All This by Chance

Paperback / softback

Main Details

Title All This by Chance
Authors and Contributors      By (author) Vincent O'Sullivan
Physical Properties
Format:Paperback / softback
Pages:336
Category/GenreModern and contemporary fiction (post c 1945)
ISBN/Barcode 9781776561797
ClassificationsDewey:NZ823.2
Audience
General

Publishing Details

Publisher Te Herenga Waka University Press
Imprint Victoria University Press
Publication Date 8 March 2018
Publication Country New Zealand

Description

If we don't have the past in mind, it is merely history. If we do, it is still part of the present. Esther's grandparents first meet at a church dance in London in 1947. Stephen, a shy young Kiwi, has left to practise pharmacy on the other side of the world. Eva has grown up English, with no memory of the Jewish family who sent their little girl to safety. When the couple emigrate, the peace they seek in New Zealand cannot overcome the past they have left behind. Following the lives of Eva, her daughter Lisa and her granddaughter Esther, All This by Chance is a moving multigenerational family saga about the legacy of the Holocaust and the burden of secrets never shared, by one of New Zealand's finest writers.

Author Biography

Vincent O'Sullivan is the author of two previous novels - Let the River Stand, which won the 1994 Montana NZ Book Award for fiction, and Believers to the Bright Coast, which was shortlisted for the 2001 Tasmania Pacific Region Prize - and many plays and collections of short stories and poems. His most recent collection of short fiction is The Families. His work has been much awarded and he was made a Distinguished Companion of the New Zealand Order of Merit in the 2000 Queens Birthday Honours. Vincent O'Sullivan was the New Zealand poet laureate 2013-2015. He lives in Dunedin.