Vendor
	Mohrbooks Literary Agency Sebastian Ritscher
Categories
Historical adventure fiction

WHAT IS VISIBLE

Kimberly Elkins

WHAT IS VISIBLE is a fictional exploration of the real-life nineteenth-century figure, Laura Bridgman, who was the first deaf and blind person to learn language, fifty years before Helen Keller.

Laura also couldn't taste or smell; she lost all senses but touch from a bout with scarlet fever at age two. Laura is the book's primary narrator, though other chapters focus on the founder of Perkins Institute, with whom she was in love; his wife, a renowned writer, abolitionist and suffragist; Laura's beloved teacher, who married a missionary and died insane from syphilis; an orphaned Irish girl with whom Laura had a tumultuous affair; and even the young Helen Keller. The novel is driven by both character and history in its examination of ability and disability; ideas about female beauty and sexuality; and slavery and the abolitionist movement. At the center of it all is the breathtaking experiment that Laura Bridgman embodied and its links to the great philosophical, theological, educational and social changes taking place between 1840 and 1890, including one chapter set in Rome. It is astonishing, given that Laura was considered the second most famous woman in the world in the 1850's (second only to Queen Victoria), that she has been virtually erased from history, and WHAT IS VISIBLE seeks to set the record straight.

Available products
Book Published by Twelve / Grand Central

Comments

I found myself slowly mesmerized by WHAT IS VISIBLE, and then increasingly haunted and bound to the story of Laura Bridgman, the second, deeper, darker invisibility of her life so permanently excavated and restored to memory by the talented hand of Kimberly Elkins and her extraordinary powers of imagination. To say that I was profoundly moved by this novel would be an understatement.

A complex, multilayered portrait of a woman who longed to communicate and to love and be loved. Elkins fully captures her difficult nature and her relentless pursuit of connection.

The story of Helen Keller’s forgotten forerunner comes nimbly to life in Elkins’ debut novel… An affecting portrait which finally provides its idiosyncratic heroine with a worthy voice.

Elkins revives this historical figure with a wonderfully imaginative and scrupulously researched debut novel… Laura comes across as a willful, mysterious marvel.

“WHAT IS VISIBLE is remarkable at many levels. It is written in an intelligent, intri- cate style, populated with many true historical figures, and teeming with convincing period details. The novel illustrates the art of fiction at its best. A splendid debut indeed.”

WHAT IS VISIBLE is not only a compelling, deeply moving novel; it is a fully realized work of art. This is an auspicious debut of an important new writer.

An astonishing debut that vividly brings to life a forgotten chapter of American history. You’ll recognize many of the characters in WHAT IS VISIBLE, but its heroine, Laura Bridgman, is likely someone you’ve never heard of. After you read it, you’ll never forget her. Beautiful, heart-wrenching, and at times quite funny, this book is a marvel.