Jon McGregor Libri

Il curatore del Museo di Coventry, David Carter, è un uomo costantemente spinto a cercare il brivido di storie antiche rese nuove. Non può fare a meno di desiderare di più: che sua moglie fosse ancora l'ambiziosa e brillante ragazza scozzese che un tempo trovava così irresistibile, che il suo lavoro potesse vivere all'altezza delle promesse passate, che l'arrivo di sua figlia avvicinasse i genitori. Ma le parole sconsiderate della zia Julia, pronunciate anni prima, hanno lasciato David inquieto, consapevole che tutta la sua vita è stata costruita attorno a un'illusione. Così tenta di ricominciare, catalogando gioie e delusioni, migrazioni e arrivi, le vite che si intrecciano attorno a lui. Una giovane irlandese, Mary Friel, è arrivata a Londra durante la guerra come un'innocente e se n'è andata portando con sé una vergogna; una vergogna che spera possa essere ridotta da un colpo alla porta della sua casa a Donegal. Ci sono tanti modi per iniziare, per vivere, per amare e per non amare, e per finire. Sullo sfondo della Gran Bretagna del dopoguerra, il romanzo lirico e intimo di Jon McGregor esplora cosa succede quando le nostre vite non seguono i percorsi che ci aspettiamo e i modi in cui impariamo a lasciar andare le persone che avremmo potuto essere.

Risky in conception, hip and yet soulful, this is a prose poem of a novel -- intense, lyrical, and highly evocative -- with a mystery at its center, which keeps the reader in suspense until the final page. In a tour de force that could be described as Altmanesque, we are invited into the private lives of the residents of a quiet urban street in England over the course of a single day. In delicate, intricately observed closeup, we witness the hopes, fears, and unspoken despairs of a diverse community: the man with painfully scarred hands who tried in vain to save his wife from a burning house and who must now care for his young daughter alone; a group of young club-goers just home from an all-night rave, sweetly high and mulling over vague dreams; the nervous young man at number 18 who collects weird urban junk and is haunted by the specter of unrequited love. The tranquility of the street is shattered at day's end when a terrible accident occurs. This tragedy and an utterly surprising twist provide the momentum for the book. But it is the author's exquisite rendering of the ordinary, the everyday, that gives this novel its freshness, its sense of beauty, wonder, and hope. Rarely does a writer appear with so much music and poetry -- so much vision -- that he can make the world seem new.

From the Booker-nominated author of If Nobody Speaks of Remarkable Things and So Many Ways to Begin A TV Book Club selection

A WHITE REVIEW BOOK OF THE YEAR 'A genuine masterpiece' Observer 'Spectacular' Maggie O'Farrell 'The most gripping piece of writing I've read in a long time: Sit. Read. Applaud' Jarvis Cocker 'It leaves the reader moved and subtly changed, as if she had become part of the story' Hilary Mantel

Midwinter in the early years of this century. A girl on holiday has gone missing in the hills at the heart of England. The villagers are called up to join the search, fanning out as the police set up roadblocks and a crowd of reporters descends. But the aftershocks of Becky's disappearance have origins long before then, and those in the village have losses, and secrets, and stories of their own.

Midwinter in the early years of this century. A teenage girl on holiday has gone missing in the hills at the heart of England. The villagers are called up to join the search, fanning out across the moors as the police set up roadblocks and a crowd of news reporters descends on their usually quiet home. Meanwhile, there is work that must still be done: cows milked, fences repaired, stone cut, pints poured, beds made, sermons written, a pantomime rehearsed. The search for the missing girl goes on, but so does everyday life. As it must. As the seasons unfold there are those who leave the village and those who are pulled back; those who come together or break apart. There are births and deaths; secrets kept and exposed; livelihoods made and lost; small kindnesses and unanticipated betrayals. Bats hang in the eaves of the church and herons stand sentry in the river; fieldfares flock in the hawthorn trees and badgers and foxes prowl deep in the woods - mating and fighting, hunting and dying. Bats hang in the eaves of the church and herons stand sentry in the river; fieldfares flock in the hawthorn trees and badgers and foxes prowl deep in the woods - mating and fighting, hunting and dying. An extraordinary novel of cumulative power and grace, Reservoir 13 explores the rhythms of the natural world and the repeated human gift for violence, unfolding over thirteen years as the aftershocks of a stranger's tragedy refuse to subside.