Mrs Engels has been shortlisted for The Walter Scott Prize for historical fiction. The prize was founded in 2009, and honours the achievements and legacy of Sir Walter Scott, the founding father of the historical novel. The prize is the first book award to recognise outstanding work in this burgeoning genre.
In Gavin McCrea's stunning debut novel, we follow Lizzie as the promise of an easy existence in the capital slips from her view, and as she gains, in its place, a profound understanding of herself and of the world. While Frederick and his friend Karl Marx try to spur revolution among the working classes, Lizzie is compelled to undertake a revolution of another kind: of the heart and the soul. Haunted by her first love, a revolutionary Irishman; burdened by a sense of duty to right past mistakes; and torn between a desire for independence and the pragmatic need to be taken care of, Lizzie learns, as she says, that 'the world doesn't happen how you think it will. The secret is to soften to it, and to take its blows.'
Wry, astute and often hilarious, Lizzie is as compelling and charismatic a figure as ever walked the streets of Victorian England, or its novels. In giving her renewed life, Gavin McCrea earns his place in the pantheon of great debut novelists.
The Judges said:
‘Set in the circles of Karl Marx and Friedrich Engels, this is a novel that surprises and engages. But this is not the story of Marx or Engels; it is the story of two working class sisters, Mary and Lizzie Burns. Gavin McCrea in this accomplished debut pulls off the quite incredible feat of writing the novel from Lizzie’s point of view. In a prose style that is at turns poetic, lyrical and full of wit, McCrea brings vividly to life this working class, illiterate woman who made such an impact on two of the greatest thinkers of the nineteenth century. Unusual in its focus, and broad in its reach, Mrs Engels does that thing that good historical novels should do: it allows you to see a piece of the past that you have never seen before, and opens your eyes to a story that has not yet been told.’
The winner will be announced at The Borders Book Festival on the 18th June 2016.