Shrines of Gaiety

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What to expect

Brought to you by Penguin.

1926, and in a country still recovering from the Great War, London has become the focus for a delirious new nightlife. In the clubs of Soho, peers of the realm rub shoulders with starlets, foreign dignitaries with gangsters, and girls sell dances for a shilling a time.

The notorious queen of this glittering world is Nellie Coker, ruthless but also ambitious to advance her six children, including the enigmatic eldest, Niven whose character has been forged in the crucible of the Somme. But success breeds enemies, and Nellie's empire faces threats from without and within. For beneath the dazzle of Soho's gaiety, there is a dark underbelly, a world in which it is all too easy to become lost.

With her unique Dickensian flair, Kate Atkinson brings together a glittering cast of characters in a truly mesmeric novel that captures the uncertainty and mutability of life; of a world in which nothing is quite as it seems.

'This is the perfect novel for uncertain times.' THE TIMES

'I can think of few writers other than Dickens who can match it' SUNDAY TIMES

'Brilliant' RICHARD OSMAN

© Kate Atkinson 2022 (P) Penguin Audio 2022

Critics Review

Brilliant.
Richard Osman
A heady brew of crime, romance and satire set amid the sordid glitz of London nightlife in the 1920s . . . Shrines of Gaiety sees Atkinson on her finest form . . . A marvel of plate-spinning narrative knowhow . . . a peak performance of consummate control.
OBSERVER
Sharp, witty and fiendishly plotted ... you don't so much as read it as surrender to it
FINANCIAL TIMES, 'Best books of 2022'
Seduction, betrayal and larger-than-life characters that will have you hooked until the last page.
THE SUNDAY TELEGRAPH
Kate Atkinson is on deliciously acerbic form in Shrines of Gaiety ... exposing the underbelly of London nightlife in the roaring 20s
GUARDIAN, 'Books of the Year'
Atkinson has a plotter's mind: intricate, clever, satisfying. Shrines of Gaiety is all about life's tangled lines, intersections and synchronicities...The kind of fine-tuned observation that can produce an enormous, vibrant cast is quite something and I can think of few writers other than Dickens who can match it. Shrines of Gaiety is engrossing and fun, powered by subtle skills.
THE SUNDAY TIMES
This book is one to savour, for the energy, for the wit, for the tenderness of characterisation that make Atkinson enduringly popular.
GUARDIAN
As vividly filthy, populous, dangerous as anything described by Dickens, but writing is closer to Thackeray's... Atkinson is a novelist of unrivalled immediacy, authority, and skill.
FINANCIAL TIMES
Kate Atkinson is simply one of the best writers working today, anywhere in the world...she's a global treasure... [Shrines] is set during Jazz Age London, in all its fizzy madness and desperation for the new, the better, the hustle. Atkinson has a magician's ability to switch a reader's mood within a few paragraphs, and as dark as her stories can get, within them always shines a beacon of humanity.
GILLIAN FLYNN
Atkinson is a thoughtful writer with an astute understanding of 20th-century social history. This is the perfect novel for uncertain times, when comfort of a particularly English and nostalgic stripe is required.
THE TIMES

User Reviews

Book 5.0
Narration 5.0
5.0
5.0
I’m a bit of a late comer to Kate Atkinson - though that means I have much to look forward to - and this was another delight!
The additional bonus is the narration of Jason Watkins who reading was totally immersive.
I cannot recommend this audiobook too highly!
PhilW 15/01/2025
5.0
5.0
Ingrid 03/02/2024

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