Beautiful Lies
Play sample
  • Published: 15 June 2013
  • ISBN: 9780099570462
  • Imprint: Vintage
  • Format: Paperback
  • Pages: 512
  • RRP: $19.99

Beautiful Lies

Formats & editions
Audiobook
6 Dec 2012
Paperback
15 Jun 2013
Buy from…
Amazon Booktopia Dymocks QBD Readings Find local retailers Find local retailers Abbeys Angus & Robertson Boomerang Collins Fishpond Gleebooks Harry Hartog Kinokuniya Robinsons The Nile Your Bookstore

London, 1887. In a momentous year dogged by economic crisis, riots and a voracious press hungry for scandal - how can one MP's wife bury the truth about her past?

It is 1887, and an unsettled London prepares to celebrate Queen Victoria's Golden Jubilee. Maribel, beautiful bohemian wife of maverick political Edward Campbell Lowe and self-proclaimed Chilean heiress educated in Paris, debates how to make her own mark on the world, while experimenting with the new art of photography. However, the wife of an outspoken member of parliament, whose views inspire enmity and admiration in equal measure, should not be hiding the kind of secrets Maribel has buried in her past.

When a notorious newspaper editor beings to take an uncommon interest in her, Maribel fears he will destroy not only Edward's career but both of their reputations.
  • Published: 15 June 2013
  • ISBN: 9780099570462
  • Imprint: Vintage
  • Format: Paperback
  • Pages: 512
  • RRP: $19.99
Categories:
Share…

About the author

Clare Clark

Clare Clark's critically acclaimed novels include The Great Stink and Savage Lands, both longlisted for the Orange Prize for Fiction. She is a regular contributor to the Guardian and writes for numerous other publications, both in the UK and the USA. She lives and works in London.

Clare Clark was born in London in 1967. A Senior Scholar at Trinity College Cambridge she graduated with a Double First in History. Her novel, The Great Stink, won the Pendleton May First Novel Award, was shortlisted for the CWA First Novel Award and was longlisted for the Orange Prize for Fiction. She is married with two children and lives in London.

portrait photo of Clare Clark

Also by Clare Clark

We That Are Left
Savage Lands
See all

Praise for Beautiful Lies

A wonderfully observed novel which explores both the role of women and the tabloid press in Victoria's jubilee year. Completely gripping

Rosie Boycott

Sentences that are so lush, so beautifully finished, that one almost wants to stroke her prose

Judith Flanders, Guardian

A hugely entertaining and generous piece of story-telling

James Walton, Daily Mail

A stirring and seductive novel

The Economist

A shining example of historical literary fiction... Nothing less than literary pyrotechnics...a dazzingly elegant novel steeped in the rich detail of the period

Lucy Scholes, Independent

Clark works on a large canvas to tell her story and Beautiful Lies is rich in character, event and period detail, but it is the compelling evocation of its heroine’s predicament that stays in the memory

Nick Rennison, Sunday Times

[A] beautifully crafted piece of Victoriana…a satisfying blend of period melodrama and psychological sharpness

Adrian Turpin, Financial Times

This is a delicious brick of a book, at the high end of historical fiction; immaculately informed, with characters you can’t forget

Kate Saunders, Saga

A meticulously researched and elegantly written novel…

Daisy Waugh, Metro

A captivating fable of truth and memory

New York Times

A distinctive portrait of Victorian London... Clark very delicately spins out the parallels with today

Scotsman

Clare Clark is one of those writers who can see into the past and help us feel its texture

Hilary Mantel

A touching portrayal of a highly unusual marriage

Lesley McDowell, Independent on Sunday

Clark is speaking for herself, and for the power of fiction

Judith Flanders, Guardian