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A quiet but emotionally resonant portrait of a middle-class family in pre-crash Ireland, Deirdre Madden's latest novel is understated and gorgeously crafted. Madden touches upon abstract ideas in a clear and accessible way, letting her characters graze past one another even as they search for intimacy and closeness. In tightly controlled prose, this beguiling novel meditates on the passage of time and the futility of memory by dwelling on the actions and preoccupations of everyday people.
"A deeply moving portrait of domestic and family life." - Sunday Telegraph (UK)
"The book is beautifully written and gently invites us to consider the shifting patterns of time." - The Scotsman (UK)
"An outstanding book." - Irish Independent
This information about Time Present, and Time Past 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.
Born in Ireland in 1960, Deidre Madden studied at Trinity College, Dublin and the University of East Anglia. She is the author of nine novels, including The Birds of Innocent Wood, which won the Somerset Maugham Prize, One by One in the Afternoon, and Molly Fox's Birthday, both of which were shortlisted for the Orange Prize. She lives in Paris.
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