A fearless portrait of a society on the brink as a mother faces a terrible choice, from an internationally award-winning author

SHORTLISTED FOR THE BOOKER PRIZE 2023. On a dark, wet evening in Dublin, scientist and mother-of-four Eilish Stack answers her front door to find the GNSB on her step. Two officers from Ireland's newly formed secret police are here to interrogate her husband, a trade unionist.Ireland is falling apart. The country is in the grip of a government turning towards tyranny and when her husband disappears, Eilish finds herself caught within the nightmare logic of a society that is quickly unravelling.How far will she go to save her family? And what - or who - is she willing to leave behind? Exhilarating, terrifying and propulsive, Prophet Song is a work of breathtaking originality, offering a devastating vision of a country at war and a deeply human portrait of a mother's fight to hold her family together.

Autorentext

Paul Lynch is the award-winning author of five novels - Prophet Song, Beyond the Sea, Grace, The Black Snow and Red Sky in Morning. His most recent novel, Prophet Song, won the 2023 Booker Prize and the 2024 Dayton Literary Peace Prize, and was shortlisted for the An Post Irish Novel of the Year. He has previously won the Kerry Group Irish Novel of the Year and France's Prix Libr'à Nous for Best Foreign Novel, among other prizes. He has been shortlisted for many international awards, including the Walter Scott Prize, France's Prix du Meilleur Livre Étranger and Prix Littérature-Monde, and the Jean Monnet Prize for European Literature.

In 2024, he was appointed Distinguished Writing Fellow at Maynooth University and was elected to Aosdána, which honours artists who have made outstanding contributions to the creative arts in Ireland. He lives in Dublin.

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WINNER OF THE BOOKER PRIZE 2023

WINNER OF THE 2024 DAYTON LITERARY PEACE PRIZE SHORTLISTED FOR THE AN PO*ST IRISH BOOK OF THE YEAR 2023 * SHORTLISTED FOR THE STREGA EUROPEAN PRIZE SHORTLISTED FOR THE DUBLIN LITERARY AWARD*

A SUNDAY TIMES BESTSELLER

A NEW YORK TIMES EDITOR'S CHOICE

AN AMAZON TOP 10 BOOK OF DECEMBER 2023

A Book of the Year for 2023 according to the Guardian, FT, Irish Independent, Irish Examiner, Sunday Independent, Economist, Big Issue, Daily Telegraph, Irish Times and Waterstones

'A CRUCIAL BOOK FOR OUR CURRENT TIMES... BRILLIANTLY HAUNTING.' OBSERVER

The explosive literary sensation: a mother faces a terrible choice as Ireland slides into totalitarianism

On a dark, wet evening in Dublin, scientist and mother-of-four Eilish Stack answers her front door to find the GNSB on her step. Two officers from Ireland's newly formed secret police are here to interrogate her husband, Larry, a trade unionist.

Ireland is falling apart. The country is in the grip of a government turning towards tyranny and when her husband disappears, Eilish finds herself caught within the nightmare logic of a society that is quickly unravelling. Soon, she must decide just how far she is willing to go to keep her family safe.

Exhilarating, terrifying and propulsive, Paul Lynch's Booker Prize-winning novel is a devastating vision of a country falling apart and a moving portrait of the resilience of the human spirit when faced with the darkest of times.

'A compassionate, propulsive and timely novel that forces the reader to imagine - what if this was me?' FT