumbria, and Barbados. It is in part a tale of discovery, and in part a love story: a tragicomedy in which race, academic politics, and contemporary enthusiasm for 'spin' all have their parts to play.

About this title

Review:

"Spectacular talent...great intellectual sharpness... [This] is a profoundly satisfying end to a magnificent sequence" (Guardian)

"Jane Stevenson's touch is so light, her learning so deep and wide, that you enter another country which, while foreign, soon feels as familiar as your own" (Daily Telegraph)

"The Empress of the Last Days is a detective story and an account of 'a game of snakes and ladders for young academics', but it is also a novel of ideas...it's refreshing to read an accessible fiction that races at serious themes with its horns lowered" (Observer)

"Stevenson deftly strikes a balance between lush romanticism and cool contemporary realism" (Sunday Times)

"Stevenson is excellent at historical detail and on relationships in history...she has whetted our appetite for more delicious tastes from the past" (Scotsman)

Book Description:

'Jane Stevenson is a writer of formidable ability' - Sunday Telegraph

About this edition

• Publisher: Jonathan Cape Ltd
• Publication date: 2003
• ISBN 10: 0224061429
• ISBN 13: 9780224061421
• Binding: Hardcover
• Number of pages: 368