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The Painted Veil
The Painted Veil
Jul 22, 2025 7:08 PM

Author:W. Somerset Maugham

The Painted Veil

'She was a fool and he knew it and because he loved her it had made no difference'

Kitty Fane is the beautiful but shallow wife of Walter, a bacteriologist stationed in Hong Kong. Unsatisfied by her marriage, she starts an affair with charming, attractive and exciting Charles Townsend. But when Walter discovers her deception, he exacts a strange and terrible vengeance: Kitty must accompany him to his new posting in remote mainland China, where a cholera epidemic rages...

VINTAGE DECO: Nine blazing, daring novels to celebrate the 1920s - 100 years on.

Reviews

Reveals many of Maugham's strengths: an understanding of women, meticulous craftsmanship and raw emotion'

—— Daily Mail

A work of art

—— Spectator

An expert craftsman... His style is sharp, quick, subdued, casual

—— New York Times

Praise for Danielle Jensen - Richly-woven, evocative and absolutely impossible to put down . . . I loved every word

—— Sarah J. Maas bestselling author of, A Court of Thorns and Roses

Richly-woven, evocative, and absolutely impossible to put down - I was hooked from the first lines! Dark Shores has everything I look for in a fantasy novel: fresh, unique settings, a cast of complex and diverse characters, and an unflinching boldness with the nuanced world-building. I loved every word

—— Sarah J. Maas

Stunning world-building, a vivid cast of secondary characters, and a steamy slow-burn romance between two exceedingly competent and compelling heroes. Dark Shores is not one to miss

—— Booklist

The book grabs readers from the beginning with its stellar world-building and multidimensional characters

—— Kirkus Reviews

A powerful story of love, shame and jealousy

—— Mohsin Zaidi

Roberts gives us two strong, absorbing voices, whose competing claims on our sympathies...make My Policeman a satisfyingly taut and involving read

—— Times Literary Supplement

A powerful story of forbidden love, regret, and living as your true self

—— Vanity Fair

A gripping read

—— Viv Groskop , Red

A sensitive, sweeping novel

—— Vogue

Captures the obsessive and destructive madness of sexual jealousy

—— Psychologies

Roberts deploys her research carefully, honing a novel with a strong period feel and a sprightly structure

—— Independent

An amazing read

—— Latest 7

Roberts’ sharp, evocative prose renders this simple story complex, enthralling and compelling

—— Anne Hill , Sussex Life

This spiky portrait of love makes for a gripping read

—— Emma Hagestadt , Independent Radar

A heartbreaking examination of lives and love

—— Diva Magazine

A powerful story of sexual jealousy and longing, My Policeman is also a heartbreaking examination of lives and love that has gone to waste in an era in which homosexuality was a prosecutable offence

—— DIVA Magazine

A beautiful and thoughtfully written novel

—— Good Housekeeping

Impressively precise in its scientific conjectures, Bewilderment is no less rich or wise in its emotionality.... channels both the cosmic sublime and that of the vast American outdoors, resting confidently in a lineage with Thoreau and Whitman, Dillard and Kerouac... Sorrowing awe is Bewilderment's primary tone, and its many remarkable scenes are controlled with high novelistic intelligence.

—— Observer

It's deftly crafted, packs an emotional punch, and Powers's urgent environmental message, delivered by the Greta Thunberg-like Robin, comes through loud and clear

—— Daily Mail

Powers is extremely good at creating a very specific emotion in the reader: a potent mix of sadness and guilt. He's also a wizard when it comes to telling us about trees, rivers, insects and birds

—— Spectator

Bewilderment is a compelling story about love in a dying world

—— Irish Independent

Powers succeeds in engaging both head and heart. And through its central story of bereavement, this novel of parenting and the environment becomes a multifaceted exploration of mortality

—— Economist

It is a thoughtful exploration of individual grief, a study in empathy for the biosphere, a questioning of the medical profession's pathologising of children and a beginner's guide to eco-biology... Bewilderment is both cerebral and heartfelt, a rigorous and damning assessment of the state of the world today. A call to arms for empathy and action

—— Irish Times

Utterly absorbing

—— Daily Mail

One of our most lavishly gifted writers

—— New Yorker

Nothing less than brilliant

—— John Updike

It's not possible for Powers to write an uninteresting book

—— Margaret Atwood

With its first few pages, Powers' novel completely captivated us and with its last, it bowled us over. Powers creates a texture and specificity to our future that feels simultaneously sweepingly large and breathtakingly intimate, told through the most relatable point of view: the ferocious love of a parent for his child and his struggle to provide him a better tomorrow.

—— Leigh Kittay, Black Bear’s Head of Film

On The Overstory: It changed how I thought about the Earth and our place in it . . . It changed how I see things and that's always, for me, a mark of a book worth reading.

—— Barack Obama

On The Overstory: Really, just one of the best novels, period

—— Ann Patchett

On The Overstory: Monumental . . . breath-taking . . . a gigantic fable of genuine truths

—— Barbara Kingsolver

On The Overstory: Exhilarating . . . on almost every page you will find sentences that combine precision and vision

—— The Times

On The Overstory: The best book I've read in ten years. A remarkable piece of literature

—— Emma Thompson

On The Overstory: An extraordinary novel . . . an astonishing performance . . . he is incredibly good at turning science into poetry

—— Guardian

The success of the story - and a success it is - comes not from the ingenious scientific speculations, nor the shrewd literary connections (on the "emotional telepathy" of a work of art, or Daniel Keyes's Flowers for Algernon), but the human story between father and son, as Theo finds out 'how my brain learns to resemble what it loves

—— The Critic

Richard Powers's Booker Prize-shortlisted novel is both brutal and heartwarming, intimate and profound. A masterfully curated story of love, grief and loneliness, quietly building to an inevitable and devastating close

—— Press Association

He composes some of the most beautiful sentences I've ever read. I'm in awe of his talent

—— Oprah Winfrey

In Bewilderment, the Pulitzer Prize-winning American novelist has crafted a story of great beauty and power

—— Business Post
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