He lived his life like clockwork. Until he met the watchmaker. From the publishers of Jonathan Strange and Mr Norrell, The Song of Achilles, The Bone Season and Harry Potter comes a ravishing new literary historical fantasy
An International Bestseller - A Guardian Summer Read - An Amazon Best Book of the Month - A Goodreads Best Book of the Month - A Buzzfeed Summer Read - A Foyles Book of the Month - AHuffington Post Summer Read - A Yorkshire Post Book of the Week
In 1883, Thaniel Steepleton returns to his tiny flat to find a gold pocketwatch on his pillow. But he has worse fears than generous burglars; he is a telegraphist at the Home Office, which has just received a threat for what could be the largest-scale Fenian bombing in history.
When the watch saves Thaniel's life in a blast that destroys Scotland Yard, he goes in search of its maker, Keita Mori - a kind, lonely immigrant who sweeps him into a new world of clockwork and music. Although Mori seems harmless at first, a chain of unexpected slips soon proves that he must be hiding something.
Meanwhile, Grace Carrow is sneaking into an Oxford library dressed as a man. A theoretical physicist, she is desperate to prove the existence of the luminiferous ether before her mother can force her to marry.
As the lives of these three characters become entwined, events spiral out of control until Thaniel is torn between loyalties, futures and opposing geniuses.
Utterly beguiling, The Watchmaker of Filigree Street blends historical events with dazzling flights of fancy to plunge readers into a strange and magical past, where time, destiny, genius - and a clockwork octopus - collide.
About the Author
Natasha Pulley studied English Literature at Oxford University. After stints working at Waterstones as a bookseller, then at Cambridge University Press as a publishing assistant in the astronomy and maths departments, she did the Creative Writing MA at UEA. She later studied in Tokyo, where she lived on a scholarship from the Daiwa Anglo-Japanese Foundation, and she is now a visiting lecturer at City University. The Watchmaker of Filigree Street is her first novel.
Industry Reviews
An assured and absorbing debut ... Immensely pleasurable reading. Ms. Pulley's prose is strong and energetic, with a wry edge, and even the most minor characters are drawn precisely ... The Watchmaker of Filigree Street might be compared to one of Mori's clockwork birds: intricate, charming and altogether surprising -- Helene Wecker New York Times, Editors Choice
Ten out of ten Spectator Impressively competent: steam-punk meets Zuleika Dobson Michele Roberts, author of Daughters of the House
Forget steampunk. Welcome to tickpunk ... Part Susanna Clarke, part Guy Ritchie's Sherlock Holmes, The Watchmaker of Filigree Street is a delightful read that benefits from wonderfully colourful characters and a lyrical prose style full of esoteric detail ... A compelling read SFX Magazine
An astonishingly disguised fairytale Joanne Harris Rare and precious ... Humour, wit, mystery and danger are threaded through the book in musical measure. It dances between genres and makes partners of several ... Pulley's capacity for making antagonists out of fully realized and sympathetic characters is impressive, as is her ability to keep one guessing as the plot ticks along. There's nothing quite like putting down a delightful, relentlessly charming and deeply moving book and then finding out it's the authors first ... A remarkable debut Los Angeles Times Book Review
Historical fiction, magic realism and elements of gothic fiction combine in this ambitious debut ... This is accomplished writing from Natasha Pulley, whose imagination shines through Irish Times
Enchanting ... Amid this thriller-like plot, Pulley raises thought-provoking questions about free will, fate and identity - making for a rich brew of historical fantasy, philosophy and emotion Washington Post