Summer: Winner of the Orwell Prize for Fiction 2021

Description

The dazzling, unforgettable conclusion to Ali Smith's tour de force, Man Booker-shortlisted Seasonal quartet In the present, Sacha knows the world's in trouble. Her brother Robert just is trouble. Their mother and father are having trouble. Meanwhile the world's in meltdown - and the real meltdown hasn't even started yet. In the past, a lovely summer. A different brother and sister know they're living on borrowed time. This is a story about people on the brink of change. They're family, but they think they're strangers. So- where does family begin? And what do people who think they've got nothing in common have in common? Summer.

Ali Smith was born in Inverness in 1962. She is the author of Spring, Winter, Autumn, Public library and other stories, How to be both, Shire, Artful, There but for the, The first person and other stories, Girl Meets Boy, The Accidental, The whole story and other stories, Hotel World, Other stories and other stories, Like and Free Love. Hotel World was shortlisted for the Booker Prize and the Orange Prize. The Accidental was shortlisted for the Man Booker Prize and the Orange Prize. How to be both won the Bailey's Prize, the Goldsmiths Prize and the Costa Novel of the Year Award, and was shortlisted for the Man Booker Prize. Autumn was shortlisted for the Man Booker Prize 2017 and Winter was shortlisted for the Orwell Prize 2018. Ali Smith lives in Cambridge.

An astonishing finale to a prescient series . . . Ali Smith brilliantly weaves strands of joy and celebration to end her Seasonal Quartet * Evening Standard * The first great coronavirus novel - a book to savour, a literary tour de force that captures the nation's psyche exquisitely * Evening Standard * This singular writer has found her moment * Prospect * A maestra's portrait of her age. . . remarkable * Guardian * Few writers today can make a more compelling claim to singularity of innovation and sustained brilliance * TLS * The bravura performance of a writer, poised at the edge of the day's vast darkness, gathering all the warmth and light of our inner summer * The Washington Post * Smith bring[s] this brilliant quartet to a satisfying close * NPR * The final flourish of a mazy and beautiful quartet * Telegraph * Sublime * The Boston Globe * Brilliant * The Scotsman * The novel's hopeful message about the healing power of friendship ensures the quartet ends on a feel-good note * Sunday Times * A remarkable experiment with timeliness in fiction * Literary Review *