Church of Marvels by Leslie Parry
A ravishing first novel, set in vibrant, tumultuous turn-of-the-century New York City, where the lives of four outsiders become entwined, bringing irrevocable change to them all.New York, 1895. Sylvan Threadgill, a night soiler cleaning out the privies behind the tenement houses, finds an abandoned newborn baby in the muck. An orphan himself, Sylvan rescues the child, determined to find where she belongs. Odile Church and her beautiful sister, Belle, were raised amid the applause and magical pageantry of The Church of Marvels, their mother?s spectacular Coney Island sideshow. But the Church has burnt to the ground, their mother dead in its ashes. Now Belle, the family’s star, has vanished into the bowels of Manhattan, leaving Odile alone and desperate to find her. A young woman named Alphie awakens to find herself trapped across the river in Blackwell’s Lunatic Asylum, sure that her imprisonment is a ruse by her husband’s vile, overbearing mother. On the ward she meets another young woman of ethereal beauty who does not speak, a girl with an extraordinary talent that might save them both. As these strangers’ lives become increasingly connected, their stories and secrets unfold. Moving from the Coney Island seashore to the tenement-studded streets of the Lower East Side, a spectacular human circus to a brutal, terrifying asylum, Church of Marvels takes readers back to turn-of-the-century New York – a city of hardship and dreams, love and loneliness, hope and danger. In magnetic, luminous prose, Leslie Parry offers a richly atmospheric vision of the past in a narrative of astonishing beauty, full of wondrous enchantments, a marvelous debut that will leave readers breathless.
ISBN 9780062367563, Paperback
There are currently 29 Members Wishing for this book.
1 lucky member will win a brand-new copy.
To enter, simply leave a comment on this Blog post. You must be a PaperBackSwap member in good standing to win.
We will choose 1 winner at random from comments we receive here on the Blog from PBS members.
You have until Sunday, July 7 , 2019 at 12 noon ET, to leave a comment.
Good Luck to everyone!
Note: All the books given away on Free Book Friday are available in the PBS Market. We have thousands of new and new overstock titles available right now, with more added hourly. Some of the prices are amazing – and you can use a PBS credit to make the deal even better!
Wow this is a book you won’t want to put down!! If it is as good as it sounds???
awesome!
This sounds great!!
Sounds like just the kind of book I enjoy reading!
Thanks so much for the chance to win. Sounds like it will be a good book 🙂
What a mixture of plot lines. Would love to see how they are resolved
A new author. Am very curious of her plots and writing style.
Have not read this book so excited to do so. Love this site, have received so many excellent books. So I glad I found it. Happy reading.
great!
Sounds like a splendid read. Can’t wait.
Some of my favorite authors and best reads have been found by wandering libraries and serendipitously pulling random books from shelves or (in the old days) flicking through the index-card catalogues to stop at nowhere in particular. Reading to tastes is fine but the world of literature is way too diverse and whimsical for that. This could be a next new favorite.
My favorite genre – historical fiction. Thanks
This sounds like a book that I’d love to read! Even if I don’t win it I might put it on my wishlist!
Would love to obtain a copy of this book. Historical fiction is one of my favorite genres.
I love turn of the century novels
Wow, sounds like something I would like to read.
I don’t read suspense, but it would make a nice gift for friends who do.
Sounds like an intriguing book!
Thanks for the chance to read this book!
I really like the choices you make for Free Friday. I end up
reading most of them, even though I haven’t been lucky. 🙂
Sounds like a great book. Thanks for the chance to win!
Would love to read this book!
Sounds like a good read.
Sounds very interesting!
I’d love to read this one.
Looks interesting
Exciting!
This sounds like a real page turner.
I like books that show how people’s lives interconnect in ways we’d never imagine. Thanks for the chance to win!
I would be interested to find out more about the author’s research process and what inspired the writing of it.
I enjoy reading this type of historical fiction
Pick me please 🙂
Sounds like quite an interesting book. I would like to read it.
Looks like a good book if you can judge a book by it cover.
Interesting book from the blurb. Hope I win it.
Yo, hit me…
What fun! Please enter my name, as well. 🙂
This sounds like a book, right up my alley! Would love to read it.
Sounds like a page turner.