Product Description

William May returns to London after the horrors of the Crimean War. Scarred and fragile though he is, he lands a job at the heart of Bazalgette's transformation of the London sewers. There, in the darkness of the stinking tunnels beneath the rising towers of Victorian London May discovers another side of the city and remembers a disturbing, violent past. And then the corruption of the growing city soon begins to overwhelm him and a violent murder is committed. Will the sewers reveal all and show that the world above ground is even darker and more threatening than the tunnels beneath? Beautifully written, evocative and compelling and with a fantastically vivid cast of characters, Clare Clarke's first book is a rich and suspenseful novel that draws the reader right into Victorian London and into the worlds of its characters desperately attempting to swim the tides of change.

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #243002 in Books
• Published on: 2005-02-24
• Original language: English
• Binding: Hardcover
• 358 pages

Review
Crisp, assured, and relentlessly pungent. One does not so much read "The Great Stink" as smell, hear and taste it.

Margaret Forster
'Staggeringly evocative...a fine new novelist'

Simon Sebag-Montefiore
'Evocative, deeply researched and thoroughly enjoyable...oozes with the stench of humanity and the secret history of subterranean Victorian London'

Customer Reviews

The Great Stink is a winner.
The under-belly of London's Victorian life may not be for the fainthearted but its huge range of unforgettable characters makes great raw material for the novelist. Clare Clark has seized this opportunity with both hands and written a story which plunges the reader from the first page into a wonderfully colourful world. She describes the interwoven lives of a disturbed survivor of the Crimean War, working on the rebuilding of London's sewers, and a resourceful scavenger and rat-catcher who scrapes his living from beneath the streets. It is an exciting story, written in a style both rich and elegant and with a real feeling for the period. Strongly recommended.

Completely gripping - holds on and won't let you go!
Written in the style of a Victorian novel, and arranged in alternating chapters dealing with the two main characters as their two very different worlds collide with each other, this is a remarkable book. It grips you from the first page and won't let you go, grabbing you with wonderful descriptions of Victorian London that really make you feel the mud beneath your boots and smell the stench of the crumbling sewers that form the backdrop to much of the drama.

This is a really intelligent historical novel with a strong plot, sympathetic and believable characters, and an atmosphere that will stay in your head long after you put the book down. I strongly recommend it.

Intelligent, gripping historical thriller
Clare Clark's The Great Stink is set during a pivotal point in the history of Victorian London, as plans are being finalised for a complete overhaul of the city's sewage system. It is this that forms the backdrop to the action. The plot works brilliantly on several levels - above ground, the machinery of this vast scheme of public works is vividly conveyed, with all its optimism and corruption. Below ground are the sewers themselves, dark foetid remnants of the city's medieval past, which are evoked in marvellously descriptive passages. Straddling the two is the hero of the book, William May, who works as an engineer under Joseph Bazalgette, and whose compulsive relationship with the dark, labyrinthine sewers will have disastrous consequences.
This is an intelligent and gripping historical murder mystery with some fantastic twists and a truly page-turning denoument. The story is moving and involving, and manages brilliantly to transport the reader back in time to the Victorian age, and down beneath the foggy streets of London. Highly recommended.