A self-portrait in 154 songs, by our greatest living songwriter.
' More often than I can count, I've been asked
As the clock chimed the turn of the twentieth century, Lilly Nelly Aphrodite took her first breath. Born to a cabaret dancer & soon orphaned in a scandalous double murder, Lilly finds refuge at a Catholic orphanage, coming under the wing of the, at times, severe Sister August, the first in a string of lost loves. There she meets Hanne Schmidt, a teen prostitute, & forms a bond that will last them through tumultuous love affairs, disastrous marriages, & destitution during the First World War & the subsequent economic collapse. As the century progresses, Lilly & Hanne move from the tawdry glamour of the tingle-tangle nightclubs to the shadow world of health films before Lilly finds success & stardom in the new medium of motion pictures & ultimately falls in love with a man whose fate could cost her everything she has worked for or help her discover her true self. Gripping & darkly seductive, The Luminous Life of Lilly Aphrodite showcases all the glitter & splendour of the brief heyday of the Weimar Republic, & the rise of Hollywood to its golden age. As it foreshadows the horrors of the Second World War, the novel asks what price is paid when identity becomes unfixed & the social order is upended. The size of this book is 19.7cm in height & 12.8cm wide with 404 pages