THE GIANT, O'BRIEN. by Mantel, Hilary - (1998)

New York:: Henry Holt,, (1998). Hardcover first edition -. Fine in fine dust jacket.. First US printing. Historical novel by this award-winning author, based on a true story - "The year is 1782; the place, London: the center of science and commerce, home to the newly rich and magnet to the desperately poor. Among the latter is the Giant, O'Brien, a freak of nature, a man of song and story who trusts in the old myths. . . He has come to exhibit his size for money. He has, he soon finds, come to die. His opposite is a man of science, a society surgeon, the famed anatomist John Hunter, employer to a legion of grave robbers. He lusts after the Giant's corpse." Short-listed for the Orange Prize. x, 192 pp.