Beautiful Revolutionary - Softcover

Laura Elizabeth Woollett

Softcover

ISBN 10: 1911617591 ISBN 13: 9781911617594

Publisher: Scribe Publications, 2019

Synopsis

The thrilling new novel, inspired by the events at Jonestown in the 1970s. It's the summer of 1968, and Evelyn Lynden is a woman at war with herself. Minister's daughter. Atheist. Independent woman. Frustrated wife. Bitch with a bleeding heart. Following her conscientious-objector husband Lenny to the rural Eden of Evergreen Valley, California, Evelyn wants to be happy with their new life. Yet she finds herself disillusioned with Lenny's passive ways _ and anxious for a saviour. Enter the Reverend Jim Jones, the dynamic leader of a new revolutionary church ... Meticulously researched and masterfully written, Beautiful Revolutionary explores the allure of the real-life charismatic leader who would destroy so many. It follows Evelyn as she is pulled into Jones's orbit _ an orbit it would prove impossible for her to leave.

About this title

About the Author:

Laura Elizabeth Woollett was born and raised in Perth, Western Australia. In 2012, she completed an honours degree in creative writing at the University of Melbourne. In 2014, she was awarded a Wheeler Centre/Readings Foundation Hot Desk Fellowship and the John Marsden/Hachette Prize for Fiction, and was chosen as one of the 2015 Melbourne Writers Festival's `30 Under 30'. Her short-story collection, The Love of a Bad Man (Scribe, 2016), was shortlisted for the 2017 Victorian Premier's Literary Award for Fiction and the 2017 Ned Kelly Award for Best First Fiction.

Review:

`She has taken years of extensive research, including interviews with surviving members of the Jones cult, then bent these facts into fictional shape ... She follows Joan Didion, another sharp-eyed observer of the Californian scene in the '60s and '70s - another writer who appreciated how genuine human impulses could be harnessed and warped by the wrong kind of leader.' * The Saturday Paper * `Beautiful Revolutionary has had me completely mesmerised - it has been so long since I've been so utterly engrossed and absorbed in a novel. The shifts in perspective are masterfully handled and offer a fascinating and nuanced portrait of Jim Jones' Peoples Temple. I do love cult novels and this is one of the best of them. The tension build to the inevitable conclusion is incredibly well done. I have nothing but love for this book, five beautiful stars. It's my number one Australian novel of the year.' -- Jaclyn Crupi, Bookseller at Hill of Content `Woollett's writing makes this story an electricity storm. The clouds are weed smoke and the lightning charging through that haze is pure sexual energy. I'm almost half-way through and feel wholly transported. The world is both real and surreal; these characters alien and freakishly familiar to me. Completely gripping, and dripping with detail never overdone.' -- Bri Lee, author of Eggshell Skull `Meticulously researched ... Woollett's prose is arresting-vivid without being flowery, subtle but still affecting. While the plot is dramatic and intriguing, the quality of Woollett's prose is the most enjoyable aspect of this novel ... This is an excellent work of literary historical fiction.' * Books+Publishing * `Beautiful Revolutionary is some of the most exciting fiction I've encountered. It fearlessly explores the human elements that attracted masses to the Peoples Temple and to Jim Jones - fear, lust, the need to be loved, and the urge to feel a part of something larger than the self. This story cuts close to the bone, unrelenting and irrefutably true, over and over. Laura Elizabeth Woollett is an immense talent, and this is a bracing - and necessary - read.' -- Kayla Rae Whitaker, author of The Animators `In this rich and skilled reimagining, Woollett joins the sprawling, doomed, and endlessly fascinating juggernaut of the Peoples Temple as it careens from fraught, idealistic inception in late-sixties California to desperately tragic demise in Guyana a decade later. Equal parts earth and ecstasy, pulsing with life, this book takes us deep within the lives of Jones's followers and the unfurling of their inevitable, dark drama. Climb aboard, and hold on tight.' -- Peggy Frew, author of Hope Farm `[D]ramatic and intriguing, the quality of Woollett's prose is the most enjoyable aspect of this novel ... Reading Beautiful Revolutionary, it is easy to imagine how so many people could have been captivated and controlled by a man such as Jones ... [A]n excellent work of literary historical fiction.' 4.5 STARS * Books+Publishing * `Laura Woollett's imaginative retelling of the Jonestown tragedy does what only fiction can do - endows Jim Jones and his inner circle with a sense of humanity. She formulates answers to unknowable questions - how could otherwise sane people be pulled into Jones's web of evil? What happened that last, tragic day? A lyrical and sharply rendered tale of innocence lost and ideals betrayed.' -- Julia Scheeres, author of A Thousand Lives: The Untold Story of Jonestown `Woollett has wisely chosen to forgo the fetishism of death and Jim Jones that is so often the focus of this tragedy. With Beautiful Revolutionary, Woollett has created an utterly intoxicating portrait of the lives of those seeking to build something new in a world that seemed to be losing its mind. Although we know what awaits us, Woollett masterfully weaves a suspenseful and complex story about people - of their dreams, beliefs, ideals, and lives all coming to a horrific end - in a way that is uniquely hers. Woollett is electric.' -- Sarah Schmidt, author of See What I Have Done

About this edition

• Publisher: Scribe Publications
• Publication date: 2019
• ISBN 10: 1911617591
• ISBN 13: 9781911617594
• Binding: Paperback
• Number of pages: 416