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The
2007 Award |
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Lord Byron's Novel by John Crowley
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Nominated by:
Publisher
of Nominated Edition
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| the complete A-Z listing of nominated authors |
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ABOUT
THE BOOK |
| Documents
discovered in a rotting old trunk in an English storage room prove that the manuscript
of a novel by Byron once existed, and that it was saved from destruction, read,
and annotated by Ada, Countess of Lovelace, a brilliant mathematician and Byron's
abandoned daughter, during the final, agonizing months of her young life. While
the curious mystery of what became of the manuscript itself is explored, we are
permitted to read it -- the whole of Byron's only novel -- beginning to end. And what a novel it is -- a thrilling romance chock-full of treacheries and deceits, loves and fortunes gloriously gained and tragically lost; a tale of blood, vengeance, and mystery, of thrilling escapes and ruthless murder. Yet in the story of Ali -- the bastard son of the demonic Lord Sane, torn from his life in high Albania to be raised a proper, if penniless, English gentleman -- Ada finds gripping revelations of its author's hidden character, and glimpses into the secrets of his soul. John Crowley's masterly creation is, in itself, a stunning and unprecedented act of literary impersonation. But Lord Byron's Novel is much more, weaving strands from different centuries into an extraordinary tapestry of loss and discovery, and the powerful, invisible threads that eternally bind parent to child. It is the story of a dying daughter's poignant attempt to understand the famous absent father she longed for to her last day, and the contemporary tale of the determined young woman who, by learning the secret of Byron's manuscript and Ada's devotion, reconnects with her own father, who was driven from her life by a crime as terrible as any Byron was accused of. John Crowley's novel is a wonder -- a modern masterwork that moves, enlightens, and satisfies on every level. |
| ABOUT THE AUTHOR |
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John Crowley is the recipient of an American Academy of Arts and Letters Award for Literature. He lives in the hills above the Connecticut River in northern Massachusetts with his wife and twin daughters. His critically acclaimed works include Dæmonomania, Love & Sleep, Ægypt, The Translator, and, most recently, Lord Byron's Novel: The Evening Land. |
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Copyright
© 2007 Dublin City Public Libraries
