Carter Beats the Devil (Paperback, New edition)

You are unlikely to have encountered a novel as rich and unusual as this. Throughout its considerable length, it continuously surprises and shocks the reader, forcing us to examine the very fabric of history. In 1923, as the Jazz Age begins to take hold in San Francisco, master magician Charles Carter gives a remarkable performance on the stage of the Curran Theatre. The climax involves nothing less than a battle with the devil, and President Warren G Harding is to take part. But two hours later, Harding will be dead. No less than Harry Houdini has dubbed Charles Carter 'Carter the Great', but when not entertaining audiences, he is an unhappy man, stricken with loneliness. His stunts have become more and more audacious, but after the death of the president, he is pursued by a secret service agent and a sinister cadre who believe that the dying Harding has confided a terrible secret to him. Taking the basic premise of the plot - prestidigitation, legerdemain, fooling the viewer - Gold builds this into the glittering fabric of his highly unusual novel. We are taken into a bizarre and magical world that harbours dark secrets, and the narrative of death and deception is given a fascinating new slant by the odd-looking apparatuses and larger-than-life personalities that inhabit this vaudevillian world. It's hard to avoid the obvious and say that this is a truly magical novel in every sense of the word. (Kirkus UK)

Charles Carter, dubbed Carter the Great by Houdini himself, was born into privilege but became a magician out of need: only when dazzling an audience can he defeat his fear of loneliness. But in 1920s America the stakes are growing higher, as technology and the cinema challenge the allure of magic and Carter's stunts become increasingly audacious. Until the night President Harding takes part in Carter's act only to die two hours later, and Carter finds himself pursued not only by the Secret Service but by a host of others desperate for the terrible secret they believe Harding confided in him. Seamlessly blending reality and fiction, Gold lays before us a glittering and romantic panorama of our modern world at a point of irrevocable change.

General

Imprint:	Sceptre
Country of origin:	United Kingdom
Release date:	May 2002
Authors:	Glen David Gold
Dimensions:	198 x 129 x 40mm (L x W x T)
Format:	Paperback - B-format / B-format
Pages:	597
Edition:	New edition
ISBN-13:	978-0-340-79499-9
Categories:	Books > Fiction > General & literary fiction > Modern fiction
LSN:	0-340-79499-2
Barcode:	9780340794999

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