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Give Us This Day
Give Us This Day
Nov 30, 2025 3:08 PM

Author:Jonathan Tulloch

Give Us This Day

Tom Carey is a priest in crisis. God's good world has curdled and the Church is beset by scandal. Increasingly, he is haunted by the face of a woman he once secretly loved.

Abandoning his comfortable parish he buries himself in the post of Port Chaplain on a busy river, but soon finds himself caught up in the murky world of international people-smuggling. The alluring but sinister Captain Cargo and his beleaguered Filipino crew seem intent on forcing him into a radical expression of his priesthood, but a chance encounter with the woman he has not seen for thirty years throws his vocation and faith into question.

Reviews

Tulloch masterfully fashions a foreboding gothic landscape out of this godforsaken colony of the damned... An immensely resonant and powerful story

—— Laurence Phelan , Independent on Sunday

Jonathan Tulloch confirms his promise with Give Us This Day, a beautifully nuanced study of a Teesside chaplain

—— Daily Express

The blighted northern English landscape is rendered lovingly... A skillfully paced, readable novel

—— Times Literary Supplement

Half-tragic, half-hopeful, always unsentimental, Give Us This Day is a wholly absorbing novel

—— D.J. Taylor , Guardian

A beautifully written and compelling story of the search for truth and integrity

—— Bernard O'Donoghue

A beautifully nuanced study of a dedicated, decent man who discovers that the simplistic pieties of his training fail to cover the moral complexities of the world in which he lives

—— Michael Arditti , Daily Mail

Vividly alive

—— Margaret Walters , Sunday Times

'Sharp, painfully honest, and as funny as it is heartbreaking. I literally couldn't put it down'

—— Shane Watson, author of Other People’s Marriages

Utterly brilliant.

—— OK!

In this interesting inversion of the wicked stepmother story the reader's sympathy is instantly engaged . . . Considerablr darker than its racy, pacy style suggests.

—— The Times

'I read in one sitting . . . A triumph.'

—— Diane Johnson, author of LE DIVORCE

A must for...any guilt-ridden, wicked stepmothers out there . . . Clever, honest...and very funny.

—— Glasgow Evening Times

Gripping ... Both candid and comic.'

—— Mail on Sunday

Ayelet Waldman isn't afraid to shock people. Quite the reverse. Her declaration last year that she loves her husband more than her children caused an international outcry and catapulted her on to Oprah Winfrey's show to defend herself. Her controversial new novel about the fractured state of family life looks set to do the same ... Honest, touching and acutely observed, it is impossible to put down. One moment I was laughing out loud...while the next I had tears pouring down my face ... But it's the growing relationship between Emilia and her stepson that forms the heart of this tale. Whether you're a parent or not, you can't fail to be moved by it.

—— Daily Express

·'Ayelet Waldman is an uplifting discovery: a fantastically enjoyable new writer with no pretensions and a genuine story-telling gift . . . An absolute delight . . . A light-hearted and human book that touches on crashing emotions with a combination of tenderness and irreverence.'

—— Sunday Times

·'Ayelet Waldman...has made it her mission to combat what she called "the perfect mother myth." . . . provocative and often rashly frank . . . Her literary models are Sue Miller and Dani Shapiro . . . shares some of British writer Rachel Cusk's acerbic wit . . . Can be gobbled up in just a sitting or two, zipping along toward its dependably cathartic climax.'

—— LA Times

'Compelling and artfully drawn . . . Emilia's voice is terrific - sharp, witty, funny, resilient, sarcastic, passionate and very angry.'

—— Washington Post

A moving and darkly funny read . . . Romantic, shocking and sometimes painful page-turner . . . says something new and interesting about women, families and love.

—— New York Times

A very good, very funny writer ... The perfect book for anyone who doesn't already know that motherhood is the hardest job in the world.

—— Irish Examiner

Funny and painful. Will strke a chord with anyone who is a member of a family.

—— Good Book Guide
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