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Tipping the Velvet, all 472 pages of it, is as saucy, as tantalizing, and as touching as the narrator's first encounter with the seductive but shame-ridden Miss Kitty Butler. And at first even Nancy's family is thrilled with her gender-bending pal, all but her sister, best friend, and bedmate, Alice, "her eyes shining cold and dull, with starlight and suspicion." Not to worry. Soon Nancy and Kitty are off to London, their relationship close though (alas for our heroine) sisterly. We know that bliss will come, and it does, in an exceptionally charged moment. A lesser author would have been content to stop her story there, but Waters has much more in mind for her buttonholing heroine, and for us. In brief, her Everywoman with a sexual difference goes from success onstage to heartbreak to a stint as a male prostitute (necessity truly is the mother of invention) to keeping house for a brother and sister in the Labour movement. And did I mention her long stint as a plaything in the pleasure palace of a rich Sapphist extraordinaire? Diana Lethaby is as cruel as she is carnal, and even the well-concealed Cavendish Ladies' Club isn't outré enough for her. Kitting Nancy out in full, elegant drag, she dares the front desk to turn them away. "We are here," she mocks, "for the sake of the irregular."
Only after some seven years of hard twists and sensual turns does Nancy conclude that a life of sensation is not enough. Still, Tipping the Velvet is so entertaining that readers will wish her sentimental--and hedonistic--education had taken twice as long. --Kerry Fried
Sarah Waters is the New York Times bestselling author of The Little Stranger, The Night Watch, Fingersmith, Affinity, and Tipping the Velvet. She has three times been short-listed for the Man Booker Prize, twice been a finalist for the Orange Prize, and was named one of Granta’s best young British novelists, among other distinctions. Waters lives in London.
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Book Description paperback. Condition: New. Language: ENG. Seller Inventory # 9781860495243
Book Description Paperback. Condition: new. Paperback. Piercing the shadows of the naked stage was a single shaft of rosy limelight, and in the centre of this was a girl: the most marvellous girl - I knew it at once! - that I had ever seen. A saucy, sensuous and multi-layered historical romance, Tipping the Velvet follows the glittering career of Nan King - oyster girl turned music-hall star turned rent boy turned East End 'tom'. Nan is captivated by the music hall phenomenon that is Kitty Butler, a male impersonator extraordinaire treading the boards in Canterbury. Through a friend at the box office, Nan manages to visit all her shows and finally meet her heroine. Soon after, she becomes Kitty's dresser and the two head for the bright lights of Leicester Square. Shipping may be from multiple locations in the US or from the UK, depending on stock availability. Seller Inventory # 9781860495243
Book Description Paperback / softback. Condition: New. New copy - Usually dispatched within 4 working days. * Sarah Water's wonderfully lush, sensuous and bawdy debut novel set in the music halls of the late 19th century - reissued with a stunning new jacket. Seller Inventory # B9781860495243
Book Description Condition: New. pp. 480. Seller Inventory # 6439758
Book Description Paperback. Condition: Brand New. 472 pages. 7.76x5.00x1.73 inches. In Stock. Seller Inventory # __1860495249
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Book Description Condition: New. Book is in NEW condition. 0.84. Seller Inventory # 1860495249-2-1
Book Description Condition: new. Seller Inventory # ed179d99c2a81105594f3323d1b94fc0
Book Description Condition: New. 2012. First American Edition. Paperback. * Sarah Water's wonderfully lush, sensuous and bawdy debut novel set in the music halls of the late 19th century - reissued with a stunning new jacket Num Pages: 480 pages. BIC Classification: 5SL; FV. Category: (G) General (US: Trade). Dimension: 198 x 126 x 32. Weight in Grams: 378. . . . . . Seller Inventory # V9781860495243