Love and Fury

Summary

From the acclaimed author of Mr. Dickens and His Carol, a richly-imagined reckoning with the life of another cherished literary legend: Mary Wollstonecraft – arguably the world’s first feminist August, 1797. Midwife Parthenia Blenkinsop has delivered countless babies over the course of her career, and when she arrives at Mary Wollstonecraft’s door, everything appears normal. But after the baby girl is delivered, the women will spend the next harrowing days together, fighting for the survival of both mother and daughter. Over those 11 days, Mary Wollstonecraft recounts the life she dared to live amidst the impossible constraints and prejudices of the late 18th century, rejecting the tyranny of men and marriage, risking everything to demand equality for herself and all women. She weaves her riveting tale to keep her fragile daughter alive and give her a reason to fight, even as her own strength wanes. Wollstonecraft’s urgent story of loss and triumph forms the heartbreakingly brief intersection between the lives of a mother and daughter who will change the arc of history and thought for centuries to come.    In radiant, emotionally gripping prose, Samantha Silva delivers an ode to the dazzling life of Mary Wollstonecraft, one of the world's most influential thinkers and mother of the famous novelist Mary Shelley. But at its heart, Love and Fury is a story about the power of a woman reclaiming her own narrative and passing along that legacy to her daughter.  A Macmillan Audio production from Flatiron Books  “Astonishing and groundbreaking. Silva’s Wollstonecraft is one of the most complex, kind and endearing characters in recent historical fiction, simultaneously strong and heartbreakingly vulnerable. A provocative, inspiring and timely novel, Love and Fury chronicles not only a great historical figure but, just as movingly, a woman, wife and mother who learns to find love and home within herself.” (Natalie Jenner, best-selling author of The Jane Austen Society)

©2021 Samantha Silva and Caroline Bleeke (P)2021 Macmillan Audio