A Change of Climate

A Change of Climate
Hilary Mantel

From the double Man Booker prize-winning author of ‘Wolf Hall’, and ’Bring Up the Bodies’ this is an epic yet subtle family saga about broken trusts and buried secrets.Ralph and Anna Eldred live in the big Red House in Norfolk, raising their four children and devoting their lives to charity. The constant flood of ‘good souls and sad cases’, children plucked from the squalor of the East London streets for a breath of fresh countryside air, hides the growing crises in their own family, the disillusionment of their children, the fissures in their marriage. Memories of their time as missionaries in South Africa and Botswana, of the terrible African tragedies that have shaped the rest of their lives, refuse to be put to rest and threaten to destroy the fragile peace they have built for themselves and their children.This is a breathtakingly intelligent novel that asks the most difficult questions. Is there anything one can never forgive? Is tragedy ever deserved? Can you ever escape your own past? A literary family saga written with the skill and subtlety of a true master, this is Hilary Mantel at her best.

Copyright (#ulink_97737d46-eef5-5bab-aef4-d64d2cf083cd)

Fourth Estate

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This edition published by Fourth Estate 2010

First published by Viking 1994

Copyright © Hilary Mantel 1994 PS section © Sarah O’Reilly 2010

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Hilary Mantel asserts the moral right to be identified as the author of this work

The lines from W.H. Auden’s As I Walked Out One Evening’ are reprinted from Collected Poems by W.H. Auden, edited by Edward Mendelson, by kind permission of Faber & Faber.

A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library

This novel is entirely a work of fiction. The names, characters and incidents portrayed in it are the work of the author’s imagination. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, events or localities is entirely coincidental.

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Source ISBN: 9780007172900

Ebook Edition © APRIL 2010 ISBN: 9780007354948

Version: 2018-10-30

This book is sold subject to the condition that it shall not, by way of trade or otherwise, be lent, re-sold, hired out or otherwise circulated without the publisher’s prior consent in any form of binding or cover other than that in which it is published and without a similar condition including this condition being imposed on the subsequent purchaser.

To Jenny Naipaul

Note (#ulink_ce3e0bb7-27b3-531b-9474-aa8cad12c1f4)

All the characters in this book are fictitious, except that of the Archbishop of Cape Town, which is based on his real-life counterpart, Geoffrey Clayton. I have used some of his words, taken from writings and sermons.

The settlement of Mosadinyana is fictional. The township of Elim is invented too, but I am indebted to the memoirs of Hannah Stanton, who served in the township of Lady Selborne.

Cases similar to that of the Eldreds may be found in the Law Reports of Botswana.

Charles Darwin, The Descent of Man, 1871:

‘We are not here concerned with hopes and fears, only with the truth as far as our reason allows us to discover it. I have given the evidence to the best of my ability…’

Job 4:7:

‘Consider, what innocent ever perished, or where have the righteous been destroyed?’

Contents

Cover Page (#uc02ca25c-99ea-5e66-9007-ff9453d57519)

Title Page (#u6516e40d-f178-58e8-a309-e64016834570)

Copyright (#uef42ad03-038e-561b-8a36-1ba416491638)

Dedication (#uf1319618-257c-56ba-b0ee-74690df2e312)

Note (#u3cf0a180-5325-5562-ae0a-d716ab099236)

Epigraph (#u4de931ec-f1a8-593e-a2f9-195ecfadd015)

1970 SAD CASES, GOOD SOULS (#u1dfdbe5e-0b84-58c9-aad7-11f0b28ec9d1)

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THREE (#ubf233c58-83e5-5c71-bdee-cc3b462a1b9c)

FOUR (#ua9d8c194-3386-50a9-aeb7-cef5fcfa44a3)

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EIGHT (#litres_trial_promo)

NINE (#litres_trial_promo)

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Keep Reading (#litres_trial_promo)

P.S. (#litres_trial_promo)

About the Author (#litres_trial_promo)