Iridescence

Samuel Barton is a remittance man, whose family pay him to keep clear of England, and in 1871 he washes up in Napier, a squalid settlement bordering unexplored country in Hawke's Bay. He drinks, longs to leave, and crosses paths with townspeople such as the piano teacher Madeleine Perrett and the jeweller Solomon Linz. Only slowly does the reason for his exile come out. The middle of the book moves to London's theatre world around 1870, where his friend Fanny, an actor who plays women on stage, is at the heart of an indecency trial drawn from the real case of Boulton and Park. The last part returns to Napier in 1880.

AI-generated summary

About the book

Form

Novel

Genres

Historical (assigned by AI)

Set in

New Zealand, United Kingdom, 1870–1880

First published

2003

Author's age

53 when first published

ISBN

9781869415839 (Vintage, New Zealand)