Fingersmith
On sale
17th November 2022
Price: £25
CWA Ellis Peters Historical Award, 2002
Shortlisted for the Orange Prize and the Booker Prize. Filmed for the television and the inspiration for The Handmaiden
London 1862. Sue Trinder, orphaned at birth, grows up among petty thieves – fingersmiths – under the rough but loving care of Mrs Sucksby and her ‘family’. But from the moment she draws breath, Sue’s fate is linked to that of another orphan growing up in a gloomy mansion not too many miles away.
Beautiful hardback 20th Anniversary Edition – with lovely endpapers, a ribbon and a new afterword by this celebrated author. Fingersmith remains one of her most successful and best-loved novels.
London 1862. Sue Trinder, orphaned at birth, grows up among petty thieves – fingersmiths – under the rough but loving care of Mrs Sucksby and her ‘family’. But from the moment she draws breath, Sue’s fate is linked to that of another orphan growing up in a gloomy mansion not too many miles away.
Beautiful hardback 20th Anniversary Edition – with lovely endpapers, a ribbon and a new afterword by this celebrated author. Fingersmith remains one of her most successful and best-loved novels.
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Reviews
A thrillerish plot, fast-moving with umpteen cunning twists, it is inhabited by richly human characters whose fortunes instantly engage the reader
A chilling, ingenious erotic thriller - unputdownable
This disquietingly twisted tale will engross
Fingersmith's tight and intricate plotting and full-flavour characters follow in a fine tradition of gothic storytelling, full of love, villains and intrigue
Fingersmith is the third slice of engrossing lesbian Victoriana from Sarah Waters. Although lighter and more melodramatic in tone than its predecessor Affinity, this hypnotic suspense novel is awash with all manner of gloomy Dickensian leitmotifs
Astonishing narrative twists
A marvelous pleasure... Waters's noted attention to historical detail and her beautifully sensitive dialogue help to anchor the force-five plot twisters
A deftly plotted thriller... absorbing and elegant
Oliver Twist with a twist... Waters spins an absorbing tale that withholds as much as it discloses... A pulsating story
One of the best twists of any book, one that lifts the novel from a brilliant piece of modern Victoriana to something altogether more original and daring... Fingersmith, like so many great books, calls into question our desire to fit novels into restrictive boxes... If you like a great story, brilliantly told, you'll love this book
A sweeping read
Deliciously brazen... A smart and seductive enchantment
Totally immersive with brilliantly drawn characters... a page-turning thriller while managing to be a tender love story
Calls to mind the feverishly gloomy haunts of Charlotte and Emily Bronte... Elaborate and satisfying
There are always novels that you envy people for not having read yet, for the pleasure they still have to come. Well, this is one. Long, dark, twisted and satisfying, it's a fabulous piece of writing... An unforgettable experience
She distils a slice of London Victoriana, involving pickpockets, orphans and identity, into a fantastic plot and handles the story so well that you just can't wait to get to the end
Serious entertainment... One of the most startling plot twists you'll ever read
High spirited and utterly compelling
Superb storytelling. Fingersmith is gripping; so suspenseful and twisting is the plot that for the last 250 pages, I read at breakneck speed
Intensely atmospheric, impeccably paced, and cunningly structured, this is that rarity in contemporary fiction: a deeply serious novel that is also a thumping great read
A richly woven tale of duplicity and passion... nobody writing today surpasses the precocious Waters's virtuosic handling of narrative complexity and thickly textured period detail. This is a marvelous novel