PositiveThe Guardian (UK)Compelling ... There is a certain opacity to Enter Ghost; geopolitical and linguistic clarifications are scant or obscured, adding to the sense of being locked out of the country, not always for the good of the storytelling.
Joseph O'Connor
PositiveThe Guardian (UK)The problem with novels about towering historical figures is that most often the author hasn’t the wit or brilliance to capture them, but Shadowplay is a book undaunted. One gives up wondering what is true, because it all is ... Sexuality and gender are shapeshifting, and there could be no better place to explore them than O’Connor’s vagabond world of theatre, where his characters may throw off their disguises amid the playacting ... The pieces of the jigsaw gather, and it is a relief when Stoker at last begins to write. All the wildness, wit and passion don’t come without a price in Shadowplay, any more than in life. As the Victorian era shifts into the new century, what has been gothic and thrilling becomes grotesque in the light of modernity. Never has that reputedly gilded era seemed so pale or flat. As much as this is a hugely entertaining book about the grand scope of friendship and love, it is also, movingly—at times, agonisingly—a story of transience, loss and true loyalty.
