From: Sophie C (tricolor@mhonline.net)
Date: Mon Jul 31 2000 - 15:41:10 PDT
Dear Dickens scholar (or enthusiast), I am spreading the word about a wonderful and thought-provoking new novel, now in bookstores, that may appeal to you. A FAR BETTER REST (Soho Press, hardcover) is a literary "reimagining" of A TALE OF TWO CITIES from the point of view of Sydney Carton, and the debut novel of my good friend Susanne Alleyn. Susanne has done a beautiful job of building on Dickens's characters and themes while adding her own twists to his story. Even if you have read TALE a dozen times, A FAR BETTER REST has some surprises in store for you! Advance praise for A FAR BETTER REST has been enthusiastic. Barbara Hoffert, review editor of LIBRARY JOURNAL, included it among the fifteen best new books of the season on the broadcast program "Public Interest" on WAMU (National Public Radio). Doris Kadish (Department of Romance Languages, University of Georgia) writes, "Once you start reading, you simply can't put down Susanne Alleyn's A FAR BETTER REST. . . . Alleyn's novel centers on the intriguing figure of Sydney Carton, enhancing the original with an abundance of surprising, historically based plot twists. The past comes alive, not merely through the vividly depicted events, but also through the carefully crafted period language that seems to capture the essence of the French Revolutionary era. Unlike Dickens, who dwelled only on the bloodthirsty phase of the Terror, Alleyn properly places that phase in a larger context including an earlier period of love, hope, and political idealism." PUBLISHERS WEEKLY concurs: "Portraying a Paris full of political intrigue, lofty goals and lost hope, Alleyn's first novel re-imagines Dickens's classic A TALE OF TWO CITIES, charting the events of the French Revolution and filling in the missing years in Sydney Carton's life. . . . From the fall of the Bastille to the Reign of Terror, the revolution's main players, both historical and fictional, are portrayed with skill and depth, making even such notorious figures as Robespierre comprehensible, if not sympathetic. Alleyn's insightful storytelling and assiduous historical research create a richly textured, tragic tale that, in the tradition of the best historical novels, brings an era alive through the depiction of human drama." Susanne has posted the first chapter of A FAR BETTER REST on the World Wide Web at http://www.angelfire.com/ny4/susannealleyn . The novel is for sale at independent and chain bookstores throughout the U.S. and Canada, and is available for international customers through Amazon.com, Barnes & Noble (www.bn.com), and other bookselling sites on the Web. Signed and/or personalized copies may be ordered directly from: Merritt Bookstore P.O. Box 918 Millbrook, NY 12545 USA Tel: (914) 677-5857 Email: info@merrittbooks.com Merritt's accepts credit cards and will ship worldwide. For those in the Albany, NY area: the Borders bookstore on Wolf Road in Colonie (near the airport) will host a book signing for Susanne on Saturday, September 16th, at 3 pm, at which she will read from her novel and field questions about A FAR BETTER REST and A TALE OF TWO CITIES. I hope you will love A FAR BETTER REST as much as I do; and if you do love it, I hope you will recommend it to your friends and colleagues. Yours sincerely, Sophie Cates