Glass Town Wars

by Celia Rees

  In 1847, Charlotte, Emily and Anne Brontë published their first adult novels, Jane Eyre, Wuthering Heights and Agnes Grey, under the pseudonyms of Currer, Ellis and Acton Bell. When contemporary readers and critics discovered the true identity of the authors, they were astonished that these novels were the work of three daughters of a parson with a living in a village on the edge of the Yorkshire Moors. These were writers of rare talent, even genius, but their achievement was not sudden or spontaneous. They were already experienced authors of Gothic fictions, romances, historical sagas, magazine and newspaper articles, and poetry. They had served a long apprenticeship.

  Acknowledgements

  I would like to thank my husband, Terence Rees, and my daughter, Catrin, for their help and encouragement during the writing of this book. I would also like to thank fellow writers Linda Newbery, Adèle Geras, Julia Jarman, Cindy Jeffries, Yvonne Coppard and Helena Pielichaty for their writerly companionship. I am grateful to the staff at the Brontë Parsonage Museum Library, Haworth, Yorkshire, and particularly Amy Rowbottom, for allowing me to view their collection of the Brontë juvenilia. And to Debra Collinge for advice on things medical, and to Faye Reason and Lucy Coats for telling me something about shamanism.

  I would also like to thank my editor at Pushkin Press, Sarah Odedina, for her support and enthusiasm for this project, and Madeleine Stevens for her careful copy-editing.

  Find out more about my inspiration and research on my website: www.celiarees.com.

  TEEN AND YA FICTION

  FROM PUSHKIN PRESS

  THE RED ABBEY CHRONICLES

  MARESI

  NAONDEL

  MARESI RED MANTLE

  Maria Turtschaninoff

  Translated by Annie Prime

  ‘Combines a flavour of The Handmaid’s Tale with bursts of excitement reminiscent of Harry Potter’s magic duels’

  Observer

  THE BEGINNING WOODS

  Malcolm McNeill

  ‘I loved every word and was envious of quite a few… A modern classic – rich, funny and terrifying’

  Eoin Colfer

  THE RECKLESS SERIES

  1. THE PETRIFIED FLESH

  2. LIVING SHADOWS

  3. THE GOLDEN YARN

  Cornelia Funke

  ‘A wonderful storyteller’

  Sunday Times

  PIGLETTES

  Clémentine Beauvais

  Translated by Clémentine Beauvais

  ‘A triumph of a book; so funny, so original, so sharp, so warm’

  Katherine Rundell, author of Rooftoppers

  THE DISAPPEARANCES

  Emily Bain Murphy

  ‘The Disappearances is a wonder of a book. I lost myself in this world where reflections, scents and stars go missing, and revelled in its reveal’

  Kiran Millwood Hargrave, author of The Girl of Ink & Stars

  THE WILDINGS

  Nilanjana Roy

  ‘A stylish, bloody, literary addition, set in India and already a considerable critical success there. Rich in cat telepathy and shuddery feral madness’

  Guardian

  THE OKSA POLLOCK SERIES

  1. THE LAST HOPE

  2. THE FOREST OF LOST SOULS

  3. THE HEART OF TWO WORLDS

  4. TAINTED BONDS

  Anne Plichota and Cendrine Wolf

  Translated by Sue Rose

  ‘A feisty heroine, lots of sparky tricks and evil opponents could fill a gap left by the end of the Harry Potter series’

  Daily Mail

  Copyright

  Pushkin Press

  71–75 Shelton Street

  London WC2H 9JQ

  Copyright © 2018 Celia Rees

  First published by Pushkin Press in 2018

  1 3 5 7 9 8 6 4 2

  Hardback ISBN 13: 978–1–78269–164–8

  All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording or otherwise, without prior permission in writing from Pushkin Press

  www.pushkinpress.com