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Title details for Cursed Bread by Sophie Mackintosh - Wait list

Cursed Bread

by Sophie Mackintosh
Genevieve Gaunt
Audiobook
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Brought to you by Penguin.
From the Booker-nominated author of The Water Cure and Blue Ticket comes a chilling new feminist fable, based on the true story of an unsolved historical mystery...

If you eat the bread, you'll die, he said. The statement made no sense, but it filled me with an electric dread.
Elodie is the baker's wife. A plain, unremarkable person, largely ignored by her husband and everyone else, she burns with the secret hunger to be extraordinary, to be desired, to be seen. One day a charismatic new couple appear in town - the ambassador and his sharp-toothed wife, Violet - and Elodie quickly falls under their spell. All summer long she stalks them through the shining streets: inviting herself into their home, trying to decipher their coded conversations, longing to possess them at any cost.
Meanwhile, beneath the tranquil surface of daily life, strange things are happening. Six horses are found dead in a sun-drenched field, laid out neatly on the ground like an offering. Widows see their lost husbands walking up the river in the night, coming back to claim them. A teenage boy throws himself into the bonfire at the midsummer feast. A dark intoxication is spreading through the town, and when Elodie finally understands her role in it, it will be too late to stop.
Audacious and mesmerising, Cursed Bread is a fevered confession, an entry into memory's hall of mirrors, a fable of obsession and transformation. Sophie Mackintosh spins a darkly gleaming tale of a town gripped by hysteria, envy like poison in the blood, and desire that burns and consumes.
Praise for Sophie Mackintosh:

'Be sure to read everything Sophie Mackintosh writes' Deborah Levy on Blue Ticket
'An extraordinary debut - otherworldly, luminous, precise' Guardian on The Water Cure
'Dreamlike, tense, compelling, with a pitch-perfect ending' The New York Times on Blue Ticket
'An unsettling dark fantasy... It lingers long after the final page' Daily Telegraph on The Water Cure

'Blue Ticket will worm its way under your skin and haunt your dreams' Red
©2023 Sophie Mackintosh (P)2023 Penguin Audio

Expand title description text
Publisher: Penguin Books Ltd Edition: Unabridged

OverDrive Listen audiobook

  • ISBN: 9780241998816
  • File size: 154322 KB
  • Release date: March 2, 2023
  • Duration: 05:21:30

MP3 audiobook

  • ISBN: 9780241998816
  • File size: 154341 KB
  • Release date: March 2, 2023
  • Duration: 05:23:28
  • Number of parts: 5
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Formats

OverDrive Listen audiobook
MP3 audiobook

subjects

Fantasy Fiction Literature

Languages

English

Brought to you by Penguin.
From the Booker-nominated author of The Water Cure and Blue Ticket comes a chilling new feminist fable, based on the true story of an unsolved historical mystery...

If you eat the bread, you'll die, he said. The statement made no sense, but it filled me with an electric dread.
Elodie is the baker's wife. A plain, unremarkable person, largely ignored by her husband and everyone else, she burns with the secret hunger to be extraordinary, to be desired, to be seen. One day a charismatic new couple appear in town - the ambassador and his sharp-toothed wife, Violet - and Elodie quickly falls under their spell. All summer long she stalks them through the shining streets: inviting herself into their home, trying to decipher their coded conversations, longing to possess them at any cost.
Meanwhile, beneath the tranquil surface of daily life, strange things are happening. Six horses are found dead in a sun-drenched field, laid out neatly on the ground like an offering. Widows see their lost husbands walking up the river in the night, coming back to claim them. A teenage boy throws himself into the bonfire at the midsummer feast. A dark intoxication is spreading through the town, and when Elodie finally understands her role in it, it will be too late to stop.
Audacious and mesmerising, Cursed Bread is a fevered confession, an entry into memory's hall of mirrors, a fable of obsession and transformation. Sophie Mackintosh spins a darkly gleaming tale of a town gripped by hysteria, envy like poison in the blood, and desire that burns and consumes.
Praise for Sophie Mackintosh:

'Be sure to read everything Sophie Mackintosh writes' Deborah Levy on Blue Ticket
'An extraordinary debut - otherworldly, luminous, precise' Guardian on The Water Cure
'Dreamlike, tense, compelling, with a pitch-perfect ending' The New York Times on Blue Ticket
'An unsettling dark fantasy... It lingers long after the final page' Daily Telegraph on The Water Cure

'Blue Ticket will worm its way under your skin and haunt your dreams' Red
©2023 Sophie Mackintosh (P)2023 Penguin Audio

Expand title description text
Fantasy Fiction Literature