Brookland
Brookland is the remarkable story of a determined and intelligent woman in eighteenth-century Brooklyn, who is consumed by a vision of a bridge, a gargantuan construction of timber and masonry she devises to cross the East River in a single, magnificent span.
Since her girlhood, Prudence Winship has looked across the tidal straits from her home in Brooklyn to Manhattan and yearned to traverse the distance. Now, established as the owner of the enormously successful gin distillery she inherited from her father, she can begin to realize her dream. With the help of the local surveyor, Benjamin Horsfield, and her sisters”“the high-spirited, obstreperous Tem, who works with her in the distillery, and the silent, uncanny Pearl”“she fires the imaginations of the people of Brooklyn and New York, promising them both a bridge to meet their most pressing practical needs and one of the most ambitious public works ever attempted. Prue’s own life and the life of the bridge become inextricably bound together as the costs of the bridge, both financial and human, rise beyond her direst expectations.
“No historical novel in recent memory has amassed such an imposing wealth of rich period detail, and few novels of any genre extend an increasingly absorbing story to such a powerful, sorrowful conclusion. A brilliant book that should be a strong Pulitzer Prize contender.”
—Kirkus Reviews on Brookland
Beautifully written and breathtaking in its scope, Brookland confirms Emily Barton’s reputation as one of the finest writers of her generation, whose work, said Thomas Pynchon, is “blessedly post-ironic, engaging and heartfelt.”
Publication Date: Feb 20, 2007
ISBN hardcover: 9780374116903
ISBN paperback: 9780312425807
ISBN ebook: 9781429982917