A New Novel

“So many people had unknown stories lurking […]”, Violet Speedwell resumes in the last chapter of the novel. We get to understand how true this is while we are absorbed more and more into Violet Speedwell’s life and learn who and what surrounds her in Winchester, Southampton and other places in Hampshire. Violet Speedwell is the protagonist of Tracy Chevalier’s new novel that will be arriving in the UK on 5 September 2019 (in the USA 17 September 2019 and in European countries in 2020). Violet Speedwell is also the name of a plant which was highly esteemed as natural medicine in the Middle Ages. Following traditional popular belief, speedwell is associated with the following characteristics: it is said to opens our minds, enabling us to connect better to our feelings and helping to find the courage to say ‘no’ to something. Thus, if we are familiar with these beliefs, we already get a taste of what is to come in the novel.

Tracy Chevalier, bestselling author of Girl with a Pearl Earring, reveals the atmosphere in the historic city of Winchester insightfully and precisely with every page. Though the story is set in 1932, we recognise one particularly strong…