The Alteration
by Kingsley Amis · 1976
Popularity 12
An alternative history novel set in a world in which the Protestant Reformation never took place. Hubert Anvil is a singer in the choir of St. George's Basilica whose life is thrown into chaos when his teachers and the Church hierarchy decree that the boy's voice is too precious to sacrifice to puberty. Despite his own misgivings, he must undergo castration, the alteration of the title, in order to preserve it. Will he escape this turn of fate?
Fiction in EnglishHistorical fictionCastratos in fictionBritish and irish fiction (fictional works by one author)Fiction, alternative historyFantasy fictionFictionCastratiChoirboysAlternative histories (Fiction)HistoryCatholic Church