The Sitter

Author(s): Caroline McGhie

Location(s): Norfolk

Genre(s): Historical, Fiction

Era(s): Late Victorian (late 1900s)

Adolescent baker’s boy Jack catches sight of a beautiful woman alighting from a train at dusk. His remote Norfolk village is built around a railway maintenance hub known as The Works which is ruled by ritual, hierarchy and God.

Newcomer Rosie is escaping a secret past involving a well-known London cartoonist who is a proponent of early photographic pornography.

A beguiling tale of love and learning unfolds against the backdrop of the hardships faced by the railwaymen and fishermen of the time.

Poignant and moving, this literary novel weaves the key themes of women’s rights, childhood memories, sexual freedom, religion, art and pornography around it’s compelling cast of characters. Based on extensive research in and around Melton Constable and Cromer, The Sitter exudes the charms of Victorian Norfolk and a nostalgia for the steam railways.

An historical novel of richness and depth, The Sitter is a remarkable, engaging and deeply atmospheric debut.

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