Two unlikely people form an unexpected bond in bestselling author Karen Joy Fowler’s captivating historical novel—a New York Times Notable Book.
When black cloaked Sarah Canary wanders into a Chinese labor camp in the Washington territories in 1873, Chin Ah Kin is ordered by his uncle to escort “the ugliest woman he could imagine” away. Far away. But Chin soon becomes the follower.
In the first of many such instances, they are separated, both resurfacing some days later at an insane asylum. Chin has run afoul of the law and Sarah has been committed for observation. Their escape from the asylum in the company of another inmate sets into motion a series of adventures and misadventures that are at once hilarious, deeply moving, and downright terrifying.
“Powerfully imagined...Drop everything and follow Sarah Canary....Humor and horror, history and myth dance cheek to cheek in this Jack London meets L. Frank Baum world....Here is a work that manages to be at the same time (and often in the same sentence) dark and deep and fun.”—The Washington Post Book World
- ISBN10 0345416449
- ISBN13 9780345416445
- Publish Date 10 February 1998 (first published 1 October 1991)
- Publish Status Out of Stock
- Out of Print 24 March 2012
- Publish Country US
- Publisher Random House USA Inc
- Imprint Ballantine Books Inc.
- Format Paperback
- Pages 290
- Language English