Named one of the best books of 2019 by the Daily Mail, The Sunday Times (London), and the BBC

An utterly transporting and original historical novel about an 18th century experiment in personal isolation that yields unexpected - and deeply, shatteringly human - results.

"The best kind of historical fiction. Alix Nathan is an original, with a virtuoso touch." (Hilary Mantel)

Herbert Powyss lives in an estate in the Welsh Marches, with enough time and income to pursue a gentleman's fashionable investigations and experiments in botany. But he longs to make his mark in the field of science - something consequential enough to present to the Royal Society in London. He hits on a radical experiment in isolation: For seven years a subject will inhabit three rooms in the basement of the manor house, fitted out with rugs, books, paintings, and even a chamber organ. Meals will arrive thrice daily via a dumbwaiter. The solitude will be totally unrelieved by any social contact whatsoever; the subject will keep a diary of his daily thoughts and actions. The pay: 50 pounds per annum, for life.

Only one man is desperate to apply for the job: John Warlow, a semi-literate laborer with a wife and six children to provide for. The experiment, a classic Enlightenment exercise gone more than a little mad, will have unforeseen consequences for all included.