Elizabeth Strout crafts novels that delve into the complexities of human experience with profound empathy and sharp insight. Her work is celebrated for its intimate portrayals of ordinary lives, exploring the subtle nuances of memory, identity, and the search for meaning. Strout's distinctive narrative voice and psychological depth resonate deeply, offering readers a powerful exploration of the human condition.
In March 2020 Lucy's ex-husband William pleads with her to leave New York and escape to a coastal house he has rented in Maine. Lucy reluctantly agrees, leaving the washing-up in the sink, expecting to be back in a week or two. Weeks turn into months, and it's just Lucy, William, and their complex past together in a little house nestled against the sea. Rich with empathy and a searing clarity, Lucy by the Sea evokes the fragility and uncertainty of the recent past, as well as the possibilities that those long, quiet days can inspire. At the heart of this miraculous novel are the deep human connections that sustain us, even as the world seems to be falling apart.
Set against the backdrop of autumn in Maine, a town lawyer finds himself intertwined in a murder case while forging a deep friendship with acclaimed writer Lucy Barton. As they share walks and discuss their fears and regrets, Lucy connects with the iconic Olive Kitteridge, now in a retirement community. Their afternoons together are filled with storytelling, exploring the lives of those around them, which Olive refers to as "unrecorded lives," ultimately giving new meaning to their experiences and relationships.
"Olive Kitteridge has returned, as indomitable as ever, this time as a person getting older, navigating her next decade as she comes to terms with the changes--sometimes welcome, sometimes not--in her own life. Here is Olive, strangely content in her second marriage, still in an evolving relationship with her son and his family, encountering a cast of memorable characters in the seaside town of Crosby, Maine. Whether it's a young girl coming to terms with the loss of her father, a young woman about to give birth at a baby shower, or a nurse who confesses a secret high school crush, the irascible Olive improbably touches the lives of others."--Provided by publisher
Exuberant and affirming, it's funny and immensely clever, emotionally rare and strong. I feel bereft now I've finished' Tessa Hadley Casey has ended up back in Massachusetts after a devastating love affair. Her mother has just died and she is knocked sideways by grief and loneliness, moving between the restaurant where she waitresses for the Harvard elite and the rented shed she calls home. Her one constant is the novel she has been writing for six years, but at thirty-one she is in debt and directionless, and feels too old to be that way - it's strange, not be the youngest kind of adult anymore. And then, one evening, she meets Silas. He is kind, handsome, interested. But only a few weeks later, Oscar walks into her restaurant, his two boys in tow. He is older, grieving the loss of his wife, and wrapped up in his own creativity. Suddenly Casey finds herself at the point of a love triangle, stuck between two very different relationships that promise two very different futures. Lily King's Writers & Lovers follows Casey in the last days of a long youth, a time when everything - her family, her work, her relationships - comes to a crisis. Hugely moving and impossibly funny, it is a transfixing novel that explores the terrifying and exhilarating leap between the end of one phase of life and the beginning of another. It is a novel about love and creativity, and ultimately it captures the moment when a woman becomes an artist.
From the author of Tell Me Everything, My Name is Lucy Barton and Olive Kitteridge: Elizabeth Strout's celebrated fourth novel The Burgess Boys Haunted by the freak accident that killed their father when they were children, Jim and Bob Burgess escaped from their Maine hometown for New York as soon as they could. Jim, a successful corporate lawyer, has belittled his bighearted brother their whole lives, something that Bob, a legal aid attorney who idolises Jim, has always taken in his stride. But when their sister desperately calls them back home to Shirley Falls to help her teenage son out of trouble, long-buried tensions begin to surface in unexpected ways that will change them forever. A stunning story about the tragedies and triumphs of two brothers, from the bestselling author of the Pulitzer Prize-winning Olive Kitteridge. Exploring the ties that bind us to family and home, this novel will resonate with readers long after they turn the final page. Praise for Elizabeth Strout ‘Astonishingly good’ Evening Standard 'So good it gave me goosebumps’ Sunday Times ‘Strout animates the ordinary with astonishing force’ The New Yorker 'A superbly gifted storyteller and a craftswoman in a league of her own' Hilary Mantel
Lucy Barton is a writer, but her ex-husband, William, remains a hard man to read. So Lucy is both surprised and not surprised when William asks her to join him on a trip to investigate a recently uncovered family secret
From the Man Booker Prize longlisted author of My Name is Lucy Barton Isabelle Goodrow has been living in self-imposed exile with her daughter Amy for 15 years. Shamed by her past and her affair with Amy's father she has submerged herself in the routine of her dead-end job and her unrequited love for her boss. But when Amy, frustrated by her quiet and unemotional mother, embarks on an illicit affair with her maths teacher, the disgrace intensifies the shame Isabelle feels about her own past. Throughout one long, sweltering summer as the events of the small town ebb and flow around them Amy and Isabelle exist in silent conflict until a final act leads ultimately to the understanding they both crave.
