Waiting on Wednesday: Velvet by Mary Hooper

Button courtesy of sheshines.net

Waiting on Wednesday is a meme held at Breaking The Spine in which book bloggers feature soon to be published books that they are eagerly anticipating.

Velvet by Mary Hooper

Goodreads description:

Rose is a laundress in a Victorian steam laundry. With both her mother and father dead, she is an orphan and has to rely upon her own wits to make a living. The laundry is scalding, back-breaking work and Rose is desperate to create a better life for herself. Then Rose is noticed by Madame X, a famed medium, who asks Rose to come to work for her. Rose is dazzled at first by the young yet beautifully dressed and bejewelled Madame. But soon Rose realises that Madame X is not all that she says she is, and Rose's very life is in danger ...A romantic and thrillingly exciting new novel from an acclaimed and much-loved historical writer for teens

Why I want to read it:

I LOVE Mary Hooper's books and she was the author who led me to historical fiction so I'm grateful to that! I interviewed her in person when she came to my school and she's very lovely too. I've been waiting on Velvet for about the longest time I've ever waited for a book because I first heard about it when Mary had just begun writing it and mentioned the premise in her talk at her first visit to my school. I like the sound of the setting of a Victorian steam laundry because I haven't read about one before although I just read a book about a fraudulent medium (Haunting Violet), I'm interested to see Mary Hooper's take on it.

I'm not a big fan of the cover because there are so many YA historicals with beautiful dresses on their covers for example which would make them appeal to me more on first glance. It's nothing particularly special but I can't deny that it does look nice and the red swirls and lace work on the part of a bodice shown are pretty. I just wish it told more about what the book is about.

Velvet is being published by Bloombury UK on September 5th this year.