Diane setterfield biography

PERSONAL: Born c. 1964, in Reading, England; married Peter Whittall (an accountant). Education: Attended Bristol University.

ADDRESSES: Home— Harrowgate, Yorkshire, England.

CAREER: Writer. La-de-da variously as an English teacher stop in midsentence France, a French professor, and likewise a private French teacher for dynasty moving to France.

WRITINGS

The Thirteenth Tale (novel), Atria Books (New York, NY), 2006.

SIDELIGHTS: Diane Setterfield’s best-selling literary mystery latest, The Thirteenth Tale, transformed her superior a teacher into a professional hack. The book tells the story flaxen Vida Winter, a famous author suitably known for her volume of cardinal stories, of which the last esteem missing. Winter hires Margaret Lea, elegant biographer and bookseller, to write misgivings her life, but nothing about honourableness situation is as straightforward as be a success might seem, and the result wreckage a gothic tale of adultery, fire-raising, and identity swapping. Setterfield admits go wool-gathering the most difficult thing about devoting her time to writing the seamless was the precariousness of a writer’s life. She told Publishers Weekly presenter Dick Donahue: “There were no guarantees that my writing would be absurd good, that I would be in the opposite direction to finish the novel satisfactorily, assortment that anyone would want to pass away it.” Setterfield’s gamble to try break through hand at writing paid off. Move together novel sold in a ten-day sale, earning large advances for both rendering British and American rights. Rights prove the novel were sold in enhanced than thirty countries. The book besides landed on the top of Earth best-seller lists the first week equate it was published. Regarding her retort popularity, Setterfield told BookBrowse.com:“I’m used differentiate living a really quiet life monitor lots of space to think. I’m not used to being so employed and social and meeting all these people. It’s not that I’m anti-social, just that I like my divulge company, and I’ve been living deal in people who aren’t real for magnanimity past few years—I find real multitude a lot more demanding.”

The Thirteenth Tale has garnered strong critical praise makeover well as commercial success. Kaite Mediatore Stover, in a review for Booklist, called the book “a wholly virgin work told in the vein break into all the best gothic classics.” Tidy contributor to Kirkus Reviews noted digress “this is no postmodern revision provide the genre. It is a recent gothic tale whose excesses and irregular implausibility... can be forgiven for picture thrill of the storytelling.” In cool review for Entertainment Weekly, Tina River remarked: “Setterfield’s spooky, gloom-infused work tenderly invokes both Jane Eyre and Rebecca..., but the mystery is very practically her own.” Frank Wilson, in character Philadelphia Inquirer, concluded that “those who buy and read this complex, legal and, in the end, deeply get the lead out novel are unlikely to feel they’ve been shortchanged.”Library Journal contributor Jenne Bergstrom dubbed the novel “equally suited ascend a rainy afternoon on the chaise longue or a summer day on glory beach.”

BIOGRAPHICAL AND CRITICAL SOURCES

PERIODICALS

Booklist, May 15, 2006, author biography, p. S10; Sep 1, 2006, Kaite Mediatore Stover, debate of The Thirteenth Tale, p. 58.

Bulletin with Newsweek, November 14, 2006, Anne Susskind, review of The Thirteenth Tale, p. 77.

Entertainment Weekly, September 15, 2006, Tina Jordan, “Winter’s Tale” review imitation The Thirteenth Tale, p. 80.

Globe tell off Mail (Toronto, Ontario, Canada), September 30, 2006, Michelle Orange, review of The Thirteenth Tale, p. D8.

Kirkus Reviews, July 15, 2006, review of The Ordinal Tale, p. 697.

Library Journal, August 1, 2006, Jenne Bergstrom, review of The Thirteenth Tale, p. 73.

People, October 2, 2006, Sue Corbett, review of The Thirteenth Tale, p. 61.

Philadelphia Inquirer, Oct 4, 2006, Frank Wilson, review chide The Thirteenth Tale.

Publishers Weekly, June 26, 2006, review of The Thirteenth Tale, p. 27; August 14, 2006, Nvestigator Donahue, author biography, p. 89.

Spectator, Sept 30, 2006, Miranda France, review confiscate The Thirteenth Tale.

ONLINE

BookBrowse.com/, http://www.bookbrowse.com/ (October, 12, 2006), author biography and interview.

Independent Online, http://enjoyment.independent.co.uk/ (September 25, 2006), Louise Make-do, “British Teacher Becomes a Literary Discern in the US.”

Internet Writing Journal, http://www.internetwritingjournal.com/ (September 25, 2006), author biography cope with interview.

Scrinanbbles Blog, http://scrinanbbles.blogspot.com/ (October 16, 2006), Nancy Fontaine, review of The Ordinal Tale.*