Summerwater

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What to expect

The Sunday Times Top Ten Bestseller
'Superb' The Times
'Sharp, searching . . . utterly of the moment' Hilary Mantel, author of Wolf Hall
'So accomplished' Guardian
'A masterpiece' Jessie Burton, author of The Miniaturist
'One of her best' Irish Times
'Beautifully written, intense, powerful' David Nicholls, author of Sweet Sorrow

From the acclaimed author of Ghost Wall, Summerwater is a devastating story told over twenty-four hours in the Scottish highlands, and a searing exploration of our capacity for both kinship and cruelty in these divided times.

On the longest day of the summer, twelve people sit cooped up with their families in a faded Scottish cabin park. The endless rain leaves them with little to do but watch the other residents.

A woman goes running up the Ben as if fleeing; a retired couple reminisce about neighbours long since moved on; a teenage boy braves the dark waters of the loch in his red kayak. Each person is wrapped in their own cares but increasingly alert to the makeshift community around them. One particular family, a mother and daughter without the right clothes or the right manners, starts to draw the attention of the others. Tensions rise and all watch on, unaware of the tragedy that lies ahead as night finally falls.

Longlisted for the Orwell Prize for Political Fiction 2021.

‘Nothing escapes her sly humour and brilliant touch. Deft and brimming with life, Summerwater is a novel of endless depth. A masterpiece.’ Jessie Burton, author of The Miniaturist

'Summerwater may be her best so far.' The Times

'This latest display of Moss’s imaginative versatility shine[s] with intelligence' Sunday Times

Critics Review

Sharp, searching, thoroughly imagined, it is utterly of the moment, placing its anxious human dots against a vast indifferent landscape; with its wit and verve and beautiful organisation it throws much contemporary writing into the shade!
Hilary Mantel, Man Booker winning author of Wolf Hall
Nothing escapes her sly humour and brilliant touch. Deft and brimming with life, Summerwater is a novel of endless depth. A masterpiece.
Jessie Burton, author of The Miniaturist
Moss’s ability to conjure up the fleeting and sometimes agonised tenderness of family life is unmatched . . . A great part of a novelist’s skill lies in the breadth of their sympathies and their ability to enter into the lives of people unlike themselves. Moss does this so naturally and comprehensively . . . there is an artfulness to her writing so accomplished as to conceal itself.
Melissa Harrison, Guardian
Summerwater is a triumph and confirms Sarah Moss as one of the best writers at work in Britain today.
Fiona Mozley, author of Elmet
Moss is a writer who can say more than most others in half the space. Her latest, a haunting story of alienation set on a Scottish campsite, is the summer’s most interesting read
Independent
Summerwater is a beautiful book, written with delicacy and grace, yet with an undertow as dark as the Scottish loch by which its characters are holidaying in ignorance of the tragedy to come. If you are a huge fan of Moss's work, as I am, you will find yourself parceling it out, to read a chapter a day, like a gift.
Louise Doughty, author of Apple Tree Yard
Suffused with fascination . . . this latest display of Moss’s imaginative versatility shine[s] with intelligence
The Times
This novel - about crisis and isolation in its own ways - moved and encouraged me in difficult times. Another deft, sensitive, crystalline book by Sarah Moss; I loved it.
Megan Hunter, author of The End We Start From
A masterful and immerse exercise in tension; here are the many conflicting voices of modern Britain in microcosm. Sarah Moss reminds us that society is only ever two short steps away from collapse.
Benjamin Myers, author of The Offing
For more than a decade, Sarah Moss has been crafting quiet, complex novels that make an indelible impression on the reader. This is one of her best, and most accessible, and should bring her work to a wider audience.
Irish Times
I read this brilliant novel in one greedy gulp. Sarah Moss is an acute observer of modern life and puts humanity on the page with deep understanding and wit.
Cathy Rentzenbrink, author of The Last Act of Love
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 humour and compassion.
Pankaj Mishra, author of The Age of Anger
Moss is the most brilliant writer. She deserves to win all the prizes.
Joanna Trollope, author of City of Friends
The Scottish actress Morven Christie reads with sensitivity to the humour and the brooding suspense. Listening rather then reading also means that we appreciate to the full Sarah Moss planting us deep inside the heads of her characters. Warmly human, this is a telling parable about our present condition; the cabins are claustrophobic islands, rife with cultural insensitivities. This is a gem of a book.
The Times
Moss has quietly, and it must be said remarkably quickly, been putting out some of the most interesting and carefully sculpted novels of recent years.
Financial Times
One of our very best contemporary novelists.
Independent
Moss’s star is firmly in the ascendant
Guardian
One of the finest contemporary writers working in Britain today
Stylist
Christie's narration keeps listeners rapt while maintaining rhythm with the action, be it a runner's stride, lovers' desire, a child's watchfulness. The result is a memorable marriage of remarkable fiction and outstanding performance.
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