In the original dustsheet. Black board binding with white title on the spine.

• F.B.A. provides an in-depth photographic presentation of this item to stimulate your feeling and touch. More traditional book descriptions are immediately available

This final novel by the wonderful Carol Shields {1935-2003} is quite simply one of the best I’ve read this century, or indeed in my life.

It has that essential ingredient which real literature cannot fake, a spark and a resonance that tells the reader he or she is in the presence of a writer worth the name. It’s a devastating and very moving tale of a family, and in particular the daughter Norah, who one day does something so oddly subversive she upsets the equilibrium of all who care about her.

The author gives all her brief chapters headings such as ‘Instead’, ‘Thus’, and Thereof’, and indeed ‘Unless’, a gimmick that is as eloquent as the novel itself.

I tell everyone I can about this great little book ~ it really is that good.