Will I love Church of Marvels?

I'm not usually a reader of historical fiction but this book absolutely sucked me in. It read a bit like a fantasy novel to me while being absolutely grounded in reality and brilliantly portraying the underbelly of turn of the century New York City. Gorgeously written, with well developed characters and a mystery that unfolded throughout the pages in a way that kept me glued to the book.

There’s something about the grittiness of turn-of-the-century New York that seems especially well-suited to the different and strange, including the depictions in this novel of the Coney Island seashore, the tenements of the Lower East Side, and a brutal asylum.

The characters include a “night-soiler” cleaning out tenement privies, an undertaker’s wife, and estranged twin sisters, and the way their stories weave together is a Dickens-esque plot full of intrigue, deception, heroism, and forgiveness. Over it all is a sense of magic and possibility, including people who aren’t who or what they claim to be.