THE STORY
It is 1792 and the political fallout from the French Revolution is rippling across Europe, including the prosperous city of Bristol. This is where property developer John Diner Tredevant has embarked on his most ambitious project yet: a magnificent terrace of houses clinging to the gorge overlooking the River Avon. But as fears of war with France grow and economic confidence evaporates, nobody wants to risk buying expensive homes and Tredevant faces ruin.
As his mood gradually darkens, the person who suffers most is his new young wife, Lizzie, the daughter of a radical writer Julia Fawkes, who is part of a group that shares the ideals of the revolutionaries across the Channel. As Tredevant becomes more possessive and threatening, Lizzie begins to question what really became of her husband’s first wife, who supposedly died after a short illness. Lizzie begins to fear for her life and that of her newborn brother, who she takes in after her mother dies in childbirth. This atmospheric 18th-century psychological thriller grips from the beginning to its heart-racing conclusion.
To read Dunmore is to live history – MARIELLA FROSTRUP
THE TASTER
‘He touched my heart then, because he wanted to think of our future and not the precarious day-to-day we were living now. If no one bought the houses… It made me sick to think of it. I could go back and live in rooms easily enough, but not Diner. There could be no more public humiliation than for a man to begin a magnificent terrace and be forced to abandon it, or to sell the houses at a knockdown price to anyone who would have them. That was not going to happen to him.’
THE AUTHOR
Award-winning poet and novelist Helen Dunmore died last June at the age of 64, just a few months after Birdcage Walk was published in hardback. It was her 12th novel and attracted widespread praise, with one critic calling it the finest she had written. There is more about Helen’s life and career at youreadinggroup.co.uk, plus exclusive background material about Birdcage Walk and suggested topics for your own book club discussion.
Birdcage Walk is published by Windmill, price £8.99. To order a copy for £7.19 until 14 January, go to you-bookshop.co.uk or call 0844 571 0640; free p&p on orders over £15.