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 … 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.
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Church of Marvels follows four people in 1895 New York. Sylvan is a privvy cleaner who finds a baby left for dead on his rounds. Belle and Odile Church are twins who grew up in the the Coney Island Sideshow whose lives are turned upside down by a fire, Alphie is a young woman imprisoned in Blackwell’s Lunatic Asylum. These four characters all from very different backgrounds have secrets that are revealed throughout the story and whose lives are intertwined in the most unusual way.
I ended up really enjoying this book but the first half seemed slow and extremely mysterious. Each chapter is from a different character’s point of view, except for Belle’s. Although I followed the story in the first half, I just didn’t know how these characters would end up interacting and it became frustrating at times. But once you get through that first part, the story sails and I thought it was quite a page turner. I loved the ending.
I finished this so late last night that I think I dreamed about it? But in a nice way. Not in a fuzzy chopped off blue tongue way.
Read a big chunk of this last night. I’m really digging it but also everything is scary and upsetting??? Anyway I’m looking forward to finishing and discussing at book club!
I’m really glad that Danielle suggested this for book club, otherwise it wouldn’t even have been on my radar because I don’t tend to pick up historical fiction. That said, this doesn’t really read like histfic. Given the concept, I was ready to deal with some of the more twee circus act imagery/descriptions. But there are also some delightfully macabre elements to balance things out. Won’t go too overboard since we’re going to discuss in book club, but highly recommend!
Three storylines come together in this well-written (but not perfect – so what?) novel set in seedy NYC, 1895. Lots to like, and this was a nice way to pass some hours. Good job. The final weaving of the different characters’ stories/conclusion was satisfying. Recommended to HF fans.
This book was like a breath of fresh air! I’ve never read anything like it. The story takes place in New York in 1895 and gradually brings together the lives of four seemingly unconnected people in a story that is part fantastical and yet so very real, part horror and yet filled with tenderness and love. The right director and actors could make something magical and wonderful from this story, maybe even better than the book, but that’s really going some. There are great summary’s of the book on the Amazon listing for the book so I won’t go into that here. I hope you will buy and read this book at once. You won’t be sorry!
I really enjoyed this book…very good story line and the charcters really come to life.
Well written novel with IMAGINATIVE storylines and mounting suspense.
This book begins as a bit of a puzzle that requires close attention and some patience on your part. Parry introduces us to multiple storylines, one-by-one, which seem unconnected. There is a pugilist in New York City who moonlights emptying privies. Twin sisters who perform with their mother at a freak show on Coney Island. There’s a man from a big Italian family hiding a secret life and a woman who can’t remember why she finds herself in an asylum.
You can expect to find yourself hanging at the end of each chapter, then needing to remember what happened to one character as you then move onto the next chapter about another. Until slowly the storylines begin to come together. I personally found this annoying at first, but less so as the novel progresses. I don’t want to ruin any surprises so I will just say that you will learn a lot about some of the darker aspects to New York in the 1880s — like medical care, or the way unwanted pregnancies could be handled, or what could happen to children living on the street. On the plus side, there are intense human connections, some of which last a lifetime.
The language is rich and evocative. And you definitely won’t be able to figure out the end until you get there. A very engaging read.
An extraordinary story, written with a unique sense of time and place. 19th century Manhattan and Coney Island are brought to life with the exquisite precision of the sounds, sights and scents of that era, specifically where the poorer, edge-living inhabitants are concerned. Freaks, performers, abortionists, opium addicts, transgender individuals…all are portrayed in the seamy underbelly of their surroundings with respect and empathy. This book is about lives coming full circle; about fate, tragedy and unexpected love; about motherhood and sisterhood. And mostly, about the sheer courage and tenacity of the human spirit.
Dark and beautiful historical fiction — many-threaded, and you won’t guess how everything comes together, but you’ll be so blown away when it does. For fans of sideshows, heartbreak, turn-of-the-century New York, and just plain wonderful writing.
I read this title for my book group and we all agreed the quirky characters were so engaging. At the conclusion so interesting they manner in which all characters and story were intertwined.
The author follows 4 people in 1895 Coney Island and New York City. She ties all the themes together after some unexpected twists.