This Marlowe
Newest edition published: December 5, 2017
Fiction / Queer Lit / Novels / Historical Fiction
Paperback: 9781773100487 $22.95
Hardcover: 9780864929204 $32.95
Longlisted, 2018 International DUBLIN Literary Award
Long-shortlisted, 2017 ReLit Awards
1593. Queen Elizabeth reigns from the throne while two rival spymasters — Sir Robert Cecil and the Earl of Essex — plot from the shadows. Their goal? To control succession upon the aged queen's death. The man on which their schemes depend? Christopher Marlowe, a cobbler's son from Canterbury who has defied expectations and become an accomplished poet and playwright. Now that the plague has closed theatres, Marlowe must resume the work for which he was originally recruited: intelligence and espionage.
An historical novel with a contemporary edge, This Marlowe measures the weight of the body politic, the torment of the flesh, and the state of the soul.
Author
Michelle Butler Hallett, she/her, is a history nerd and disabled person who writes fiction about violence, evil, love, and grace. The Toronto Star describes her work as "perfectly paced and gracefully wrought," while Quill and Quire calls it "complex, lyrical, and with a profound sense of a world long passed." Her short stories are widely anthologized in Hard Ol’ Spot, The Vagrant Revue of New Fiction, Everything Is So Political, Running the Whale’s Back, and Best American Mystery Stories, and her essay "You’re Not ‘Disabled’ Disabled" appears in Land of Many Shores. Her most recent novel, This Marlowe, was longlisted for the ReLit Award and the Dublin International Literary Award. Her first novel, Double-blind, was shortlisted for the Sunburst Award.
Butler Hallett lives in St. John’s. Constant Nobody is her fifth novel.
Awards
Longlisted: International DUBLIN Literary Award
Reviews
"Complex, lyrical, and with a profound sense of a world long passed and humanity's eternal motivations, This Marlowe holds up extremely well next to the most lauded recent historical fiction." — Quill & Quire
"Perfectly paced and gracefully wrought, This Marlowe is superior historical fare." — The Toronto Star
"Butler Hallett builds upon a strong, believable foundation, giving the reader a vibrant sense of the times." — Atlantic Books Today
"Michelle Butler Hallett angles a glass onto a four-centuries-old tragedy and haunts us with our own reflection. This Marlowe is lyrical, audacious, and achingly human: a psychological thriller and a meditation upon power, faith, loyalty, and betrayal — and the capacity of love to ruin and redeem. I loved it." — Ian Weir, author of Will Starling
"There's the real rigour of authenticity here, the tone and nuance of a time and place skilfully conjured. Butler Hallett's great gift to us, though, is her ability to chart these waters in ways that are still surprising and fresh. History's Marlowe becomes her own, offering us his wit and wisdom and seemingly new lessons about faith, ambition, loyalty, and yes, love." — Robert Chaff, author of Afterimage, winner of the Governor General's Award for Drama
“This is a masterful work of historical fiction, beginning with the cover to the printed pages.” — Seaboard Review
