Recommendations from our site
“It’s a great story, and beautifully told. Maggie O’Farrell’s prose is smooth as silk. You can almost run your hand over it. But what readers experience is the top of the writerly iceberg, the visible peak below which, unseen by the reader, pulses the solid, confident and inventive technical skill of the true novelist. Look at how deftly Maggie O’Farrell deals with time. Back we go, and forward, but we’re never lost. And see how she ensures that Shakespeare’s wife and children are never overshadowed by their father. In less skilled hands, not naming Shakespeare would grate and fail. With Maggie O’Farrell, this not-naming seems effortless and natural. As we said in our judge’s quote, a bravura performance.” Read more...
The Best Historical Fiction: The 2021 Walter Scott Prize Shortlist
Maggie O’Farrell’s novel Hamnet, a fictionalised account of the short life of Shakespeare’s son, won the 2020 Women’s Prize for Fiction. It’s also read beautifully as an audiobook by Ell Potter.
Narrator: Ell Potter
Listening time: 12 hours and 42 minutes
Maggie O’Farrell’s lyrical eighth novel, Hamnet – a fictionalised account of the short life of Shakespeare’s son – appeared during the height of Covid-19 panic, so don’t miss out
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