The Boy in the Rain - by Stephanie Cowell (Paperback)

About the Book

"The Boy in the Rain transports us to another time and place in this powerful, sensual, and lyrical novel that literally took my breath away-the love is so visceral, the pain so deep, the beauty so real, and the danger so palpable!"-NYT bestseller, M.J. Rose, author of The Last Tiara. It is 1903 in the English countryside when Robbie, a shy young art student, meets the twenty-nine-year-old Anton who is running from memories of his brutal childhood and failed marriage. Within months, they begin a love affair that will never let them go. Robbie grows into an accomplished portraitist in the vivid London art world with the help of Anton's enchanting former wife, while Anton turns from his inherited wealth and connections to improve the conditions of the poor. But it is the Edwardian Era, and the law sentences homosexual men to prison with hard labor, following the tragic experience of Oscar Wilde. As Robbie and Anton's commitment to each other grows, the world about them turns to a more dangerous place.

Book Synopsis

"The Boy in the Rain transports us to another time and place in this powerful, sensual, and lyrical novel that literally took my breath away--the love is so visceral, the pain so deep, the beauty so real, and the danger so palpable!" NYT bestseller, M.J. Rose, author of The Last Tiara

It is 1903 in the English countryside when Robbie, a shy young art student, meets the twenty-nine-year-old Anton who is running from memories of his brutal childhood and failed marriage. Within months, they begin a love affair that will never let them go. Robbie grows into an accomplished portraitist in the vivid London art world with the help of Anton's enchanting former wife, while Anton turns from his inherited wealth and connections to improve the conditions of the poor. But it is the Edwardian Era, and the law sentences homosexual men to prison with hard labor, following the tragic experience of Oscar Wilde. As Robbie and Anton's commitment to each other grows, the world about them turns to a more dangerous place.

Review Quotes

"A love story of the highest order...powerful for advancing important issues from a historical perspective in Ed"wardian England, but more significantly for vividly and elegantly capturing the passion, beauty and despair of a forbidden (at the time) affair between two men." --Jim Alkon, Booktrib

"A masterpiece of longing, love, and empathy." --Lauren B. Davis, author of Even So, The Empty Room, Our Daily Bread and others

"At its core The Boy in the Rain is a sweeping love story-complex, bittersweet-reminiscent of Wuthering Heights." Janet Goldberg, author of The Proprietor's Song

"Poignant, engrossing, and evocative. I know of no writer who captures place, period, and emotion better than Stephanie Cowell. " --Mitchell James Kaplan, author of Rhapsody and Into the Unbounded Night

"The Boy in the Rain is a novel I hated to put down and was sorry to see end. It's rare for that alone, but it's also an important novel about injustices that linger on today. Stephanie Cowell is a wonderful writer." --Sandra Gulland, author of the internationally bestselling Josephine B. Trilogy

"The Boy in the Rain is a poignant love story about two Englishmen set at the beginning of the twentieth century when homosexuality was a crime. As Robbie tries to launch a career in portraiture, Anton fights his demons to give voice to his socialist beliefs. How they collide, come apart, and try to rekindle their romance against forbidden yearnings, kept me turning the pages." --Martha Anne Toll, winner of the Petrichor Prize for Finely Crafted Fiction, and author of Three Muses (forthcoming September 2022)

"The Boy in the Rain transports us to another time and place in this powerful, sensual and lyrical novel that literally took my breath away? the love is so visceral, the pain so deep, the beauty so real, and the danger so palpable!" --NYT bestseller, M.J. Rose, author of The Last Tiara

"A tender and immersive love story such as you've never read before... Cowell evokes the glamor as well as the underbelly of Edwardian England, a place rife with prejudice and social injustice, where the book's protagonists--a working-class artist and a well-born socialist crusader--search for love, meaning, and redemption. The characters, the story, and the landscape are utterly immersive, utterly compelling." --Barbara Quick, author of Vivaldi's Virgins and What Disappears

"Shadows of E.M. Forster and Oscar Wilde haunt this tender, moving novel of illicit passion and enduring love. I was captivated by both the self-discovery of young artist Robbie and the redemption of his lover Anton, tormented by past regrets. A vividly immersive portrayal of the heady joys of youthful romance and the heartbreaking cruelties of Edwardian England." --Myrlin A. Hermes, author of The Lunatic, the Lover, and the Poet

"Stephanie Cowell's The Boy in the Rain centers on two young men, worlds apart in experience, navigating a passionate, once-in-a-lifetime romance against the backdrop of England in the first decade of the 20th century. Their love unexpectedly mirroring both the ecstasies and the agonies of a world on the brink of momentous change." --Lance Ringel, author of Flower of Iowa and Floridian Nights, Foreword Reviews INDIES Finalist in the Romance category and Lambda Literary Award Finalist

About the Author

Stephanie Cowell has been an opera singer, balladeer, founder of Strawberry Opera and other arts venues, including a Renaissance festival and an outdoor arts series in NYC. She is the author of Nicholas Cooke, The Physician of London, The Players: A Novel of the Young Shakespeare, Marrying Mozart, and Claude & Camille: A Novel of Monet. Her work had been translated into nine languages and adapted into an opera. Stephanie is the recipient of an American Book Award.