Review: Land of Marvels by Barry Unsworth

Reading this novel is like watching an Olympic athlete about to win the gold: the seamless flow of action, the mastery of technique, seemingly effortless yet demanding attention and eliciting admiration as an end in itself. Not that Barry Unsworth's writing is morally neutral, like pole-vaulting or a foot-race; the book in fact bears a quite heavy burden of moral meaning. But the story is so thoroughly adapted to expressing that meaning, so tightly organised, so concentrated in its forward drive...