Blog

  • A.C. Gunter’s Baron Montez: 6. Jesse’s Letter

    Although this chapter begins in 1880, it spans the years to 1887. The Baron Montez, Larchmont and his ward, Jessie, arrive in Paris at the centre of a glorious time which in the future will be known as the ‘Belle Epoque’. Imagine wide boulevards where bunches of flowers spill from vendors’ baskets onto the pavement… Read more

  • A.C. Gunter’s Baron Montez: 5. Black Blood Changes to Blue

    Twenty-five years after the closing events of the last chapter, Panama is still our setting, though the focus has shifted from the Panama Railroad to a new major engineering challenge: The Panama Canal. The year is 1880 and Ferdinand de Lesseps, French diplomat and developer of the Suez Canal and his entourage, are in Panama… Read more

  • A.C. Gunter’s Baron Montez: 4. What The Moon Saw In Panama

    This is the last chapter of Book One, dealing with the climax of events on the evening 15th April, 1856, for which the narrator has been preparing the reader. There is a thin line between author and narrator, and in some novels the narrator is distinct, is known, has a name: ‘Call me Ishmael’, so… Read more

  • Gunter Biosnip: Trade in Desires

    Archibald Clavering Gunter’s life exhibits the marks of a new breed of author – one that in turn exemplifies an emerging species of individual. Homo Economicus, or ‘economic man’: a term coined initially in reaction to John Stuart Mill’s utilitarianist theory and the eminently sensible-sounding principle that “actions are right in the proportion as they… Read more

  • A.C. Gunter’s Baron Montez: 3. The Railroad Station At Panama

    As we begin this chapter, Fernando Gomez Montez, having tampered with George Ripley’s revolver, has new confidence, and commences putting in place other components in his plan to relieve the American of his gold-filled chest, and fair-skinned wife. Montez arranges boat transport for himself and the Ripleys to Panama where they find it crowded with… Read more