It's Spitalfields, 1840. Catherine Sorgeiul lives with her Uncle in a rambling house in London's East End. She has few companions and little to occupy the days beyond her own colourful imagination. But then a murderer strikes, ripping open the chests of young girls and stuffing hair into their mouths to resemble a beak.
Reviews
A wonderfully ripe, imaginative and gripping piece of Victorian pastiche, with a spider's web of a plot and a spine-tingling atmosphere of menace and suspense The Times Fans of Sarah Waters will love this - Good Housekeeping
The Pleasures of Men shares with Wolf Hall an ambitious, challenging concern with form combined with a pitch-perfect historical ear ... This intoxicating and disturbing novel is properly thrilling and extraordinarily well-written. Kate Williams is already an accomplished biographer; The Pleasures of Men shows a soaring talent let loose - Independent on Sunday
A dark story of murder and obsession - Elle Catherine
Sorgeuil's obsession with a series of murders of young girls in London's East End enmeshes her in deceit, betrayal and danger. A spine-tingling, seductive thriller - Woman and Home
An intense, intelligent and hugely entertaining read - The Guardian
Historian Kate Williams successfully makes the move from non-fiction, creating a society, and protagonist, on the brink of hysteria Psychologies A sure-footed evocation of seamy Victorian London - Sunday Telegraph
Part-bodice-ripper, part-slasher, the book's elaborate plot moves along at a brisk clip with a nod to the likes of Sarah Waters and Peter Ackroyd - Daily Mail
As crowded with sensation as a Victorian parlour with furniture - The Scotsman Not since Sarah Waters have I seen so much lesbian sex in a historical novel -- Mariella Frostrup Radio 4 Open Book
Williams creates an extraordinary world with unforgettable characters and a dark heart - highly recommended - The Bookseller
An eerie murder mystery set in the corrupt heart of Victorian London - Marie Claire Good Book Club pick This is a fast-paced thriller written by an expert on all things Victorian. Fans of Sarah Waters and Michel Faber will revel in this charged and colourful Victorian epic - The Bookseller
Author description
Kate studied her BA at Somerville College, Oxford where she was a College Scholar and received the Violet Vaughan Morgan University Scholarship. She then took her MA at Queen Mary, University of London and her DPhil at Oxford. Kate's first book was England's Mistress: the Infamous Life of Emma Hamilton and her second, Becoming Queen was about the passionate youth of Queen Victoria and Princess Charlotte. She was also a consultant on the movie Young Victoria which starred Emily Blunt and Rupert Friend and has appeared on the Today programme and as a guest reviewer on Newsnight Review in addition to presenting a programme about Queen Victoria for BBC2's Timewatch.
