Summary
Marvellously written short novella from Susan Hill - a family story as evocative, gripping and Gothic as her best-selling ghost story, The Woman in Black.
Colin. May. Frank. Berenice. The Prime children grew up in a bleak country farm house called The Beacon. Colin and Berenice married locally. May went to university in London, but came home within a year and never left again. Only Frank, quiet, watchful Frank, got away. He left for Fleet Street and a career in journalism but it’s the…
Book Details
| ISBN-13: | 9780099526957 |
|---|---|
| ISBN-10: | 0099526956 |
| Author: | Susan Hill |
| Publisher: | Vintage Publishing |
| Imprint: | Vintage |
| Format: | Paperback |
| Number of Pages: | 160 |
| Release Date: | 15 October 2009 |
| Weight: | 117g |
| Dimensions: | 9mm x 129mm x 198mm |
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Critics Review
A moving, evocative and rewarding novel
A moving, evocative and rewarding novel * The Times *
A brilliantly eerie little tale…with a very adroitly handled contemporary theme: the misery memoir * Scotland on Sunday *
The Beacon uses a small canvas, but it examines larger issues of truth, mental health and memory… Ideas about wasted lives, about grinding exhaustion at the expense of self-expression and about rank injustice are all here in a novel of great structural and stylistic control * Guardian *
Magnificent…It is all done so well, so wisely, that this short book is richly satisfying…it is a little masterpiece * Daily Telegraph *
Captivating… There is, from the start, a highly charged atmosphere of anxiety and ambiguity…the suspense and mystery work perfectly, and for this Hill’s economy is exactly what is needed * Financial Times *
Short, beautifully crafted and gripping… Hill’s astute and skilful probing of motives and the ambiguities of appearances extends the reach of the novel much wider * Sunday Times *
This enigmatic novella tracks the full impact of Frank’s book, probing notions of guilt and truth, and deftly capturing those family bonds that warp even as they appear to nurture – Hephzibah Anderson * Daily Mail *
Compelling, cut through with sloe-sharp details as Hill exhibits complete mastery of the tools at her disposal… It is a moving, evocative and rewarding novel * The Times *
Beautiful, clean prose…[an] absorbing story * Literary Review *
A clever novel that’s timeless in its tension-building storytelling * Good Housekeeping *
Susan Hill
SUSAN HILL has been a professional writer for over fifty years. Her books have won awards and prizes including the Whitbread, the John Llewellyn Rhys and a Somerset Maugham, and have been shortlisted for the Booker. Her novels include Strange Meeting, I’m the King of the Castle, In the Springtime of the Year and The Mist in the Mirror. She has also published autobiographical works and collections of short stories as well as the Simon Serrailler series of crime novels. The play of her ghost story The Woman in Black is one of the longest running in the history of London’s West End. In 2020 she was awarded a damehood (DBE) for services to literature. She has two adult daughters and lives in North Norfolk.
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