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Everyone Brave Is Forgiven

On sale

21st April 2016

Price: £9.99

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Selected: Digital (deliver electronic) / ISBN-13: 9781473618688

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Winner of the 2017 Goldsboro Books Glass Bell Award

‘Ian McEwan did this with Atonement, Sarah Waters did it with The Night Watch, and Chris Cleave does it too with Everyone Brave is Forgiven... A compelling and finely crafted novel.’ FT

An extraordinary story of love and honour in extreme circumstances, from the multi-award-winning author of THE OTHER HAND.

Instant New York Times bestseller
Evening Standard top ten bestseller
iBooks BOOKS OF THE YEAR 2016
Irish Times summer reading pick
‘A cracker’ Stylist, 10 Exciting Books in 2016
‘His best book to date’ Esquire, 10 best novels of 2016
Guardian Literary Highlight of 2016
Independent Best Book to read in 2016
Irish News Top Picks for 2016
Washington Post 20 Books We Can’t Wait to Read in 2016

In a powerful combination of both humour and heartbreak, this dazzling novel weaves little-known history, and a perfect love story, through the vast sweep of the Second World War – daring us to understand that, against the great theatre of world events, it is the intimate losses, the small battles, the daily human triumphs, that change us most.

Reviews

Financial Times
A compelling and finely crafted novel...The Second World War is dangerous territory for a contemporary novelist: the enemies they face include familiarity, cliché, and the reader's knowledge that any number of things happened then that were far stranger than fiction. For a writer to succeed in setting a tale in a period of heightened emotions, they need first to keep their own emotions under close control. Ian McEwan did this with Atonement, Sarah Waters did it with The Night Watch, and Chris Cleave does it too with Everyone Brave is Forgiven.
Helen Dunmore, Guardian
Absorbing [and] sharply paced.
Theo Tait, The Sunday Times
An addictive, propulsive read . . . Cleave writes with an engaging intensity, a determination to tackle big moral issues, and a willingness to take risks.
Claire Allfree, Metro
Brilliant [and] fearlessly written . . . Thoroughly absorbing.
Hannah Beckerman, Observer
Cleave cements his reputation as a skilful storyteller, and a sensitive chronicler of the interplay between the political and the personal . . . intricately researched and evocatively conveyed.
Woman & Home
I was blown away by it.
Esquire, Top 10 Best New Novels of 2016
It's a war novel but not as you know it. Cleave, a Guardian journalist and celebrated novelist (Incendiary, The Other Hand), has reportedly written his best book to date with this tale of a young teacher determined to stay in Blitz-time London.
Shelf Awareness
Magnificent and profoundly moving...This dazzling novel of World War II is full of unforgettable characters and the keen emotional insights that moved readers of Chris Cleave's Little Bee.
Lucy Scholes, Independent
Powerful and moving . . . Cleave's real revisionism exists in the very fabric of his prose.
Eithne Farry, Mail on Sunday
Tender and touching.
People Book of the Week
With dazzling prose, sharp English wit, and compassion, Cleave paints a powerful portrait of war's effects on those who fight and those left behind.
Good Housekeeping
A special book
Grazia Book Club
He has the rare ability to tell a unique story while also expressing universal truths that pierce straight into your own everyday. Sure to be one of the hits of this year.
<i>Daily Mail</i>
Loosely based on the author's grandparents' stories, this is a superb novel that breathes fresh life into an often brutal scenario. Particularly astute at demonstrating how war seeps into the psyche and changes it, this is beautifully written, funny, gut-wrenching and, above all, honest.
Barking and Dagenham Post
A story of epic love inspired by grandparents and capital.
Irish Times
Brings both the Blitz and the siege of Malta to unforgettable life.
Mumsnet
You'd be hard-pushed to find a list of what to read in 2016 that doesn't feature Chris Cleave's latest.
Mail on Sunday
A tremendous, sweeping love story that unfolds against the backdrop of war-torn London and Malta.