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A Constellation of Vital Phenomena

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What to expect

In a snow-covered village in Chechnya, eight-year-old Havaa watches from the woods as her father is abducted in the middle of the night by Russian soldiers. Their life-long friend and neighbour, Akhmed, has also been watching, and when he finds Havaa he knows of only one person who might be able to help.

For tough-minded doctor Sonja Rabina, it’s just another day of trying to keep her bombed-out, abandoned hospital going. When Akhmed arrives with Havaa, asking Sonja for shelter, she has no idea who the pair are and even less desire to take on yet more responsibilities and risk.

But over the course of five extraordinary days, Sonja’s world will shift on its axis, revealing the intricate pattern of connections that binds these three unlikely companions together and unexpectedly decides their fate.

'A Constellation of Vital Phenomena is simply spectacular' Ann Patchett

Critics Review

A Constellation of Vital Phenomena is simply spectacular. Not since Everything is Illuminated have I read a first novel so ambitious and fully realized. If this is where Anthony Marra begins his career, I can't imagine how far he will go
Ann Patchett
Storytelling of magical purity, illuminated by hope... Marra is a magnificent writer
The Times
An extraordinary first novel... A 21st-century War and Peace
New York Times
Both heart-wrenching and uplifting, a stunning, intricately plotted, brilliantly written, tour-de-force of a novel that burns into the memory
Choice
A powerful tale... rivals anything Michael Ondaatje has written in its emotional force
Boston Globe
50 Best Spring Reads
Independent
A book of violence and beauty, and the undisputed arrival of a major new talent
Globe and Mail, Canada
Remarkable and breathtaking, Anthony Marra’s A Constellation of Vital Phenomena is a spellbinding elegy for an overlooked land engulfed by an oft forgotten war. Set in the all-too-real Chechen conflict, Marra conjures fragile and heartfelt characters whose fates interrogate the very underpinnings of love and sacrifice
Adam Johnson, New York Times bestselling and Pulitzer Prizewinning author of The Orphan Master’s Son
Powerful, convincing, beautifully realized -- it's hard to believe that A Constellation of Vital Phenomena is a first novel. Anthony Marra is a writer to watch and savor
TC Boyle
Anthony Marra’s novel, A Constellation of Vital Phenomena, is both devastating and transcendent. The story of eight people (and a nation) navigating two brutal wars, it’s a novel of loyalty and sacrifice and enduring love. You’ll finish it transformed
Maile Meloy, author of Both Ways Is the Only Way I Want It
Author Anthony Marra
Narrator Colette Whitaker
Duration 12 hours and 8 minutes
Release Date
ISBN 9781473512849
Format Audiobook
Publisher Random House
Genre Modern and contemporary fiction, Narrative theme: Sense of place, Specific wars and campaigns
Availability AU, GB, IE

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