Testament - Tapa dura

Reseña del editor

When Damia Miller is employed to promote revered Kineton and Dacre college, it doesn't take her long to recognise that a grotesque antique painting recently uncovered on one of the college's walls might hold the key to the college's future. Six hundred years earlier, master mason Simon of Kineton is preparing plans for his magnum opus, a college to rival anything in England. His work only interrupted when he becomes father to the son he has longed for for twenty years. In the present day, Damia grows increasingly obsessed with the mysterious wall-painting and the college's dark history. What is the painting trying to tell her? Why was the college named after its mason as well as its founder? And who does the statue of the carefree boy in the Toby Yard represent? In mediaeval Salster, Simon of Kinnerton is struggling to come to terms with the fact that his son is disabled - cursed, in the eyes of many of Salster's townspeople. But just as Simon himself is coming to accept young Toby a tragedy occurs whose repercussions will echo until the present day. Testament is a startling feat of imaginative skill, distinguished by the breadth of its vision, and by the heartbreaking story at its centre: that of the sacrifice a child made for his father, six hundred years ago.

Nota de la solapa

It is 1385 and master mason Simon of Kineton is building his magnum opus: a great college to rival any in England. But the Bishop of Salster, hostile to free education, is determined to sabotage Simon’s project. When rumour spreads that the mason’s son is cursed, the bishop sees an opportunity to undermine both Simon and the college.

Six hundred years later, in the same city, Damia Miller has been employed to promote penniless Kineton and Dacre College. She realizes that a grotesque wall-painting uncovered during renovations may hold the key to the ancient college’s survival. Marshalling Kineton and Dacre’s devoted student body, she is determined to unlock the painting’s mysteries and, she hopes, guarantee the college’s future.

In medieval Salster, Simon of Kineton is struggling to accept his imperfect son, while battling to complete his masterpiece. But just as he is coming to terms with the child, a tragedy occurs whose implications will resound until the present day.

A startling feat of imaginative skill, Alis Hawkins’s unforgettable debut novel is a heartbreaking reminder of what it is that makes us human – no matter what era we are born into.

Biog: Brought up in west Wales, Alis Hawkins read English at Oxford before training as a speech and language therapist. She lives in Kent with her partner and teenage sons.