Review
'The trial is a delicious romp but it's also an eye-opening look at the injustice of Victorian divorce, where children were their father's property. It might not have the inspiring qualities of Room, but The Sealed Letter is a page-turner with a jaw-dropping ending.' --Stylist
'A very enjoyable . . . romp.' --Independent on Sunday
'An enjoyable romp with subtle intrigue woven into the plot and demonstrates a deftness for dialogue, bringing to life the well-painted characters.' --Press Association
'Donoghue plunges her readers headlong into her deeply researched world . . . Donoghue never allows the pace to falter, while her fresh imagery and fastidious attention to period detail . . . recall the immersive, mock-Victorian milieu of Michel Faber's The Crimson Petal and the White . . . It's in her characterisation that Donoghue is most successful.' --Big Issue
'Although the headline-grabbing timeliness of Donoghue's most recent, Booker-shortlisted work is absent here, her burgeoning reputation as an author is hopefully enough to earn this earlier work a deserved reappraisal.'
--The List
'Blissfully readable and immaculately researched.' --The Times
'The Sealed Letter is an enjoyable romp with subtle intrigue woven into the plot and demonstrates a deftness for dialogue, brining to life the well-painted characters.' --Press Association
'Set in Victorian England and based on a real-life divorce case that scandalised the country in 1864, it tells the tale of two female friends whose lives are never the same again once one of them embarks on an obsessive affair.' --Bella
'A page-turning drama packed with sex, passion and intrigue.' --Daily Mail
`In forensically revisiting the true story of the Codrington divorce, Donoghue tells a tale which slow-burns with the pace of English reserve but lends sharp insight to each of its players . . . a deserved reappraisal.' --The List
`Donoghue never allows the pace to falter, while her fresh imagery and fastidious attention to period detail . . . recall the immersive, mock-Victorian milieu of Michel Faber's The Crimson Petal and the White' --Big Issue
`The author interlaces hard-hitting historical fact and imaginative fiction into the narrative with a deft and breezy touch: the reader can almost hear the characters' voices long after closing the book.' --Sunday Telegraph
`A page-turning drama packed with sex, passion and intrigue.' --Daily Mail
`A glorious piece of Victoriana: it's elegant and well-constructed, it's finished off with fancy swoops and swirls, but it's also a great work of industry' --Sunday Herald
`They don't make scandals like this anymore.' --Saga
`The author interlaces hard-hitting historical fact and imaginative fiction into the narrative with a deft and breezy touch: the reader can almost hear the characters' voices long after closing the book.' --Irish Independent
`An absorbing read with vivid characters.' --We Love This Book
`Donoghue has crafted a lively, gossipy drama.' --Image magazine
`Donoghue's mastery lies in making a relationship between a vain and treacherous adulteress and a woman of principle believable, while retaining one explicatory secret for the very last scene.' --The Tablet
`In a story that gallops along yet is packed with detail, she has brought colour to the black-and-white reports of the Codringtons' divorce, and written intriguingly about the accompanying issues of feminism and love between women.' --TLS
'A very enjoyable . . . romp.' --Independent on Sunday
'An enjoyable romp with subtle intrigue woven into the plot and demonstrates a deftness for dialogue, bringing to life the well-painted characters.' --Press Association
'Donoghue plunges her readers headlong into her deeply researched world . . . Donoghue never allows the pace to falter, while her fresh imagery and fastidious attention to period detail . . . recall the immersive, mock-Victorian milieu of Michel Faber's The Crimson Petal and the White . . . It's in her characterisation that Donoghue is most successful.' --Big Issue
'Although the headline-grabbing timeliness of Donoghue's most recent, Booker-shortlisted work is absent here, her burgeoning reputation as an author is hopefully enough to earn this earlier work a deserved reappraisal.'
--The List
'Blissfully readable and immaculately researched.' --The Times
'The Sealed Letter is an enjoyable romp with subtle intrigue woven into the plot and demonstrates a deftness for dialogue, brining to life the well-painted characters.' --Press Association
'Set in Victorian England and based on a real-life divorce case that scandalised the country in 1864, it tells the tale of two female friends whose lives are never the same again once one of them embarks on an obsessive affair.' --Bella
'A page-turning drama packed with sex, passion and intrigue.' --Daily Mail
`In forensically revisiting the true story of the Codrington divorce, Donoghue tells a tale which slow-burns with the pace of English reserve but lends sharp insight to each of its players . . . a deserved reappraisal.' --The List
`Donoghue never allows the pace to falter, while her fresh imagery and fastidious attention to period detail . . . recall the immersive, mock-Victorian milieu of Michel Faber's The Crimson Petal and the White' --Big Issue
`The author interlaces hard-hitting historical fact and imaginative fiction into the narrative with a deft and breezy touch: the reader can almost hear the characters' voices long after closing the book.' --Sunday Telegraph
`A page-turning drama packed with sex, passion and intrigue.' --Daily Mail
`A glorious piece of Victoriana: it's elegant and well-constructed, it's finished off with fancy swoops and swirls, but it's also a great work of industry' --Sunday Herald
`They don't make scandals like this anymore.' --Saga
`The author interlaces hard-hitting historical fact and imaginative fiction into the narrative with a deft and breezy touch: the reader can almost hear the characters' voices long after closing the book.' --Irish Independent
`An absorbing read with vivid characters.' --We Love This Book
`Donoghue has crafted a lively, gossipy drama.' --Image magazine
`Donoghue's mastery lies in making a relationship between a vain and treacherous adulteress and a woman of principle believable, while retaining one explicatory secret for the very last scene.' --The Tablet
`In a story that gallops along yet is packed with detail, she has brought colour to the black-and-white reports of the Codringtons' divorce, and written intriguingly about the accompanying issues of feminism and love between women.' --TLS
Product Description
After a separation of many years, Emily 'Fido' Faithfull bumps into her old friend Helen Codrington on the streets of Victorian London. Much has changed: Helen is more and more unhappy in her marriage to the older Vice-Admiral Codrington, while Fido has become a successful woman of business and a pioneer in the British Women's Movement. But, for all her independence of mind, Fido is too trusting of her once-dear companion and finds herself drawn into aiding Helen's obsessive affair with a young army officer. When the Vice-Admiral seizes the children and sues for divorce, the women's friendship unravels amid accusations of adultery and counter-accusations of cruelty and attempted rape, as well as a mysterious 'sealed letter' that could destroy more than one life . . . Based on blow-by-blow newspaper reports of the 1864 Codrington Divorce, The Sealed Letter, full of sparkling characters and wicked dialogue, is a thought-provoking mystery and gripping drama of friends, lovers and marriage.
