Grace's Day
Grace's Day
by William Wall
This is a novel written with uncanny style and control, in a range of voices that mirror the growing wisdom of the characters about a world of adult self-indulgence and the consequences of careless decisions and dishonest compromises. William Wall is an Irish master whose work is reaching astonishing maturity.
This book is a co-edition with Head of Zeus publishers in the UK. It has recently been issued by them as a smaller format paperback. To order, click here.
Trade Paperback | ISBN: 9781788548618 | Release Date: August 2018
Grace and her mother and sisters live on an island off the west coast of Ireland. Their father is a successful writer of travel books that advocate a simpler way of life, though he is so seldom there that his family become the subjects of his social experiments and his children's freedom is indistinguishable from poverty. Grace and Jeannie take turns to look after their little sister Emily. Then one day - Grace's day - Em falls from the island's watchtower. But why and how Em found her way to that dangerous height remains a mystery, and Grace's lifelong remorse and guilt force her to relive the moment of her sister's death again and again.
Reviews
“It’s close to miraculous that the Cork novelist succeeds in crafting something as compelling as Grace’s Day...At a time when neophytes are routinely showered with praise, it’s time to appreciate an underrated veteran at the peak of his powers.”
“Wall writes with a lightly worn and beautiful lyricism ... A strong and knowing meditation on the tyranny of writers, whose work hinges on an uneasy balance of engagement and self-preserving distance. As the novel draws to a close, and it is another character’s turn to pick up their pen, it’s hard to know whether we should fear, or pity or applaud them.”
“It’s this mood of lives irreparably spoiled that make this bitter-tasting tale so potent.”
“Beautifully written novel about how a family, living on an island off the west coast as a kind of “social experiment”, deal with the tyranny of an often absent and neglectful father and the loss of a sibling.”
“On both story and style it doesn’t disappoint ... Wall unfolds his story with a controlled prose, his poetical skills shining throughout.”
