Overview

FROM THE BOOKER PRIZE-SHORTLISTED AND WOMEN'S PRIZE-WINNING AUSTRALIAN NOVELIST Kate Grenville often takes inspiration for her fiction from her family history and this extraordinary memoir about the life of her own mother, Nance Russell, reveals why. Born to an unhappy marriage and into a deeply sexist society, Nance worked hard for everything she had, and while the world changed around her, she went on to university, opening businesses and raising a family. One Life is just as much a universal story as it is Nance's. Beautifully captured by her daughter, it draws on the tales passed down by word of mouth, creating an evocative portrait of life in twentieth-century rural Australia and a deeply intimate and caring homage to a mother's struggle.

Full Product Details

9781782116875

Table of Contents

Reviews

* Kate Grenville is one of Australia's finest writers ... her great skill as a writer is to take the barest of biographical details and spin them into something of intricate moral complexity Telegraph * Written in the third-person, blending her mother's plain, brisk language and her own novelistic skills ... moving ... Grenville's feminist instincts, which run quietly through her life and writing, built on her mother's example Sydney Morning Herald * Grenville inhabits characters with a rare completeness ... She writes with a poet's sense of rhythm and imagery Guardian * Grenville has emerged not only as the truth-teller but also something of a hero ... her novels are important quests that go beyond art Irish Times * The power with which Kate Grenville evokes places and people is so remarkable -- DIANA ATHILL * Kate Grenville has a reputation for elegant prose that cuts to the very heart of her subject matter with breathtaking precision Vogue * A work of imaginative sympathy, it is as successful as it is audacious ... Clear, authentic and utterly engaging ... Provides a microcosm for the changes taking place on the world stage in the period spanned Independent on Sunday * We are given the portrait of a woman whole. I adored her and the way Grenville wrote about her from every angle Savidge Reads

Wonderful * Independent * A work of imaginative sympathy, it is as successful as it is audacious ... Clear, authentic and utterly engaging ... A microcosm for the changes taking place on the world stage in the period spanned * Independent on Sunday * Kate Grenville is one of Australia's finest writers ... her great skill as a writer is to take the barest of biographical details and spin them into something of intricate moral complexity * Telegraph * Written in the third-person, blending her mother's plain, brisk language and her own novelistic skills ... moving ... Grenville's feminist instincts, which run quietly through her life and writing, built on her mother's example * Sydney Morning Herald * Grenville inhabits characters with a rare completeness ... She writes with a poet's sense of rhythm and imagery * Guardian * Grenville has emerged not only as the truth-teller but also something of a hero ... her novels are important quests that go beyond art * Irish Times * The power with which Kate Grenville evokes places and people is so remarkable -- DIANA ATHILL Kate Grenville has a reputation for elegant prose that cuts to the very heart of her subject matter with breathtaking precision * Vogue * We are given the portrait of a woman whole. I adored her and the way Grenville wrote about her from every angle * Savidge Reads *

Author Information

Kate Grenville's bestselling novel The Secret River received the Commonwealth Writers' Prize, and was shortlisted for the Man Booker Prize and the Miles Franklin Literary Award. The Idea of Perfection won the Orange Prize. Grenville's other novels include Sarah Thornhill, The Lieutenant, Lilian's Story, Dark Places and Joan Makes History. www.kategrenville.com

Tab Content 6

Customer Reviews

Recent Reviews

Countries Available