Life Mask

The bestselling author of Slammerkin vividly brings to life the Beau Monde of late eighteenth-century England, turning the private drama of three celebrated Londoners into a robust, full-bodied portrait of a world on the brink of revolution. In a time of looming war, of glittering spectacle and financial disasters, the wealthy liberals of the Whig Party work to topple a tyrannical prime minister and a lunatic king. Marriages and friendships stretch or break; political liaisons prove as dangerous as erotic ones; and everyone wears a mask. Will Eliza Farren, England's leading comedic actress, gain entry to that elite circle that calls itself the World? Can Lord Derby, the inventor of the horse race that bears his name, endure public mockery of his long, unconsummated courtship of the actress? Will Anne Damer, a sculptor and rumored Sapphist, be the cause of Eliza's fall from grace?

This is a remakable novel in the tradition of the very best historical fiction.


Binding Type: Paperback
Publisher: Mariner Books
Published: 09/01/2005
ISBN: 9780156032643
Pages: 650
Weight: 1.52lbs
Size: 7.96h x 5.40w x 1.23d

Review Citations: Ingram Advance 09/01/2005 pg. 72
New York Times 11/06/2005 pg. 36