"From the acclaimed award-winning author of 1974 and The Vixen comes an utterly original novel inspired by Charles Dickens's true, strange friendship with his fellow literary genius, Hans Christian Andersen, set against the summer Dickens's family life famously exploded In the summer of 1857, as the newspapers are full of an impending comet that may or may not destroy civilization, an unusual looking stranger arrives by express invitation to Charles Dickens's estate, Gad Hill. He is a fellow writer of almost equal renown to Dickens, who chanced to meet him at a dinner party years before. But Hans Christian Anderson, far from receiving a receptive welcome at the bustling household filled with a large brood of children, finds himself immediately estranged and unmoored. Unable to communicate in a language he doesn't speak, he's all the same attuned to an electric tension in the air between Charles and Catherine Dickens that pervades the home. He's also witness to Dickens's fervent attachment to his new play, and his new leading lady, Ellen Tiernan . . . . Despite the awkwardness of his surroundings, for reasons that remain mysterious even to him, Andersen finds himself paralyzed, lingering at Gad's Hill far past the point of welcome. Five Weeks in the Country, inspired by an actual literary encounter, is Francine Prose at her dazzling best"-- Provided by publisher.