The girl with glass feet - Ali Shaw

Winner of the Desmond Elliott Prize (2010)Shortlisted for the Costa Book Award Nominee for First Novel (2009)Longlisted for Guardian First Book Award (2009)Longlisted for the Dylan Thomas Prize (2010)Shortlisted Thtifantasia Award Nominee (2012)A mysterious and frightening alchemical metamorphosis has befallen Ida Maclaird - she is slowly turning into glass, from the feet up. She returns to St Hauda's Land, where she believes the glass first took hold, in search of a cure. Midas Crook is a young loner, who has lived on the islands his entire life. When he meets Ida, something about her sad, defiant spirit pierces his emotional defenses. As Midas helps Ida come to terms with her affliction, she gradually unpicks the knots of his heart, and they begin to fall in love... What they need most is time - and time is slipping away fast. Will they find a way to stave off the spread of the glass? The Girl with Glass Feet is a dazzlingly imaginative and gripping first novel, a love story to treasure.