In the 200 years since its first publication, the story of Frankenstein's creation during stormy days and nights at Byron's Villa Diodati on Lake Geneva has become literary legend. In this book, Daisy Hay returns to the objects and manuscripts of the novel;s genesis in order to assemble its story anew. By stripping Frankenstein back to its constituent parts, Hay reveals an uneven novel written by a young woman deeply engaged in the process of working out her thoughts on the pressing issues of her time, from politics to religion and from science to the imagination, and in doing so creates a compelling and innovative biography of the novel for all those fascinated by its essential, brilliant chaos. -- Inside flap.