Lessons: the new novel from the author of Atonement

Description

Epic, mesmerising and deeply humane, Lessons is a chronicle for our times - a powerful meditation on history and humanity through the prism of one ordinary man The mesmerising new novel from Ian McEwan, the bestselling author of Atonement. The world is forever changing. But for so many of us, old wounds run deep. Lessons is an intimate yet universal story of love, regret and a restless search for answers. 'Lessons is deep and wide, ambitious and humble, wise and substantial... McEwan's best novel in 20 years' New Statesman 'Superb... A wonderful author has delivered another mesmerising, memorable novel' Independent 'Lessons triumphantly achieves its primary aim of conveying the "commonplace and wondrous" intertwining of global history and everyday life' Daily Telegraph While the world is still counting the cost of the Second World War and the Iron Curtain has descended, young Roland Baines's life is turned upside down. Stranded at boarding school, his vulnerability attracts his piano teacher, Miriam Cornell, leaving scars as well as a memory of love that will never fade. Twenty-five years later, as the radiation from the Chernobyl disaster spreads across Europe, Roland's wife mysteriously vanishes and he is forced to confront the reality of his rootless existence and look for answers in his family history. From the fall of the Berlin Wall to the Covid pandemic and climate change, Roland sometimes rides with the tide of history but more often struggles against it. Haunted by lost opportunities, he seeks solace through every possible means -- literature, travel, friendship, drugs, politics, sex and love. His journey raises important questions. Can we take full charge of the course of our lives without damage to others? How do global events beyond our control shape us and our memories? What role do chance and contingency play in our existence? And what can we learn from the traumas of the past?

Ian McEwan is the critically acclaimed author of seventeen novels and two short story collections. His first published work, a collection of short stories, First Love, Last Rites, won the Somerset Maugham Award. His novels include The Child in Time, which won the 1987 Whitbread Novel of the Year Award; The Cement Garden; Enduring Love; Amsterdam, which won the 1998 Booker Prize; Atonement; Saturday; On Chesil Beach; Solar; Sweet Tooth; The Children Act; Nutshell; and Machines Like Me, which was a number-one bestseller. Atonement, Enduring Love, The Children Act and On Chesil Beach have all been adapted for the big screen.

Lessons should have made the Booker longlist (and shortlist) but no matter. It marks a significant new phase in McEwan's already astonishingly productive career - and may well be remembered as one of the finest humanist novels of its age. * New Statesman * Magnificent and moving, Lessons is up there with McEwan's greatest works. -- Independent The Booker-winning author has woven multiple versions of himself into Lessons, his 500-page masterpiece. -- Andrew Billen * The Times * Superb... A wonderful author has delivered another mesmerising, memorable novel. * Independent * A tour de force of breadth... McEwan writes with invigorating alertness about social and political shifts over the past 70 years. * Sunday Times * McEwan's prose always goes down like a cool drink, and its content is often trenchant...I'm delighted to have added this thoughtful, touching and historically grounded novel to my bookshelf. -- Lionel Shriver * Financial Times * A moving and masterful work that captures the essence of McEwan....The book's psychological astuteness and elegant prose, is a thrill to behold. * Irish Independent * Compassionate and gentle, and so bereft of cynicism it feels almost radical.... -- Beejay Silcox * Guardian * Lessons has the wonderful freshness that comes when an author tries something new - along with McEwan's customary wit, insight and compassion. * Sunday Express * McEwan's deft, descriptive prose charts the complexity of growing up and finding one's place in an ever-shifting world * Cultur Whisper * [A] big, detailed, sweep of history: starting in the aftermath of World War Two and ending in lockdown. And there's lots going on here other than history too - family drama, tales from boarding school, and a vanishing wife * You Magazine, Mail on Sunday * An expansive novel that finds the epic in domestic situations. * List * Lessons triumphantly achieves its primary aim of conveying the "commonplace and wondrous" intertwining of global history and everyday life. * Daily Telegraph * One of his most humane and agreeable [novels]. * Scotsman * [Lessons is] an epic tale with domesticity at its centre, encompassing a swathes of history, designed to make you think of the impact of events have on you and, in turn, the impact you make on the world. * List * Roland's journey is not easy, but the dramatic evocation of his struggles and setbacks means readers will follow him every step of the way * Economist * A literary feat of undeniable majesty. * Spectator * Lessons... [is] so beautifully done as to provide abundant proof of why McEwan still occupies that number-one spot. * Reader's Digest * Lessons is deep and wide, ambitious and humble, wise and substantial. It is, to my mind, McEwan's best novel in 20 years because it is so alert to human texture and complexity... It marks a significant new phase in McEwan's already astonishingly productive career. * New Statesman * Lessons is easily McEwan's most accomplished novel since Atonement... he offers intelligent reflection on his novel's evergreen themes * The Times *