The Enchanted
Publisher,Orion
Publication Date,
Format, Hardcover
Weight,
No. of Pages,
The Enchanted, by Rene Denfeld, is set in a high security prison. The narrator is a prisoner on death row who escapes his terrible surroundings through immersing himself in books, and through re-imagining the world that surrounds him.
He watches The Lady, graceful and filled with a strange strength and beauty, who attempts to find mitigating circumstances and gain prisoners a reprieve. Then there is The Fallen Priest is falling in love with her. What is so striking in this book is that moments of sheer poetry are juxtaposed with the most horrible realities of prison life - the brutality and violence, the corruption and the way each prisoner must fight for their place in the hierarchy. I
t is a book about redemption, the humanity that can lie within what is monstrous, and the human capacity to transcend and survive. It really is an astonishing read.
