The Public Image

by Muriel Spark

First published 1998

Muriel Spark's "The Public Image" plunges us into the glamorous, cutthroat world of Reportage, a popular magazine. Here, Annabel Christopher is a rising star, her face plastered across billboards. But Annabel's carefully cultivated public persona hides a darker private life. When a disastrous incident threatens to expose the truth, Annabel must fight to preserve her image at all costs. As she's drawn into a spiral of deceit and manipulation, the stakes grow higher – and the question remains: how much is Annabel willing to sacrifice to stay on top?

Genres: fiction, literary-fiction, 20th-century, contemporary

Vibes: dark, emotional, suspenseful

Tropes: deception, unreliable-narrator

144 pages · Paperback · New Directions

Content warnings: gaslighting

More by Muriel Spark

• The Girls of Slender Means
• The Prime of Miss Jean Brodie
• Memento Mori
• The Mandelbaum Gate
• The Bachelors
• The Ballad of Peckham Rye
• A Far Cry from Kensington
• Robinson

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