The Prince's Boy (20 page)

By the Same Author

At the Jerusalem  

Trespasses

A Distant Likeness

Peter Smart’s Confessions

Old Soldiers

An English Madam: The Life and Work of Cynthia Payne

Gabriel’s Lament

An Immaculate Mistake: Scenes from Childhood and Beyond

Sugar Cane

Kitty and Virgil

Three Queer Lives: An Alternative Biography

of Naomi Jacob, Fred Barnes and Arthur Marshall

Uncle Rudolf

A Dog’s Life

Chapman’s Odyssey

Also available by Paul Bailey

Chapman’s Odyssey

‘A wonderfully elegant novel’
The Times

‘I love this beautiful book’ Ali Smith

Harry Chapman is not well, and he doesn’t like hospitals. Furthermore, Dr Pereira’s wonder drug is causing some strange side effects: he can hear more than the usual quotient of voices. First, it is his mother, acerbic and disappointed in him as ever, but then more and more voices add their differing notes and stories to the chorus, squabbling, cajoling and commenting. Friends from childhood, lovers, characters from novels and poetry, Virginia Woolf and a man who wants to sell him T. S. Eliot’s teeth.

Written with a gentle, effortless generosity, full of delicate observation,
Chapman’s Odyssey
is the work of a master; a superbly rendered act of storytelling and ventriloquism that is both witty and deeply moving.

‘An immensely enjoyable read: sprightly, finely rendered, vivid, economical and true’
Independent

‘Not only is the writing quality the same as in Bailey’s earlier novels and memoirs, but so is much of the content ... Quietly powerful and often touching’
Spectator

‘Beautifully written and constructed with great craft’ Tom Sutcliffe,
Independent

‘Bailey’s books are understated, mysterious, quietly beautiful accounts of English life ... A masterpiece’ ***** Roger Lewis,
Sunday Express

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First published in Great Britain 2014

This electronic edition published in 2014 by Bloomsbury Publishing Plc

Copyright © 2014 by Paul Bailey

The moral right of the author has been asserted

All rights reserved

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publisher. Any person who does any unauthorised act in relation to this publication

may be liable to criminal prosecution and civil claims for damages

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A CIP catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library

ISBN 9781408851883

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