Half-Sick Of Shadows

Nov 12, 2025 9:53 PM

Author:David Logan

On the eve of Granny Hazel’s burial in the back garden, a stranger in his time machine – a machine that bears an uncanny resemblance to a Morris Minor – visits five year-old Edward with a strange request. And Edward agrees to be his friend.

But Edward is not alone in the world. His twin sister Sophia is about to bring future tragedy upon herself through an all-too-literal misunderstanding of a promise she’s made to their father.

So while Sophia stays at home, seemingly condemned to spend the rest of her days in The Manse – a world untouched by modern trappings – Edward is sent to boarding school. There he encounters the kind and the not-so-kind, and meets the strangest child. His name is Alf, and Alf is a boy whose very existence would seem to hint at universes of unlimited possibilities...and who might one day help Edward liberate Sophia.

With its Gothic backdrop, Half-Sick of Shadows is a novel of many parts: at once a comical tragedy, a dark and dazzlingly told tale of childhood wonder and dismay, of familial dysfunction, of poetry, the imagination and theoretical physics.

Reviews

A most excellent writer

—— TERRY PRATCHETT

Brilliantly witty...highly entertaining

—— SFX magazine

Brilliantly written, darkly humorous and often touching

—— SCI-FI NOW magazine

A wonderful fantasy

—— BELFAST TELEGRAPH

An affecting, impressionistic novel-cum-memoir. Like all great autobiographical writing, it pulls the magic trick of making the specific and personal universally appealing.

—— Juanita Coulson , Lady

Rivas’ deepest, most confidential and intimate book to date.

—— Heraldo de Aragón

Rivas reveals himself as an authentic storyteller, transforming reality into imagination without ever betraying it.

—— La Vanguardia

It is wonderful, a luminescent account of lives lived… For those of a more political bent – and setting aside that the book has been funded by the EU taxpayers! – reading it now is an interesting backdrop to the Catalonian bid for independence, with its pride in community diversity and awareness that bad things in the Spanish past linger long in family memories. But for others, just read it, enjoy the pictures created and admire the outstanding writing.

—— Hilary White , Nudge

The Adversary is exactly the idea I have of a modern novel: struggling deftly with facts and with itself

—— Laurent Binet, author of HHhH

An absolutely stunning piece of work, totally involving and unforgettable

—— Evening Standard

This is the sort of story I dreamed of covering when I was a journalist. The sort of story for which the phrase You couldn’t make it up was invented. The Adversary takes a deep, mesmerising dive into the darkness of a human soul. There were moments when I truly could not believe what I was reading. But unlike other serial killer noirs sitting on my shelves, this horror is real. And so much more chilling for that.

—— Fiona Barton, author of The Widow

[A] book that fairly struck me over the head was The Adversary… it’s the coexistence of almost unimaginably variant realities within a family that haunts you.

—— Megan Nolan , New Statesman, *Books of the Year*

A remarkably thoughtful and unnerving book...mesmerising

—— Sunday Telegraph

Profoundly disturbing...a remarkable and undoubtedly important book - perhaps even a necessary one

—— Daily Express

A fascinating meditation on Jean-Claude Romand and what his bizarre life might mean... Carrère's inquiry is highly personal, written in lucid prose...the narrative is often mesmerizing, and revealing about the fragility of human relationships

—— New York Times

As a writer, Carrère is straight berserk; as a storyteller he is so freakishly talented, so unassuming in grace and power that you only realize the hold he's got on you when you attempt to pull away... You say: True crime and Literature? I don't believe it. I say: Believe it

—— Junot Díaz

Justifiably considered the French In Cold Blood

—— Paris Review

The sense of dread he conveys is authentic – it is a loss of self, of connection to the world...dystopian

—— London Review of Books

It’s fascinating, watching Carrere dig around in Romand’s inner life… By the end you feel this clever, intriguing book is too good for its banal human subject.

—— Robbie Millen , The Times

Dark, strange, astonishing.

—— Marcel Theroux , Big Issue

A jaw-dropping tale of murder and deception that goes right to the heart of what it means to be human... The perfect antidote to an excess of sunshine

—— Paul Murray, author of THE BEE STING , Observer, *Summer Reads of 2023*

The perfect antidote to Trump.

—— Sarah Churchwell , Guardian

This book is a compelling study of the relationship between artist and spectator, and how suffering feeds into art, and he’s made of it a bravura performance… Extraordinary.

—— Alastair Mabbott , Herald

A haunting, intense and Man Booker International prize-winning novel from a great writer.

—— Mail on Sunday

Incredibly fast paced, and the dialogue comes at you like a machine gun… It is powerful in its own right.

—— Sara Garland , Nudge

Abrasive, unexpected and eventually heartbreaking, it is a masterclass in characterisation and structure, and it beat off some exceptionally strong competition to win the prize… A Horse Walks into a Bar is quite unlike any other Grossman book except in one important respect: it’s another masterpiece.

—— Nick Barley , New Statesman

Excellent.

—— Dara Ó Briain , Observer

Pitch-perfect black comedy

—— Salman Rushdie , Guardian

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