Shelf Control #2: Burning Bright by Tracy Chevalier

Shelf Control is a weekly feature created by Lisa at Bookshelf Fantasies, and celebrates the books waiting to be read on your TBR piles/mountains. Since early January 2023, Shelf Control has moved base to Literary Potpourri.

My pick this time is:

Burning Bright by Tracy Chevalier

Tracy Chevalier is one of my favorite historical fiction writers. It all started since my reading of Girl with A Pearl Earring, which is, so far, my favorite. Since then I've also read: The Lady and the Unicorn, The Virgin Blue, Falling Angels, and Remarkable Creatures.

What I loved most from Chevalier is her subjects. She usually picks an extraordinary historical art or culture, then weaves a remarkable story around it - story of people involved in it: their lives, struggles, and triumph. Chevalier's great penmanship allows us to be transported to the past, mingling with these characters and living their lives.

In Burning Bright, we are transported to the 18th century London. From Amazon: 1792. Uprooted from their quiet Dorset village to the riotous streets of London, young Jem Kellaway and his family feel very far from home. They struggle to find their place in this tumultuous city, still alive with the repercussions of the blood-splattered French Revolution.

Luckily, streetwise Maggie Butterfield is on hand to show Jem the ropes. Together they encounter the neighbour they’ve been warned about: radical poet and artist William Blake. Jem and Maggie’s passage from innocence to experience becomes the very stuff of poetic inspiration…

I haven't heard about William Blake before, but it is rather interesting, right? Can't wait to be immersed once more into an absorbing reading with Chevalier's.


Have you read this book? Or any of Chevalier's?