Overview

In California her name was Aden Grace Sawyer. In Pakistan she must choose a different name - Suleyman - and take on a new identity as a young man. She has travelled a long way to begin her new life, and she'll travel further to protect her secret. But once she is on the ground, Aden finds herself in more danger than she could have dreamed. Faced with violence and loss, she must make intense and unimaginable choices that will test not only her faith, but her understanding of who she is. Compelling, unnerving and timely, Godsend is a subtle masterpiece of empathy: a study of what it means for a person to give themselves to their faith, and how far they will go from home to find a place to belong.

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9781782119623

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Reviews

John Wray is making a place for himself among our greatest living writers. Godsend is a wonder to me: a fearless book about a terrifying subject. The elegance and daring of this novel left me dizzy -- AKHIL SHARMA, author of FAMILY LIFE This is a great book about a time and a place that I lived through. I was nostalgic, reading Godsend, for the days when I was a young girl in Afghanistan, going to the madrasa with my friends. This came as a surprise to me. But there was beauty in that life. And there is beauty in this story -- SHAMILA KOHESTANI, recipient of the Arthur Ashe Courage Award One of our most astonishing and relevant young writers * * Esquire * * For a while now, John Wray has been writing as if let in on the secret history of the world, paying attention to moments we all know, but at the point we've stopped looking . . . This is literature as high-wire act without the net; epic in scale, even bigger in heart -- MARLON JAMES John Wray is a daring young writer * * New Yorker * * John Wray is the next wave of American fiction -- Jonathan Lethem America's most original young writer -- Gary Shteyngart * * author of Absurdistan * * Praise for The Lost Time Accidents: A science fiction novel about time-travel, filled with unabashedly zany characters . . . a highly enjoyable book * * Sunday Times * * Startlingly accomplished * * Daily Telegraph * * John Wray gets his Calvino on, his Mitchell on, his Murakami on, and even his Joyce on in this spectacular rattlebag of a novel . . . Who says the novel is dead? Just smash the clocks and open this novel -- Colum McCann

Frequently mesmerising . . . This is a significant literary performance -- Dwight Garner * * New York Times * * Rawly unsentimental but illuminated throughout by a subtle compassion, Godsend is a novel of enormous emotional intelligence which makes for compelling and consistently unpredictable reading -- Robin Yassin-Kassab * * Guardian * * The 9/11 novel that finally understands the fulfilments of faith . . . It is not only Wray's heroine but also his novel that comes of age, steadily deepening and astounding as it develops . . . Godsend impresses because Wray is so fearlessly committed to his fictional world, and to his own depiction of it -- James Wood * * New Yorker * * Wray's storytelling is so taut, his psychology so audacious -- JONATHAN FRANZEN * * Guardian * * A nervy drama of secrecy and desire . . . Fascinating * * Observer * * Illuminating . . . At a time when so many novelists are turning towards inner landscapes, Wray has undertaken a journey to the edge of the unimaginable -- Michael LaPointe * * Times Literary Supplement * * Brilliantly executed . . . Wray's novel is on one hand an entirely familiar story of youthful rebellion and on the other an unimaginable depiction of a cold-blooded killer groomed by the world's most notorious army * * Wall Street Journal * * Laden with tension and suspense . . . A compelling adventure story * * Irish Times * * Wray writes with an elegant economy . . . Wray's understanding of the beauties and cruelties of religious faith is deeply impressive . . . This is a very fine novel indeed . . . Anybody who seeks to understand the world as it is today will find enlightenment here -- Allan Massie * * Scotsman * * This novel crosses lines that fiction should, stretching the imagination from suburban California to a jihadi training camp in the foothills of the Hindu Kush. Wray's taut prose propels a gripping narrative that stands head and shoulders above most fiction about America's war on terror -- HARI KUNZRU, author of WHITE TEARS

Serious, sober and frequently mesmerising . . . Godsend is part adventure and part horror story. With financial help from her local mosque, Aden flies to Pakistan with a friend. If the Muslim world is no place for an adventurous woman, she will be a man . . . This is a significant literary performance -- Dwight Garner * * New York Times * * Godsend, which begins like a recognisable combination of bildungsroman and adventure tale, becomes much stranger and more original after it arrives in Pakistan, discovering within itself a profound understanding of the demands of religious practice - of religious submission, especially - which has eluded almost every serious contemporary American novelist since 9/11. It is not only Wray's heroine but also his novel that comes of age, steadily deepening and astounding as it develops . . . Godsend impresses because Wray is so fearlessly committed to his fictional world, and to his own depiction of it -- James Wood * * New Yorker * * Wray's storytelling is so taut, his psychology so audacious -- JONATHAN FRANZEN * * Guardian * * Brilliantly executed . . . Mr Wray's novel is on one hand an entirely familiar story of youthful rebellion and on the other an unimaginable depiction of a cold-blooded killer groomed by the world's most notorious army * * Wall Street Journal * * Godsend is a 9/11 novel unlike any other - one in which the cataclysm at the World Trade Center registers as a far-off rumble, something rumored in hushed Pashtun rather than replayed infinitely across TV screens * * The Atlantic * * This novel crosses lines that fiction should, stretching the imagination from suburban California to a jihadi training camp in the foothills of the Hindu Kush. Wray's taut prose propels a gripping narrative that stands head and shoulders above most fiction about America's war on terror -- HARI KUNZRU, author of WHITE TEARS John Wray is an adventurous literary traveler. It's impossible to predict where he's going to land next . . . Godsend offers plenty of surprises . . . Wray regulates the excitement levels, from tense to explosive, with a sure hand for narrative momentum . . . It's a work of great power, seamlessly elucidating the seductions of faith and violence * * San Francisco Chronicle * * John Wray is making a place for himself among our greatest living writers. Godsend is a wonder to me: a fearless book about a terrifying subject. The elegance and daring of this novel left me dizzy -- AKHIL SHARMA, author of FAMILY LIFE I've just spent every spare moment in a fever heat reading Godsend, and I'm truly dazzled by its daring literal and psychological border-crossings, its tonal complexity, and its pitiless compassion. Nothing is foreign to John Wray's imagination. I hope I can write half as fearlessly one day -- KAREN RUSSELL, author of VAMPIRES IN THE LEMON GROVE This is a great book about a time and a place that I lived through. I was nostalgic, reading Godsend, for the days when I was a young girl in Afghanistan, going to the madrasa with my friends. This came as a surprise to me. But there was beauty in that life. And there is beauty in this story -- SHAMILA KOHESTANI

Serious, sober and frequently mesmerising . . . Godsend is part adventure and part horror story. With financial help from her local mosque, Aden flies to Pakistan with a friend. If the Muslim world is no place for an adventurous woman, she will be a man . . . This is a significant literary performance -- Dwight Garner * * New York Times * * Godsend, which begins like a recognisable combination of bildungsroman and adventure tale, becomes much stranger and more original after it arrives in Pakistan, discovering within itself a profound understanding of the demands of religious practice - of religious submission, especially - which has eluded almost every serious contemporary American novelist since 9/11. It is not only Wray's heroine but also his novel that comes of age, steadily deepening and astounding as it develops . . . Godsend impresses because Wray is so fearlessly committed to his fictional world, and to his own depiction of it -- James Wood * * New Yorker * * This novel crosses lines that fiction should, stretching the imagination from suburban California to a jihadi training camp in the foothills of the Hindu Kush. Wray's taut prose propels a gripping narrative that stands head and shoulders above most fiction about America's war on terror -- HARI KUNZRU, author of WHITE TEARS John Wray is an adventurous literary traveler. It's impossible to predict where he's going to land next . . . Godsend offers plenty of surprises . . . Wray regulates the excitement levels, from tense to explosive, with a sure hand for narrative momentum . . . It's a work of great power, seamlessly elucidating the seductions of faith and violence * * San Francisco Chronicle * * John Wray is making a place for himself among our greatest living writers. Godsend is a wonder to me: a fearless book about a terrifying subject. The elegance and daring of this novel left me dizzy -- AKHIL SHARMA, author of FAMILY LIFE This is a great book about a time and a place that I lived through. I was nostalgic, reading Godsend, for the days when I was a young girl in Afghanistan, going to the madrasa with my friends. This came as a surprise to me. But there was beauty in that life. And there is beauty in this story -- SHAMILA KOHESTANI I've just spent every spare moment in a fever heat reading Godsend, and I'm truly dazzled by its daring literal and psychological border-crossings, its tonal complexity, and its pitiless compassion. Nothing is foreign to John Wray's imagination. I hope I can write half as fearlessly one day -- KAREN RUSSELL, author of VAMPIRES IN THE LEMON GROVE Wray communicates a disturbing image of disaffected youth and the lures of extremism * * Publishers Weekly * * PRAISE FOR JOHN WRAY: One of our most astonishing and relevant young writers * * Esquire * * For a while now, John Wray has been writing as if let in on the secret history of the world, paying attention to moments we all know, but at the point we've stopped looking . . . This is literature as high-wire act without the net; epic in scale, even bigger in heart -- MARLON JAMES

Author Information

John Wray is the author of five novels, including The Lost Time Accidents and Lowboy. He is the recipient of a Guggenheim Fellowship, a Whiting Writers' Award, and a Mary Ellen von der Heyden Fellowship from the American Academy in Berlin, and has been named one of Granta's Best Young American Novelists. A citizen of both the United States and Austria, he lives in New York City. @John_Wray | johnwray.net

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