To Battersea Park

Description

'A brilliantly conceived and audacious novel from one of our most consistently intelligent and beguiling writers' William Boyd 'An imaginative tour de force' Mick Herron 'An engrossing human drama' The Times The new novel from the Booker shortlisted author of The Northern Clemency An order is issued. A population may not meet, or touch or speak to each other. They stay inside, and the reality of a few streets in a capital city emerges. An underground river is discovered; an urban grove of pomeloes emerges. The imagination reaches out, and makes sense of the world. By the sea, two men walk into a future of uncertain violence. There is time now to see the human dramas within a hundred yards (an abduction, a quiet breakdown, an outbreak of violence, a young mind beginning to stretch itself); to wait for the weather to change; to understand that what lies underneath this part of the city are seasonally wet pastures and woodlands. Written in four parts, To Battersea Park explores the strata and sediment of a single place and time. It shows what brings us together, through love, through the clashes of what we want to do and what the world wants to do with us. Set in a large crowded city where we are forbidden to approach strangers, this is about what we share: humanity, imagination, and the love that emerges from many acts of telling. 'An utterly engrossing skein of narratives, beautifully written and often disturbing' Lissa Evans, author of V for Victory 'What a writer he is!' Philip Pullman, author of The Book of Dust

Philip Hensher is a columnist for the Independent, arts critic for the Spectator and a Granta Best of Young British novelist. He has written six novels, including The Mulberry Empire and the Booker-shortlisted The Northern Clemency, and one collection of short stories. He lives in South London.

'A brilliantly conceived and audacious novel from one of our most consistently intelligent and beguiling writers' William Boyd, author of The Romantic 'To Battersea Park is an imaginative tour de force. The first great lockdown novel, and perhaps the only one we'll need' Mick Herron, author of Bad Actors 'An utterly engrossing skein of narratives, beautifully written and often disturbing' Lissa Evans, author of V for Victory 'An engrossing human drama' The Times 'Hensher has always been masterly in marrying observations of the minutiae of the lives of 'ordinary' people with huge, soaring themes - and To Battersea Park is no exception' AnOther Magazine 'Hensher is fascinatingly good on how social transformation manifests itself in the textures, colours and manners of a culture... extremely funny, but also deeply humane' Sunday Times