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  • Published: 14 September 2021
  • ISBN: 9781529112276
  • Imprint: Vintage
  • Format: Paperback
  • Pages: 464
  • RRP: $26.00
Categories:

Islands of Mercy




An audacious novel about destiny and desire from the incomparable Rose Tremain

'A hell of a read' Sunday Times

'Triumphant, and beautifully told...one of the best novelists writing today' Sara Collins, Guardian

All must gamble with their fate. But not all can win...

In the city of Bath, in the year 1865 Jane Adeane, renowned for her restorative skills, is convinced that some other destiny will one day show itself to her.

But when she finds herself torn between a dangerous affair with a female lover and the promise of a conventional marriage to an apparently respectable doctor, her desires begin to lead her towards a future she had never imagined...

Discover the ultimate historical read.

'Terrific' The Times

'One of our most accomplished novelists' Observer

'One of my favourite writers' Nina Stibbe

  • Published: 14 September 2021
  • ISBN: 9781529112276
  • Imprint: Vintage
  • Format: Paperback
  • Pages: 464
  • RRP: $26.00
Categories:

About the author

Rose Tremain

Rose Tremain’s novels and short stories have been published in thirty countries and have won many awards, including the Orange Prize (The Road Home), the Dylan Thomas Award (The Colonel's Daughter and Other Stories), the Whitbread Novel of the Year (Music & Silence) and the James Tait Black Memorial Prize (Sacred Country). Her most recent novel, The Gustav Sonata, was a Sunday Times Top Ten Bestseller. It won the National Jewish Book Award in the US, the South Bank Sky Arts Award in the UK and was shortlisted for the Costa Novel Award. Rose Tremain was made a CBE in 2007 and a Dame in 2020. She lives in Norfolk and London with the biographer, Richard Holmes.

www.rosetremain.co.uk

Also by Rose Tremain

See all

Praise for Islands of Mercy

A moving exploration of love and the sacrifices we're willing to make in its name

Joanne Finney, Good Housekeeping

An exhilarating exploration of love, life, loss and death... A thrilling and seductive story... Vivid and beguiling

Rowan Mantell, Eastern Daily Press

Another gratifyingly well-put-together work... Tremain's long sentences brim with a poised positivity...[and] add lightness to her fond depictions of these imperfect strivers

Francesca Carington, Sunday Telegraph, *Novel of the Week*

A hell of a read - so emotionally sophisticated, so deft with shade and light, more absorbing than most fiction I've read this year

Johanna Thomas-Corr, Sunday Times

Terrific

Louise Carpenter, The Times

A new book from Rose Tremain is always a cause for celebration. Her exceptionally well-crafted and deeply humane historical novels are invariably a joy and Islands of Mercy is no exception... A rich, rewarding and highly satisfying novel from one of our finest novelists.

Daunt Books

An enjoyable page-turner

Robert Douglas-Fairhurst, The Times

Over a distinguished literary career, Rose Tremain has traversed genres with her customary flair... in her portrayal of the ways in which individual longing and frustration unfold against the constraints of forces beyond our control, Tremain has long been one of our most accomplished novelists, and here is further confirmation

Stephanie Merritt, The Observer

Rose Tremain gives Hilary Mantel a run for her money for the title of Britain's greatest living historical novelist... there are still few writers who can conjure up a version of the past that is so startlingly unfamiliar yet so convincing

Charlotte Heathcote, Sunday Express

Vivid, transgressive, explicit and kaleidoscopic

Rose Shepherd, Saga Magazine

Subtle, illuminating and captivating

Eithne Farry, Mail on Sunday