Beatrice And Virgil

Destiny can take many shapes.

For Henry, a writer struggling to finish a book about the Holocaust, and living in a new city with his pregnant wife, it arrives in the form of a puzzling envelope from a stranger. The envelope contains a story by Flaubert in which many animals are killed, together with a play featuring two characters named Beatrice and Virgil. And a note signed 'Henry', with an address in the same city.

From the moment Henry finds that address, and steps into a taxidermist's workshop, a place unlike anywhere he has ever been, he understands that his life cannot remain the same. Now the strange dramatic world of Beatrice and Virgil, a donkey and a monkey, starts to expand. How does their conversation relate to his own creative impasse? Has he somehow become another player on the bizarre stage his namesake has invented?

With the imaginative reach and spirit that helped Life of Pi delight over seven million readers around the world, Beatrice and Virgil asks profound questions about violence, kindness, and the power of stories to change us.