Girl

£9.99

Captured, abducted, and married into Boko Haram, the narrator of this story witnesses and suffers the horrors of a community of men governed by a brutal code of violence. Barely more than a girl herself, she must soon learn how to survive as a woman with a child of her own. Just as the world around her seems entirely consumed by madness, bound for hell, she is offered an escape of sorts – but only into another landscape of trials and terrors amidst the unforgiving wilds of northeastern Nigeria, through the forest and beyond; a place where her traumas are met with the blinkered judgement of a society in denial. How do we love in a world that has lost its moorings? How can we comprehend the barbarism of our enemies, and learn forgiveness for atrocities committed in the name of ideology? Edna O’Brien’s novel pierces to the heart of these questions: and the result is her masterpiece.

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Description

The final novel by the legendary Irish icon Edna O’Brien, author of The Country Girls.

‘The taboo-breaking, the fabulous prose – there’s no one like Edna.’ Anne Enright
‘Girl broke me in two: a hard and beautiful miracle.’ Eimear McBride
‘An extraordinary act of imagination.’ J.M. Coetzee
‘Glittering energy . . . Exemplary.’ Colm Tóibìn

I was a girl once, but not any more . . .

A young Nigerian woman, barely more than a girl herself, must learn to survive with a child of her own, in a world which seems entirely consumed by madness. As she navigates a landscape of terrors and trials, ruled by Boko Haram, can she find a place of safety within a society blinkered by mistrust and denial?

‘Astonishing.’ New Statesman
‘Raw and transfixing.’ Observer
‘A masterpiece.’ Irish Independent
‘Mesmerising.’ Sunday Times
‘Devastating and moving.’ Daily Telegraph

*Winner of the Kerry Group Irish Novel of the Year 2020; longlisted for the 2020 Women’s Prize for Fiction; shortlisted for the 2020 Orwell Prize for Political Fiction; shortlisted for the James Tait Black Memorial Prize 2020*

Additional information

Weight 0.197 kg
Dimensions 19.9 × 13 × 1.5 cm
Author

Publisher

Imprint

Cover

Paperback

Pages

320

Language

English

Edition

1st paperback ed

Dewey

823.914 (edition:23)

Readership

General – Trade / Code: K