‘Compelling, elegant and bitingly smart, Reproduction left me
reeling. It is playful and serious, witty and searing, inventive
and heart-rending. I utterly loved it.’ Nell Stevens, author of
Briefly, A Delicious Life ‘I read this novel in a single
rapturous sitting, torn between the desire to hurtle through its
hypnotic prose and the desire to reread every perfect sentence.
Reproduction exquisitely captures the lunacy of inhabiting an
animal body with a human mind, and somehow manages also to be
gross, funny, heartrending, and formally acrobatic. Louisa Hall is
a singular talent and I am a devotee.’ Melissa Febos, author of
Body Work and Girlhood ‘A brave and dynamic novel about the
creation of life and art – narratively free, compulsively
readable, and true to life.’ Tao Lin, author of Leave Society and
Taipei ‘What a brilliant novel! I was moved, troubled, enchanted;
hardly able to breathe as I read. Hall’s dazzling and original
tale has the force of myth, embodying the monstrous challenges of
reproducing in our strange new world.’ Andrea Barrett, author of
Ship Fever and Natural History ‘It’s taken me seven years of
reading, and about a thousand more books, to be able to say once
again: “This is the best book I’ve ever read.” For one thing,
Louisa Hall has written what is by far the best depiction of
childbirth I’ve ever seen in print. In other pages, she has
perfectly captured the hollow void of grief after the miscarriage
of a wanted child. She has reminded me of the sometime-strangeness
of living inside a woman’s body when it refuses to get pregnant
when you want it to, or gets pregnant when you don’t want it to.
I’ve also had the privilege of spending time with a deeply
feeling, deeply observant narrator, and she has gifted me with a
wise and revelatory view of these times. When I read this book
again in ten years I’ll surely be saying to myself: ‘Yes, that
is exactly how it was.’ It’s a marvellous gift of a book.’
Claire Oshetsky, author of Chouette For readers of Rachel Cusk,
Jenny Offill, and Doireann Ní Ghríofa, a deeply intimate
novel about pregnancy, birth, and artistic creation, by the Dylan
Thomas Prize-shortlisted author of Trinity and Speak. A woman
begins work on a novel about Mary Shelley while pregnant for the
first time. Recently married, she has just moved from New York to
Montana. As the woman writes, fragments of Shelley’s story begin
to detach themselves from the page. Moving through her reproductive
years, Shelley endured a catalogue of losses painful beyond
comprehension. Still, she wrote, conceiving Frankenstein in
1818. The woman’s experiences of pregnancy, miscarriage and
labour are traumatic and disorienting, especially in the context of
political upheaval, climate crisis, and an ongoing
pandemic. Finally, she gives birth to a daughter and together
they emerge into another world. Then a friend from the past
reappears. Anna is a biochemist who has been struggling to become a
parent, a scientist who sees everything as an experiment. How
far will she go in her desire to bring a baby into being? A
Frankenstein for the twenty-first century, Reproduction is a story
of intense grief and transformative joy, and a powerful depiction
of the emotional and physical costs of creating new life. 'Louisa
Hall is a writer to be admired.' Kevin Powers, author of The Yellow
Birds ‘Crystalline, utterly persuasive and transfixing.’ New
York Times on Speak ‘Hypnotic . . . Hall has a knack for the
precise, underwritten image.’ Guardian on Speak
General
Imprint: |
Simon & Schuster
|
Country of origin: |
United Kingdom |
Release date: |
June 2023 |
Authors: |
Louisa Hall
|
Dimensions: |
216 x 135 x 20mm (L x W x T) |
Format: |
Hardcover
|
Pages: |
288 |
ISBN-13: |
978-1-398-52243-5 |
Categories: |
Books >
Fiction >
General
|
LSN: |
1-398-52243-0 |
Barcode: |
9781398522435 |
Is the information for this product incomplete, wrong or inappropriate?
Let us know about it.
Does this product have an incorrect or missing image?
Send us a new image.
Is this product missing categories?
Add more categories.
Review This Product
No reviews yet - be the first to create one!