ballingdon books

Nothing destroys like art: In 18th century London, dying artist Henry Grace plans to atone for unspeakable crimes he committed as a member of a clandestine hell-fire club in an extraordinary way which threatens the establishment. Secreted in the attic of his house in Leicester Square, the guilt-ridden artist is painting a highly-detailed, coded masterpiece intended to incriminate the wealthy and powerful. But when fiery female apprentice Michel Angelo enlists Grub Street journalist, ’Mouse’ Malone to investigate Grace’s epic masterpiece, deadly forces are unleashed - this time, the devil really is in the detail. Among those whose cages they rattle is the darkly charismatic Osiris De’Ath, whose Faustian deal with the young Henry Grace made on a Grand Tour of Paris, Rome and Venice has set in motion a chain of shadowy events which will lead to subterranean atrocities and to grisly murder. In Leicester Fields is set in the boisterous, dangerous city of the satirical illustrators Hogarth and Rowlandson, where buzzing coffee houses are the internet of their day and nascent tabloid newspapers spread real and fake news. Readers are escorted on an immersive tour through bustling Georgian London, from the stark wards of London’s Foundling Hospital to shadowy Newgate gaol and the public gallows at Tyburn. Perfect for readers of literary historical fiction, art-world novels, and stories that probe the dangerous edges of ambition.