The Illusionist

When Stella first meets Martyn, he's just a stranger on a train. She knows nothing at all about him. But very quickly she is won over by his charm and breathtaking illusions, and when he asks her to marry him, she agrees.

However, as they begin their life together, Stella starts to feel uneasy. What exactly is the show-stopping illusion he claims to be working on, locked away in that room Who are those men that visit the house at strange hours And why are her questions never answered As Stella realises that she barely knows the man she married, her thoughts turn to escape.

“An immaculate artist: understated, unshowy, a careful and economical craftswoman of language and all the loose, unwieldy stuff of emotion”

Scotsman
Assured, skilful, delicately comic and mutedly sad The Sunday Times
An elegant, elegiac exploration of love, loss, memory and longing Independent on Sunday

Jennifer Johnston is one of the foremost Irish writers of her, or any generation. She has won the Whitbread Prize for THE OLD JEST, the Evening Standard Best First Novel Award for THE CAPTAINS AND THE KINGS, the Yorkshire Post Award, Best Book of the Year twice, for THE CAPTAINS AND THE KINGS and HOW MANY MILES TO BABYLON . She has also been shortlisted for the Booker Prize with SHADOWS ON OUR SKIN.

When Stella first meets Martyn, he's just a stranger on a train. She knows nothing at all about him. But very quickly she is won over by his charm and breathtaking illusions, and when he asks her to marry him, she agrees. However, as they begin their life together, Stella starts to feel uneasy. What exactly is the show-stopping illusion he claims to be working on, locked away in that room Who are those men that visit the house at strange hours And why are her questions never answered As Stella realises that she barely knows the man she married, her thoughts turn to escape.

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