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Published Jan 2021
208 pages
Genre: Literary Fiction
Publication Information
The acclaimed author of Ghost Wall offers a new, devastating, masterful novel of subtle menace.
They rarely speak to each other, but they take notice―watching from the safety of their cabins, peering into the half-lit drizzle of a Scottish summer day, making judgments from what little they know of their temporary neighbors. On the longest day of the year, the hours pass nearly imperceptibly as twelve people go from being strangers to bystanders to allies, their attention forced into action as tragedy sneaks into their lives.
At daylight, a mother races up the mountain, fleeing into her precious dose of solitude. A retired man studies her return as he reminisces about the park's better days. A young woman wonders about his politics as she sees him head for a drive with his wife, and tries to find a moment away from her attentive boyfriend. A teenage boy escapes the scrutiny of his family, braving the dark waters of the loch in a kayak. This cascade of perspective shows each wrapped up in personal concerns, unknown to each other, as they begin to notice one particular family that doesn't seem to belong. Tensions rise, until nightfall brings an irrevocable turn.
From Sarah Moss, the acclaimed author of Ghost Wall―a "riveting" (Alison Hagy, The New York Times Book Review) "sharp tale of suspense" (Margaret Tablot, The New Yorker), Summerwater is a searing exploration of our capacity for kinship and cruelty, and a gorgeous evocation of the natural world that bears eternal witness.
"[T]his broodingly suspenseful and engagingly intimate novel is a miniature portrait of family life in various forms, of old age and childhood, framed by wild nature, which becomes a character in itself...A psychologically acute depiction of modern Britain through the lens of one rainy summer day." - Kirkus Reviews (starred review)
"Moss's taut latest turns a rain-drenched park in the Scottish Highlands into a site of tension and unease for a group of vacationing strangers...a series of lyrical interludes describing the park's elements of nature and eons of evolution provide delightfully ironic contrasts to the small human dramas. Readers unafraid of a bit of rain will relish this." - Publishers Weekly
"A rich parade of inner lives...[A] thoughtful investigation into community and difference." - The Guardian (UK)
"Sharp, searching, thoroughly imagined, Summerwater is utterly of the moment, placing its anxious human dots against a vast, indifferent landscape; with its wit and verve and beautiful organization, it throws much contemporary writing into the shade!" - Hilary Mantel, author of The Mirror & the Light
"Nothing escapes Sarah Moss's sly humor and brilliant touch. Deft and brimming with life, Summerwater is a novel of endless depth. A masterpiece." - Jessie Burton, author of The Miniaturist
"With delicate precision, Summerwater takes the moral and emotional temperature of a whole society. It is matchless, too, in its blending of steely insight with humor and compassion." - Pankaj Mishra, author of Age of Anger
This information about Summerwater was first featured
in "The BookBrowse Review" - BookBrowse's membership magazine, and in our weekly "Publishing This Week" newsletter. Publication information is for the USA, and (unless stated otherwise) represents the first print edition. The reviews are necessarily limited to those that were available to us ahead of publication. If you are the publisher or author and feel that they do not properly reflect the range of media opinion now available, send us a message with the mainstream reviews that you would like to see added.
Any "Author Information" displayed below reflects the author's biography at the time this particular book was published.
Sarah Moss is the author of Summerwater, a best book of the year in the Guardian and the Times (London), and Ghost Wall, a New York Times Book Review Editors' Choice and a best book of the year in Elle, the Financial Times, and other publications. Her previous books include the novels Cold Earth, Night Waking, Bodies of Light, and Signs for Lost Children, and the memoir Names for the Sea: Strangers in Iceland. She was educated at the University of Oxford and now teaches at University College Dublin.
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