Splendors and Glooms - Paperback

by Laura Amy Schlitz (Author)

"A brooding, Dickensian novel with a touch of fantasy and a glimmer of hope. . . . As mysterious and timeless as a fairy tale." -- Booklist (starred review)

Laura Amy Schlitz's Newbery Honor-winning Victorian gothic is a rich banquet of dark comedy, scorching magic, and bewitching storytelling. Clara Wintermute, the only child of a wealthy doctor, invites master puppeteer Grisini to entertain at her birthday party. When Clara vanishes that night, suspicion falls upon the puppeteer and his orphaned assistants. The three children -- two penniless waifs and one pampered heiress -- have been caught in a trap set by Grisini's ancient rival, a witch with a deadly inheritance she's determined to shed before it's too late.

Author Biography

Laura Amy Schlitz is the author of the Newbery Medal-winning Good Masters! Sweet Ladies! Voices from a Medieval Village, illustrated by Robert Byrd; A Drowned Maiden's Hair: A Melodrama; The Night Fairy, illustrated by Angela Barrett; and other books for children. She lives in Maryland.