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NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER • “A beautifully written, extraordinary quest in which two ordinary, overlooked women embark on an unlikely scientific expedition to the South Seas.”—Helen Simonson, author of Major Pettigrew’s Last Stand
WINNER OF THE WILBUR SMITH ADVENTURE WRITING PRIZE • From the bestselling author of The Unlikely Pilgrimage of Harold Fry comes an uplifting, irresistible novel about two women on a life-changing adventure, where they must risk everything, break all the rules, and discover their best selves—together. She’s going too far to go it alone.
It is 1950. London is still reeling from World War II, and Margery Benson, a schoolteacher and spinster, is trying to get through life, surviving on scraps. One day, she reaches her breaking point, abandoning her job and small existence to set out on an expedition to the other side of the world in search of her childhood obsession: an insect that may or may not exist—the golden beetle of New Caledonia. When she advertises for an assistant to accompany her, the woman she ends up with is the last person she had in mind. Fun-loving Enid Pretty in her tight-fitting pink suit and pom-pom sandals seems to attract trouble wherever she goes. But together these two British women find themselves drawn into a cross-ocean adventure that exceeds all expectations and delivers something neither of them expected to find: the transformative power of friendship. Praise for Miss Benson’s Beetle “A hilarious jaunt into the wilderness of women’s friendship and the triumph of outrageous dreams.”—Kirkus Reviews
NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER • “A beautifully written, extraordinary quest in which two ordinary, overlooked women embark on an unlikely scientific expedition to the South Seas.”—Helen Simonson, author of Major Pettigrew’s Last Stand
WINNER OF THE WILBUR SMITH ADVENTURE WRITING PRIZE • From the bestselling author of The Unlikely Pilgrimage of Harold Fry comes an uplifting, irresistible novel about two women on a life-changing adventure, where they must risk everything, break all the rules, and discover their best selves—together. She’s going too far to go it alone.
It is 1950. London is still reeling from World War II, and Margery Benson, a schoolteacher and spinster, is trying to get through life, surviving on scraps. One day, she reaches her breaking point, abandoning her job and small existence to set out on an expedition to the other side of the world in search of her childhood obsession: an insect that may or may not exist—the golden beetle of New Caledonia. When she advertises for an assistant to accompany her, the woman she ends up with is the last person she had in mind. Fun-loving Enid Pretty in her tight-fitting pink suit and pom-pom sandals seems to attract trouble wherever she goes. But together these two British women find themselves drawn into a cross-ocean adventure that exceeds all expectations and delivers something neither of them expected to find: the transformative power of friendship. Praise for Miss Benson’s Beetle “A hilarious jaunt into the wilderness of women’s friendship and the triumph of outrageous dreams.”—Kirkus Reviews
En raison de restrictions imposées par l'éditeur, la bibliothèque n'est pas en mesure d'acheter des exemplaires supplémentaires de ce titre et nous vous présentons toutes nos excuses si la liste d'attente est longue. N'oubliez pas de regarder s'il existe d'autres exemplaires, car d'autres éditions sont peut-être disponibles.
En raison de restrictions imposées par l'éditeur, la bibliothèque n'est pas en mesure d'acheter des exemplaires supplémentaires de ce titre et nous vous présentons toutes nos excuses si la liste d'attente est longue. N'oubliez pas de regarder s'il existe d'autres exemplaires, car d'autres éditions sont peut-être disponibles.
Extraits-
From the bookThe Golden Beetle of New Caledonia, 1914
When Margery was ten, she fell in love with a beetle.
It was a bright summer’s day, and all the windows of the rectory were open. She had an idea about sailing her wooden animals across the floor, two by two, but the set had belonged to her brothers once, and most of them were either colored in or broken. Some were even missing altogether. She was wondering if, under the circumstances, you could pair a three-legged camel and a bird with spots when her father came out of his study.
“Do you have a moment, old girl?” he said. “There’s something I want to show you."
So she put down the camel and the bird, and she followed him. She would have stood on her head if he’d asked.
Her father went to his desk. He sat there, nodding and smiling. She could tell he didn’t have a proper reason for calling her: he just wanted her to be with him for a while. Since her four brothers had left for war, he often called her. Or she’d find him loitering at the foot of the stairs, searching for something without seeming to know what it was. His eyes were the kindest in the world, and the bald top of his head gave him a naked look.
“I think I have something that might interest you, old girl,” he said. “Nothing much, but maybe you will like it.”
At this point he would normally produce something he’d found in the garden, but instead he opened a book called Incredible Creatures. It looked important, like the Bible or an encyclopedia, and there was a general smell of old things, but that could well have been him. Margery stood at his side, trying hard not to fidget.
The first page was a painted illustration of a man. He had a normal face and normal arms but, where his legs should have been, a green mermaid tail. She was amazed. The next picture was just as strange. A squirrel like one in the garden, but this had wings. And it went on, page after page, one incredible creature after another.
“Well, well, look,” her father kept saying. “Well, now, goodness me. Look at this chap, Margery.”
“Are they real?”
“They might be.”
“Are they in a zoo?”
“Oh, no, dear heart. If these creatures live, they’ve not been found. There are people who believe they exist, but they haven’t caught them yet so they can’t prove it.”
She had no idea what he was talking about. Until that moment she’d assumed everything in the world was already found. It had never occurred to her things might happen in reverse. That you could see a picture of something in a book—that you could as good as imagine it—and then go off and look.
Her father showed her the Himalayan yeti, the Loch Ness Monster, the Patagonian giant sloth. There was the Irish elk with antlers as big as wings. The South African quagga, which started as a zebra until it ran out of stripes and became a horse. The great auk, the lion-tailed monkey, the Queensland tiger. So many incredible extra creatures in the world, and nobody had found a single one of them.
“Do you think they’re real?” she said.
Her father nodded. “I have begun to feel comforted,” he said, “by the thought of all we do not know, which is nearly everything.” With that upside-down piece of wisdom, he turned another...
Au sujet de l’auteur-
Rachel Joyce is the author of The Music Shop, the Sunday Times and international bestsellers The Unlikely Pilgrimage of Harold Fry, Perfect, and The Love Song of Miss Queenie Hennessy, as well as the digital short story A Faraway Smell of Lemon and a story collection, A Snow Garden & Other Stories. Her books have been translated into thirty-six languages and two are in development for film. The Unlikely Pilgrimage of Harold Fry was shortlisted for the Commonwealth Book Prize and longlisted for the Man Booker Prize. Joyce was named the Specsavers National Book Awards "New Writer of the Year" in December 2012 and shortlisted for the "UK Author of the Year" 2014. Joyce has also written more than thirty original afternoon plays and adaptations of the classics for BBC Radio 4, including all the Brontë novels. She moved to writing after a long career as an actor, performing leading roles for the RSC, the National Theatre, and Cheek by Jowl. She lives with her family in Gloucestershire.
Critiques-
Starred review from August 31, 2020 Joyce’s sparkling latest (after The Music Shop) pops with grit, resilience, and the power of friendship. It’s 1950, and 46-year-old Margery Benson teaches domestic science to girls in a London school. Having been humiliated one too many times in her 20-year stint teaching, a demeaning sketch of her by a student captioned, “The Virgin Margery!” is the catalyst that changes her life: she leaves the school with a pair of stolen lacrosse boots, returns to her lonely existence in her deceased aunt’s flat, and puts an advertisement in the paper for a French-speaking assistant to travel with her to New Caledonia, where she intends to find a mythical golden beetle. The adventure is sparked by a memory of her father showing her a picture of the beetle in a book called Imaginary Creatures, full of “many incredible extra creatures in the world, and nobody had found a single one of them.” Enter Enid Pretty, Margery’s polar opposite: young, beautiful, petite, and headstrong. During their travels in New Caledonia, each woman faces uncomfortable truths about herself and the other, and both eschew traditional women’s expectations in their own way to celebrate their true selves. Joyce’s graceful touch and cutting humor undercut the potential for mawkishness and give the characters a rich complexity and depth. With a plucky protagonist and plenty of action, this is a winner. Agent: Alexander Cochran, C&W Agency.
Starred review from November 1, 2020
In 1914, Margery Benson is introduced to the mythical Golden Beetle of New Caledonia at the age of 10. Her family is almost immediately deeply devastated by World War I, and Margery shelves her dream of finding the beetle until 1950. In her middle age, she realizes that her life is not what she wants it to be, and she wants to prove to the world that the golden insect does in fact exist. She just has to make her way to New Caledonia, an island in the South Pacific, pay for an expedition, and hire an assistant to help her find, mount, and describe the beetle to entomologists back in England. She engages the services of Enid Petty, the least likely assistant to an entomologist to ever be found, a brassy young woman with troubles of her own. VERDICT Joyce (The Unlikely Pilgrimage of Harold Fry) has written a delightful book filled with for whom characters readers will root. Margery finds herself again, after being buried by family and work troubles; Enid finds a friend and completes her own dream while in the wilderness of New Caledonia. Sure to be a hit with book clubs.--Jennifer Mills, Shorewood-Troy Lib., IL
Copyright 2020 Library Journal, LLC Used with permission.
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