Overview

Early in the morning of Monday 8 July 1895, 13-year-old Robert Coombes and his 12-year-old brother Nattie set out from their small, yellow-brick terraced house in East London to watch a cricket match at Lord’s. Their father had gone to sea the previous Friday and their mother was visiting her family in Liverpool. Over the next 10 days Robert and Nattie spent extravagantly, pawning their parents’ valuables to fund trips to the theatre and the seaside. But as the sun beat down on the Coombes house, a strange smell began to emanate from the building ... When the police were finally called to investigate, the discovery they made sent the press into a frenzy of horror and alarm. In The Wicked Boy, Kate Summerscale has uncovered a fascinating true story of murder and morality – it is not just a meticulous examination of a shocking Victorian case, but also a compelling account of its aftermath, and of man’s capacity to overcome the past.

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9781489373298

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Reviews

'Ms. Summerscale has found a nifty literary specialty: resurrecting and reanimating, in detail as much forensic as it is novelistic, notorious true-life tales of the Victorian era ...' -- The New York Times 'Irresistible.' -- New York Times Book Review 'This well-written story is not so much a true-crime tale or murder mystery as an excellent sociological study of turn-of-the-20th-century England.' -- Kirkus Reviews

'Ms. Summerscale has found a nifty literary specialty: resurrecting and reanimating, in detail as much forensic as it is novelistic, notorious true-life tales of the Victorian era …' -- The New York Times 'Irresistible.' -- New York Times Book Review 'This well-written story is not so much a true-crime tale or murder mystery as an excellent sociological study of turn-of-the-20th-century England.' -- Kirkus Reviews

Author Information

Jot Davies was brought up by teacher parents in Kenya, Colombia and the Isle of Wight. He eventually studied Modern and Medieval Languages at Cambridge University where he acted in and directed probably too many plays. After touring with the Footlights in his final year, Jot joined the BBC Radio Drama Company and cut his audio teeth in plays, live comedy shows and readings. It was a natural and welcome step into audiobooks and now he is an award-winning narrator, across most genres, with well over a hundred books to his name.

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