Mrs. Gulliver
A Novel
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- $14.99
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- $14.99
Publisher Description
From the prize-winning and beloved author Valerie Martin (Mary Reilly, Property, Italian Fever) comes a surprisingly inventive tale of female subversion and agency in a patriarchal world, with two brilliantly crafted protagonists to root for.
It’s 1954 on far-flung Verona Island, a tropical paradise with a fragile economy and a rising crime rate. Prostitution is legal and Lila Gulliver is proud of her business, a high-end brothel where her clients are guaranteed privacy and discretion. When Carità Bercy, a young, destitute, and beautiful blind woman arrives at her door seeking employment, Lila decides to give her a chance.
Carità proves a valuable asset to the house, as well as a psychological puzzle to her employer. One hot night, Ian Drohan, a handsome youth and the scion of the wealthiest family on the island, visits Lila’s house and falls madly in love with Carità. Lila doubts his sincerity and fears for Carità ‘s future.
Carità has no such fears. In fact, Carità is a reckless force of nature, determined to succeed in ways Lila hasn’t even contemplated.
Spirits of the star-crossed lovers Romeo and Juliet, as well as the devilish denizens of the magical island in The Tempest, haunt this steamy tale of passionate love, found and lost, and found again.
PUBLISHERS WEEKLY
Martin (The Ghost of the Mary Celeste) sets this undercooked romp in a brothel on a fictional tropical island in the 1950s, where prostitution is legal. The story opens with beautiful blind orphan Carità Bercy arriving at the brothel in search of employment. Hired by proprietor Lila Gulliver, Carità is breezy and self-possessed, popular with the other girls and the clients. Then Ian Drohan, the self-righteous heir to one of the island's largest fortunes, falls for Carità, and the star-crossed lovers run away to be secretly married. It turns out Ian is sought by a gang boss whose goon Ian killed in a shoot-out after he murdered Ian's friend. Ian's father, Mike, searches for his son at the brothel, where he meets Lila. The two become romantically involved as they set out to find the runaways. As the plot unfolds, the enigmatic Carità, who desires most of all to go to college and sees Ian as her ticket to get there, reveals herself to be more self-serving than heartfelt. Unfortunately, Martin doesn't delve into questions of agency or victimization, slipping instead into trite language and cringe-worthy clichés ("He pulled me in gently for a five-alarm kiss"; "My knees buckled"). This lacks the punch of Martin's earlier works.
