The Great Stink (Thorndike Press Large Print Mystery Series) - Hardcover

Clark, Clare

3.54

1,412 ratings by Goodreads

9780786283217: The Great Stink (Thorndike Press Large Print Mystery Series)

Hardcover

ISBN 10: 0786283211 ISBN 13: 9780786283217

Publisher: Thorndike Pr, 2006

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William May returns to London after the horrors of the Crimean War. Scarred and fragile though he is, he lands a job at the heart of Bazalgette's transformation of the London sewers. There, in the darkness of the stinking tunnels beneath the rising towers of Victorian London May discovers another side of the city and remembers a disturbing, violent past. And then the corruption of the growing city soon begins to overwhelm him and a violent murder is committed. Will the sewers reveal all and show that the world above ground is even darker and more threatening than the tunnels beneath? Beautifully written, evocative and compelling and with a fantastically vivid cast of characters, Clare Clarke's first book is a rich and suspenseful novel that draws the reader right into Victorian London and into the worlds of its characters desperately attempting to swim the tides of change.

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Review:

'Evocative, deeply researched and thoroughly enjoyable...oozes with the stench of humanity and the secret history of subterranean Victorian London' -- Simon Sebag-Montefiore

'Not since Patrick Suskind wrote Perfume has a novelist so effectively made a story reek with atmosphere' -- Publishing New

'Staggeringly evocative...a fine new novelist' -- Margaret Forster

From the Back Cover:

"[Clark] keeps the suspense high . . . [in this] captivating historical thriller."--People (4 stars)
It is 1855, and engineer William May has returned home to London and his beloved wife from the horrors of the Crimean War. When he secures a job transforming the city s sewer system, he believes that he will be able to find salvation in the subterranean world beneath the city. But the peace of the tunnels is shattered by a murder, and William is implicated as the killer. Could he truly have committed the crime? How will he bring the truth above-ground?
"In rich Dickensian detail, Clark creates the whole city teeming with life and decay, but she keeps the focus on a few fascinating characters in desperate straits . . . it's a rich work of history and a gripping exploration of the unmentionable currents that run beneath the surface of our lives--and it reeks of talent."--Washington Post Book World
"Who knew that drainage could be so captivating? And, more to the point, that excrement could be so, well, lyrically malleable? The Great Stink is a trove of olfactory poetry . . . The Great Stink is a crackerjack historical novel that combines the creepy intrigue of Caleb Carr, the sensory overload of Peter Ackroyd and the academic curiosity of A.S. Byatt."--Los Angeles Times

CLARE CLARK was born in London in 1967. A Senior Scholar at Trinity College Cambridge, she graduated with a Double First in History. THE GREAT STINK, her first novel, won the Quality Paperback Book Club s New Voices Fiction Award. She is married with two children and lives in London.
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