The Unburied
It is Christmas, 1888. A lonely academic historian, Dr Courtine, arrives in the sleepy cathedral town of Thurchester with two aims: he wants to find a medieval document that will prove his pet theory about King Alfred and he also hopes for a reconciliation with his former university friend, Austin Fickling, who teaches at the cathedral school. Twenty years ago their close friendship ended in mysterious circumstances and Courtine hopes to discover what happened at that time. Fickling, who seems both angry with Courtine and remorseful towards him, tells him a story of deception and murder that shook the cathedral community during the Civil War. Is he warning his former friend or trying to entrap him? Intent on understanding the past, Courtine fails to realise that he is being ensnared right now in a similar story of betrayal and murder.
The New York Times
“Palliser knows what he is doing, and he does it with grace. Involving us in one of the most complex and multilayered plots we have ever been mystified by, he allows us finally to realize that it's the questions we don't ask that matter and the solutions we cannot find that make for a life we can tolerate living. … The Unburied is a novel of spoofs, tricks and general flummoxing, presented through a series of unhelpful hints. … The Unburied is a novel of the night, walking in the midst of those most spooky ghosts, the ones we call up in answer to our fears. In the end, Palliser is as brave and generous as his central character, assuring us that we can survive without all those phantoms.”
The New Yorker
“All the murders are puzzles, and Palliser constructs his plot like a maze and lures readers into it.”
Entertainment Weekly
“Mesmerizing, meticulous … As the layers of dirty deeds are unearthed, [the novel] feels like an archaeological dig.”
Kirkus Reviews
“A complex puzzler, though the real story here, which is finely done even in its anachronistic 19th-century style, is the simple one of a decent man forced at last to open his eyes and take a good look around.”