>
MICHAEL IRWIN
The Skull and The Nightingale
About the Book Set in England in the early 1760s, this is a chilling and deliciously dark tale of manipulation, sex, and seduction. When Richard Fenwick, a young man without family or means, returns to London from the Grand Tour, his wealthy godfather, James Gilbert, has an unexpected proposition. Gilbert has led a fastidious life in Worcestershire, but now in his advancing years, he feels the urge to experience, even vicariously, the extremes of human feeling—love and passion, adultery and deceit—along with something much more sinister. He has selected Fenwick to be his proxy, and his ward has no option but to accept. But Gilbert’s elaborate and manipulative “experiments” into the workings of human behaviour drag Fenwick into a vortex of betrayal and danger where lives are ruined and tragedy is always one small step away. And when Fenwick falls in love with one of Gilbert’s pawns and the stakes rise even higher – is it too late for him to escape the Faustian pact? Praise for The Skull and The Nightingale: ‘This is a surprising and thrilling Rake’s Progress. I enjoyed every word’ Diana Athill, author of Stet ‘I really admired and enjoyed it. The atmosphere, idiom and characters are great, and the plotting terrific – I had a genuine shock at the end’ Jenny Uglow ‘A splendid novel: immaculately researched, morally fascinating and strangely troubling. It kept surprising me and delighting me in equal measure’ Andrew Taylor, author of The American Boy ‘I devoured this dark, compelling tale of an eighteenth-century Faustus and his Mephostophilis, which troubles the reader with a growing unease from the start and never slackens pace right up to its disturbing conclusion’ Maria McCann, author of The Wilding About the Author After teaching at various universities around the world, Michael Irwin moved to the University of Kent, in Canterbury, where he became Professor of English, specialising in eighteenth and nineteenth-century literature. His published eighteenth century work includes a full-length study of Fielding and essays that take in Defoe, Richardson, Sterne, Smollett, Johnson and Pope. Table of Contents
Praise for The Skull and The Nightingale
The Skull and The Nightingale – Reading Group Guide
For Stella
There is no difference to be found between the skull of King Philip and that of another man.
Samuel Richardson, Clarissa 1 It was a breezy day in March when I returned to London from two years of travel, my age twenty-three, my prospects uncertain. I refreshed
