A Whistling Woman

Description

This intoxicating novel stands on its own, while forming a triumphant conclusion to A.S. Byatt's great quartet depicting the clashing forces in English life from the early 1950s to 1970. While Frederica falls almost by accident into a career in television in London, tumultuous events in her home county of Yorkshire threaten to change her life, and those of the people she loves. Through her wayward, lovingly-drawn characters and breath-taking twists of plot, Byatt illuminates the effervescence of the 1960s - both its excitements and its dangers - as no one has done before. Magical and thought-provoking, and with spine-chilling moments, A Whistling Woman is the ultimate novel of ideas made flesh - gloriously sensual, sexy and scary, bursting with ideas, and wonderful humanity.

A.S. Byatt is a novelist, short-story writer and critic of international renown. Her novels include Possession (winner of the Booker Prize in 1990), and the Frederica Quartet; The Children's Book was shortlisted for the Man Booker Prize and won the James Tait Black Memorial Prize for Fiction. She was appointed CBE in 1990 and DBE in 1999 and is the recipient of the Erasmus Prize 2016 for her 'inspiring contribution to life writing'.

Full of new energy and a sense of new directions... The plot has a driving ferocity, the huge and extraordinary cast marshaled with exceptional dexterity * Spectator * In this concluding installment [of her quartet of novels], Byatt blends her own excitement at 'intellectual curiosity of any kind' with a lucid narrative and gripping plot... I suspect her fans will be hoping for a fifth * Independent * An intellectual adventure full of energy and vitality [with] solid delights, keen and demanding pleasure * Scotsman * Rich in metaphor and glancing allusion... Predominantly a novel of ideas. It makes a fine conclusion to the quartet * The Economist * Brilliant and densely written...it's an absorbing read * Daily Mail *