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According to Queeney

According to Queeney

by Beryl Bainbridge (Author), Amanda Craig (Introduction), Beryl Bainbridge (Author), Amanda Craig (Introduction)

  • Used

    Paperback 2002

    $3.25

  • Used

    Hardcover 2001

    $3.25

  • New

    Paperback 2002

    $11.54
Synopsis

'A stellar literary event ... written with panache and an enviable economy ... the biggest risk of her literary life' Margaret Atwood

According to Queeney is a masterly evocation of the last years of Dr Johnson, arguably Britain's greatest Man of Letters. The time is the 1770s and 1780s and Johnson, having completed his life's major work (he compiled the first ever Dictionary of the English Language) is running an increasingly chaotic life. Torn between his strict morality and his undeclared passion for Mrs Thrale, the wife of an old friend, According to Queeney reveals one of Britain's most wonderful characters in all his wit and glory. Above all, though, this is a story of love and friendship and brilliantly narrated by Queeney, Mrs Thrale's daughter, looking back over her life.

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4 in stock

More Information

Format: Paperback
 Pages: 288
 Edition: paperback / softback
 Publisher: Abacus
Published: 05 Sep 2002
ISBN 10: 0349114471
ISBN 13: 9780349114477
Book Overview: * National press broadsheet ad campaign including The Irish Times Saturday Magazine * Author PR activity to include media interviews, starting with an interview in The Sunday Times Magazine, plus events and appearances at literary festivals * Poster and displaybin with custom header * Submitted for trade promotions * Reading copies available * Signed copies available

Media Reviews
This is a small, wise book of small prose miracles ... It is a larger miracle in this way: it makes us feel we see Johnson and his friends in unexpected and unfamiliar ways which are nevertheless convincing and authentic * Andrew Marr *
Its subjects - guilt, passion, misunderstanding and suffering - are those that she has addressed throughout her career, but never so perfectly as in this book * Amanda Craig *
Deftly brilliant...Her novel may be called According to Queeney, but it is Bainbridge's unique and acute slant on life, and death, that everywhere transforms it into the slim, packed masterpiece it is * Sunday Times *
These real people are superbly recreated in fictional form...Bainbridge's spare prose is perfectly suited to her purpose, conveying an immediate sense of experience, in the muddle and intensity of the present. This is a highly intelligent, sophisticated and entertaining novel * Observer *
Bainbridge is brilliant at combining established fact and compelling fiction * Daily Mail *
This is a triumph, subtle, rich and heartrending...Anything worth reading is of course worth reading twice, and this is worth reading many times * Independent on Sunday *
Thought-provoking and bleakly beautiful...brilliant...Bainbridge has shown herself to be working at the peak of her form * Mail on Sunday *
Poignant, pierced with truth, According to Queeney reaches into the dustier realms of history, bringing vividly to life a group of remarkable personalities with all their frailties, absurdities and cruel sensitivities * Sunday Telegraph *
A dark, often hilarious and deeply human vision ... a major literary accomplishment * Margaret Atwood *
Majestically deft.... Absolutely wonderful * Kirkus, starred review *
A stellar literary event ... written with panache and an enviable economy ... the biggest risk of her literary life * Margaret Atwood *
This is a small, wise book of small prose miracles ... It is a larger miracle in this way: it makes us feel we see Johnson and his friends in unexpected and unfamiliar ways which are nevertheless convincing and authentic. I did not think anyone could do t * Andrew Marr, DAILY TELEGRAPH *
It is hard to think of anyone now writing who understands the human heart as Beryl Bainbridge does, or exposes its workings with more tenderness * THE TIMES *
This is a triumph, subtle, rich and heartrending...Anything worth reading is of course worth reading twice, and this is worth reading many times. * INDEPENDENT ON SUNDAY *
Author Bio
Beryl Bainbridge wrote seventeen novels, two travel books and five plays for stage and television, she was shortlisted for the Booker Prize five times, and won literary awards including the Whitbread Prize and the Author of the Year Award at the British Book Awards. She died in July 2010.