{"product_id":"golden-hill-by-francis-spufford","title":"Golden Hill by Francis Spufford","description":"\u003cp\u003e\u003cmeta charset=\"utf-8\"\u003e\u003cspan\u003eNew York, a small town on the tip of Manhattan island, 1746.\u003c\/span\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cspan\u003eOne rainy evening in November, a handsome young stranger fresh off the boat pitches up at a counting-house door in Golden Hill Street: this is Mr Smith, amiable, charming, yet strangely determined to keep suspicion simmering. For in his pocket, he has what seems to be an order for a thousand pounds, a huge amount, and he won't explain why, or where he comes from, or what he can be planning to do in the colonies that requires so much money.\u003c\/span\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cspan\u003eShould the New York merchants trust him? Should they risk their credit and refuse to pay? Should they befriend him, seduce him, arrest him; maybe even kill him?\u003c\/span\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cspan\u003eAs fast as a heist movie, as stuffed with incident as a whole shelf of conventional fiction, Golden Hill is both a novel about the 18th century, and itself a book cranked back to the novel's 18th century beginnings, when anything could happen on the page, and usually did, and a hero was not a hero unless he ran the frequent risk of being hanged.\u003c\/span\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cspan\u003eThis is Fielding's Tom Jones recast on Broadway - when Broadway was a tree-lined avenue two hundreds yards long, with a fort at one end flying the Union Jack and a common at the other, grazed by cows.\u003c\/span\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cspan\u003eRich in language and historical perception, yet compulsively readable, Golden Hill has a plot that twists every chapter, and a puzzle at its heart that won't let go till the last paragraph of the last page.\u003c\/span\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cspan\u003eSet a generation before the American Revolution, it paints an irresistible picture of a New York provokingly different from its later self: but subtly shadowed by the great city to come, and already entirely a place where a young man with a fast tongue can invent himself afresh, fall in love - and find a world of trouble.\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e","brand":"Stirring Pages","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":65633496138077,"sku":null,"price":4.5,"currency_code":"EUR","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/1077\/7827\/7725\/files\/9928113482391.jpg?v=1787210501","url":"https:\/\/stirringpages.com\/products\/golden-hill-by-francis-spufford","provider":"Stirring Pages","version":"1.0","type":"link"}