Merivel bookcover

Merivel

A Man of His Time
4.9/5.0
21,000+ Reviews
Bookshop.org has the highest-rated customer service of any bookstore in the world

Description

The gaudy years of the Restoration are long gone. Robert Merivel, physician and courtier to Charles II, loved for his gift for turning sorrow into laughter, now faces the agitations and anxieties of middle age. Questions crowd his mind: has he been a good father? Is he a fair master? Is he the King's friend or the King's slave?

In search of answers, Merivel sets off for the French court. But Versailles--all glitter in front and squalor behind--leaves Merivel in despair, until a chance encounter with Madame de Flamanville, a seductive Swiss botanist, allows him to dream of an honorable future.

Yet will that future ever be his? Back home at Bidnold Manor, his loyalty and medical skills are tested to their limits, while the captive bear he has brought back from France begins to cause havoc in his heart and on his estate.

With a cascade of lace at his neck and a laugh that can burst out of him in the midst of torment, Merivel is a uniquely brilliant creation--soulful, funny, outrageous, and achingly sad. He is Everyman. His unmistakable, self-mocking voice speaks directly to us down the centuries.

Product Details

PublisherW. W. Norton & Company
Publish DateApril 15, 2013
Pages373
LanguageEnglish
TypeBook iconHardback
EAN/UPC9780393079579
Dimensions9.4 X 6.4 X 1.2 inches | 1.4 pounds
BISAC Categories: Historical Fiction,

About the Author

Rose Tremain's prize-winning books, including The Road Home, The Gustav Sonata, Merivel, and The American Lover, have been published in thirty countries. Chancellor of the University of East Anglia, Commander of the Order of the British Empire, and member of the Royal Society of Literature, she lives in Norfolk, England with the biographer Richard Holmes.

Reviews

Tremain's control of her character and her reflective but often dramatic unfolding of events are impressive acts of authorial ventriloquism, in which she gives a nod to the great diarists of that era but carries off her own man's story with wit, grace and originality. . . . She not only effortlessly sustains momentum and mood, but brings the novel to as near a perfect ending as one could wish.--Rosemary Goring

Earn by promoting books

Earn money by sharing your favorite books through our Affiliate program.sign up to affiliate program link
Become an affiliate