Love and romance reside at the heart of British
author William Nicholson's work, be it in his screenplays (Shadowlands)
or in his prose fiction (Motherland).
In his historical novel, Amherst,
two secret love affairs--past and present--come together under the influence of
poet, Emily Dickinson, who has a vivid impact on all their lives.
Nicholson
threads the needle of his intriguing, well-plotted narrative with Alice
Dickinson, a contemporary, 20-something, London copywriter whose shared last
name with the poet draws her to Emily's work. Alice travels to Amherst, Ma., to
research a screenplay she's writing about the real-life, 1880s love affair
between Austin Dickinson, Emily's 50 year-old, unhappily married brother, and
Mabel Loomis Todd, the 24 year-old wife of an Amherst College professor.
Once Alice arrives in the States, she boards in
the home of Nick Crocker, a handsome, married, charismatic English Literature
academic in his fifties. Alice's research into the mysteries of love, fidelity
and passion is soon complicated when she and Nick begin an affair that ultimately
parallels the intense complexity found in Austin and Mabel's relationship that
was secretly consummated in the home that Emily Dickinson shared with her
sister, Vinny.
The plotlines of these tender, revealing love
stories are told via alternating chapters. Nicholson draws from historical
texts and includes letters along with Dickinson's poems in order to fictionally recreate the long-standing
affair between Austin and Mabel—and the significant role that Emily, an
enigmatic spinster-recluse, played in their romance, as well as how Emily's
ghost permeates the relationship between Alice and Nick.
Publication Date: February 10,
2015
Note: This review is a reprint and
is being posted (in a slightly different form) with the permission of Shelf Awareness. To read
this review on Shelf
Awareness: Reader's Edition (2/17/15), click HERE