A Shock
09 June 2022Synopsis
WINNER OF THE JAMES TAIT BLACK PRIZE FOR FICTION 2022
‘Remarkable' - Colm Tóibín, author of Brooklyn
'Like Finnegans Wake, only readable' - The Times
In A Shock, a clutch of more or less loosely connected characters appear, disappear and reappear. They are all of them on the fringes of London life, often clinging on – to sanity, solvency or a story – by their fingertips. With this deftly conjured high-wire act, Ridgway achieves a fine balance between drama and fidelity to his characters. The result is pin-sharp and breathtaking.
Book of the Year Selection in the Guardian, New York Times, Spectator, Hot Press and The White Review
Shortlisted for The Goldsmiths Prize
Details
09 June 2022
9781529064810Reviews
Keith Ridgway offers his London a luminous glow, but his competing narratives are also rooted in a real place, with a remarkable sense of character and the shifting systems that make up his contemporary urban space
Colm Tóibín
Like Finnegans Wake, only readable. The Times
Ingeniously slippery . . . an expertly constructed house of mirrors Lucy Scholes, New York Times Book Review
A sultry, steamy shock of a novel . . . a provocative collection of nine interlinked stories, jostled together like neighbours on a London street or regulars in a pub, which is where most of his characters cross pathsThe Spectator
