One proof of Elizabeth Strout's greatness is the sleight of hand with which she injects sneaky subterranean power into seemingly transparent prose. Strout works in the realm of everyday speech, conjuring repetitions, gaps and awkwardness with plain language and forthright diction, yet at the same time unleashing a tidal urgency that seems to come out of nowhere even as it operates in plain sight

Strout is not only mercilessly funny on the page, she's also unerringly precise about the long-term effects of loneliness, parental neglect and betrayal . . . The final scene between William and Lucy has been carouselling in my mind for days now . . . devastating and vital, bleak and tender

What sets Strout's work apart is her characterisation . . . Long on empathy while steering clear of sentimentality, her prose bears the minerality of a crisp white wine, with a seeming simplicity that belies its profound power

A very good novel, deft when it needs to be and ambivalent where certainty would be facile. Its celebration of the ungraspable riddles and sudden judgments of real life becomes compulsive. . . . I cannot get Lucy Barton out of my head

[Strout] is a novelist of the inner sensibility, and what makes her so compellingly readable is her rendering of the ebb and flow of emotion and impression, of the stream of consciousness between past and present that makes Lucy cousin to Virginia Woolf's Mrs Dalloway

Strout is very good at parsing the contradictory elements that make up our relationship with ourselves and the lives we lead, and the extent to which these elements exist in a state of flux. Such a pleasure to read. And so very wise

Strout gets you to reassess every relationship you've ever had while you can still do something about it

Elizabeth Strout is one of my very favorite writers, so the fact that Oh William! may well be my favorite of her books is a mathematical equation for joy. The depth, complexity, and love contained in these pages is a miraculous achievement

The end lines of this novel from the staggeringly gifted Elizabeth Strout are a revelation - a profound understanding of our relationships, ourselves . . . A luminous novel about love, loss and family secrets; hard to believe a writer can fathom us so well

A superbly gifted storyteller and a craftswoman in a league of her own

A terrific writer

She gets better with each book

One of America's finest writers

A powerful, thought-provoking novel

[A] tenderly rendered apocalyptic novella... Johnson is an unusually sensitive writer, combining a mood of impending doom with language of soulful beauty

This brief, brilliant gut-punch of a novel is frighteningly plausible... Lush, harrowing, and entirely believable - a marvel of economy

My Monticello is short, satisfying and punchy: more debuts should be like this

Stunning

Chilling, affecting and intelligent

This brief, brilliant gut-punch of a novel is frighteningly plausible

My Monticello is a bleak story but reading it elicits the same kind of sensation that comes from listening to a poignant blues song: there is pleasure in its creation without denying the pain of the subject

A history lesson, a fable, an inquiry into the nature of historic monuments, a heartfelt tale of community and above all a nail-biting story.

Beautifully written with unforgettable characters... My Monticello is an unforgettable and thought-provoking novella that will unsettle you to your core.