INVISIBLE IN A BRIGHT LIGHT by Sally Gardner
From I, Coriander to Invisible in a Bright Light, Sally Gardner’s first middle grade novel in 14 years soars with the imagination of a master story-teller. A pitch-perfect story about a crystal chandelier that splinters into a thousand pieces, a girl abandoned as a baby on the steps of an opera house and a dangerous game called the Reckoning.
It is 1870: opening night at the Royal Opera House in a freezing city by the sea, where a huge, crystal chandelier in the shape of a galleon sparkles magically with the light of 750 candles.
Celeste, a theatre rat, wakes up in a costume basket from what she hopes is a bad dream, to find that everyone at the theatre where she works thinks she is someone else.
When the chandelier falls, she is haunted by a strange girl who claims to know Celeste’s past and why she must risk playing a game called the Reckoning to try to save the people she loves.
‘Gardner is on superb form, bringing all her love of the theatre and costume (she used to be a designer) to a richly textured prose style with echoes of Hans Christian Andersen. Wicked opera singers, warm chocolate and shipwrecks combine to wondrous effect in a novel for children eleven and up’ ~ Literary Review.
‘Gardner’s first Middle Grade novel since the award-wining I, Coriander is sumptuous historical fiction; an elegant, complex novel that keeps readers guessing until the end’ ~ The Bookseller.
