Seaton's Orchid by Chips Hardy (ePub edition)

SEATON’S ORCHID from Chips Hardy, co-creator with his son Tom Hardy of the acclaimed TV series “Taboo,” is a powerful, provocative and emotionally raw character portrait of a man haunted by a crime against nature, denied redemption, confronted by polite society, and forced to reconcile memories of a self he can no longer recognise.

Set between WW1 and WW2, SEATON’S ORCHID tells the story of the enigmatic Captain Ainsley Seaton – a retired, much decorated professional solider, amateur explorer and artist living a reclusive life in Highleigh, a charming English village in West Sussex.

Seaton’s quiet existence is shattered when his well-buried past is unexpectedly resurrected over dinner by a shadowy Church diplomat, who seems to know more about Seaton’s history than he does. Forced to re-open chapters of his life that he has been at such pains to forget – from the phantasmal, savage events that unfolded in the deep jungle of the North-West Amazon to the horrors of the Western Front – Seaton withdraws into characteristic seclusion. But the diplomat refuses to let matters lie, and for his own secret purpose will stop at nothing to get to the truth; a truth which reverberates through the village itself, and beyond, with devastating results.

Chips Hardy has written successfully for television, theatre, film and publication. SEATON’S ORCHID reflects upon many of the preoccupations he developed in the acclaimed TV series “TABOO,” which he co-created, wrote and produced with his son, Tom Hardy, and which earned him the Writers Guild of Great Britain award for Best Long Form TV Drama. Here he expands upon his investigation into dislocation and social dysfunction, the dark processes of Empires and their institutions, and the quest for personal redemption for those who have crossed a line of no return.

‘Hardy opens a revealing window into the ills of Empire and the savagery that mankind can so easily revert to and delivers a true punch to the gut, with fascinating echoes of his Writers Guild screenplay for TABOO, the sequel of which many of us are still eager to see, and the murky jungle epics of Joseph Conrad.’
Maxim Jakubowski, Crimetime

What the critics said about Hardy's ‘Taboo':

Dark, brooding and consistently brilliant.
The Observer

Taboo is a work of Wicker Man genius. Taboo might be full of grime and torment but it’s also dry-witted, shot through with sharp and knowing one-liners.
The Guardian

The best thing on television…Taboo has a strong plot at its dark heart. You want to know what will happen next, which is refreshing.
The Sunday Times

Dark, compelling and often haunting... one of the more unique and thoughtful offerings of the new year.
Los Angeles Times

A swaggering brute of a costume drama.
Daily Telegraph

One of the most extraordinary, subversive, dramas British television has ever produced.
Daily Mail

Taboo takes the grim and distant world of 19th century London to extremes of darkness and wonder…. If Charles Dickens had been a TV scriptwriter, then he might have come up with something like this.
Daily Express

If you like your historical fiction grim and your cobblestones dirt-caked, if you don’t mind looking into some of humanity’s bleaker facets, this one’s for you.
Boston Globe

It is filled with darkness, danger and mystery, and has a level of quality and import not often seen in television miniseries.
San Francisco Chronicle