Mister Pip

‘One of the best books of the year! Poetic, heartbreaking, surprising. Matilda is a young girl in Bougainville, a tropical island where the horror of civil war lurks. Mr. Watts, the only white person, is the self appointed teacher of the tiny school where the only textbook is the Dickens novel Great Expectations. Storytelling, imagination, courage, beauty, memories and sudden violence are the main elements of this extraordinary book.’

– Isabel Allende
‘New Zealand writer Lloyd Jones’s spare, haunting fable explores the power and limitations of art…’

* Washington Post *
‘Matilda is in the tradition of Holden Caulfield and Huck Finn, conjuring up an adult world before she can fully understand it; and Mister Pip is a poignant and impressive work which can take its place alongside the classic novels of adolescence.’
* Times Literary Supplement *
Jones’ epigraph is Umberto Eco’s “Characters migrate”. They do. Read this novel and Mr Watts, and perhaps Matilda, will migrate instantly into your heart.’

– Helen Elliott * Age *
‘For so brutal a reminder of atrocities so close to home, this is still an oddly satisfying book that goes on resonating long after you get to the end.’
– Kerryn Goldsworthy * Sydney Morning Herald *
‘As compelling as a fairytale—beautiful, shocking and profound.’
– Helen Garner
‘This prizewinning novel by New Zealand author Jones is an eloquent homage to the power of storytelling.’
– Joanne Wilkinson * STARRED Review, Booklist *
‘A little Gauguin, a bit of Lord Jim, the novel’s lyricism evokes great beauty and great pain.’

* Kirkus Reviews *
‘Jones tactfully handles the confrontation between Mr Watts and Matilda’s mother, aware that the mesmeric qualities of literature can be dangerous as well as redemptive. Only through Great Expectations does Matilda learn to see grown-ups as they really are. Morally subtle, Mister Pip has none of the arid cleverness that mars novels about books, making it a worthy winner of this year’s Commonwealth Writers’ Prize.’

– Jonathan Beckman * Daily Mail *
‘Lloyd Jones brings to life the transformative power of fiction … The experience of reading in this book is tangible …This is a beautiful book, It is tender, multi-layered and redemptive’

– Lucy Atkins * Sunday Times *
‘A novel about reading and writing and their impact on people’s lives that can be read with pleasure by someone who has never known the power of Charles Dickens, or Great Expectations, and still make them hunger for more… Its fable-like quality is spellbinding; the depth of its insights compelling.’
* Canberra Times *
‘Sad, beautiful, poignant, moving and honest, this is a remarkable book.’ * Good Book Guide *
‘Capturing a place and a conflict and a whole set of personalities, conjuring love amidst devastating violence.’ * Michael Winkler, ArtsHub *

Lloyd Jones was born in New Zealand in 1955. His best-known novel is Mister Pip, which won the 2007 Commonwealth Writers’ Prize, the 2008 Kiriyama Prize Fiction Category, the 2008 Montana Award for Readers Choice, the Montana Fiction Award and the Montana Medal for Fiction or Poetry. It was also shortlisted for the Man Booker Prize, and has been made into a major feature film, directed by Andrew Adamson (Shrek and Narnia).

His other books include Hand Me Down World, The Book of Fame—which won the Deutz Medal for Fiction at the 2001 Montana New Zealand Book Awards and the Tasmania Pacific Fiction Prize—Here at the End of the World We Learn to Dance and Biografi. He has also published a collection of short stories, The Man in the Shed. Lloyd Jones lives in Wellington.

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