Philip Womack

An Hour with a Houri

The Aviary Gate

By

Bloomsbury 340pp £12.99 order from our bookshop

There is much fascination with the Sublime Porte: Jason Goodwin has recently produced a brace of books featuring a crime-solving eunuch in the nineteenth century, and now Katie Hickman has written The Aviary Gate, her second novel, set in Istanbul.

Veils are set a-flutter, jewelled slippers patter down corridors, the scent of myrrh fills the Sultan’s Palace, and the Chief Eunuch – a hideously ugly black man known as ‘Little Nightingale’ – is found poisoned (but not dead). It is 1599, and Britain wants to keep its trading rights with the Ottoman Empire. In order to do this an embassy has been sent with a gift for the Sultan. In attendance is Paul Pindar (a real-life merchant) who is in mourning for his lost love, Celia Lamprey, thought to be drowned.

Sign Up to our newsletter

Receive free articles, highlights from the archive, news, details of prizes, and much more.

Follow Literary Review on Twitter

  • Last Tweets

    • From the Archive: Martyn Bedford on Ian McEwan's 'Atonement' ,
    • In 'Silenced Voices' reports the ongoing story of the human rights lawyer, Nasrin Sotoudeh, who has been… ,
    • The mystery of Jack the Ripper's identity has long been agonised over. But what do we know about his victims?… ,
    • A piece of Literary Review history from way back in 1983: John Haffenden talks to the great Iris Murdoch. ,
    • Britain’s only travelling lit fest, the Garden Museum Literary Festival is heading to Houghton Hall, Norfolk, for a… ,
    • 'The 19th-century German sage is not my idea of a pleasant travel companion' goes hiking with Friedr… ,
    • If you want ideas about what to read next, sign up to our free email newsletter, and get book reviews, archive mate… ,
    Follow Us