20th April 2017
The UK 30th anniversary edition of Wideacre is out today.
Wideacre was my first novel, and is therefore very special to me. It’s incredible to think it’s been thirty years since its release. The book is set in the latter half of the eighteenth century, a time when common land was being enclosed by landowners, locking out the common people. Beatrice Lacey is daughter to the squire of Wideacre – the land she loves more than anything or anyone else. She is expected to marry and give up her name and leave Wideacre – but she will do anything to make sure that she can keep the estate for herself. Beatrice may be a fictional character, but the oppression of women and the rebellion of the poor all came from the history of the time.
I’m very pleased to share this new edition with you all, and I hope you enjoy it. It also comes with a new foreword I wrote as I reflected on this anniversary. Thank you to all my readers for the last thirty years.
'It is like some sort of magic. As if everyone secretly belonged somewhere. As if everyone had a horizon, a view, that perhaps they may never see, but if they did, they would recognize it as if they had waited all their lives for it. They would see it, and they would say, "Here I am at last." It's like that for me with Wideacre.'
https://www.harpercollins.co.uk/9780008229986/wideacre
Pre-order the US edition here: https://goo.gl/6zNP9G
blue: UK cover; red: US cover