Strange, beautiful and terribly moving

This deeply moving book shames most writers with its nerve and tact and wonder

An unconsoling masterpiece...It is exquisitely written and exquisitely translated...a true work of art

A spellbinding account of four Jewish exiles. Its restrained and meditative tone has stayed with me all year

A sober delicate account of displacement, and a classic of its kind. Modest and remote, it resurrects older standards of behaviour, making most contemporary writing seem brash and immature. No book has pleased me more this year

It's like nothing I've ever read...A book of excruciating sobriety and warmth and a magical concreteness of observation...I know of no book which conveys more about that complex fate, being a European at the end of European civilization. I know of few books written in our time but this one which attains the sublime

The writing seems long distilled, intensely pre-mediated and yet utterly fresh. It has an unaffected earnestness, a loner's earnestness

One of the most innovative writers of the late 20th century... It's as if the spirit of ruined Europe were speaking through him

The writer who above all others transformed the ravaged lands and minds of post-war Europe into a scene of hauntings

It’s been a long time since a book kept me up all night, but Eva Nour’s The Stray Cats of Homs did. A tender, yet wild and tangible testimony bearing witness to the tragedy in Syria.

One of the greatest successes of The Stray Cats of Homs is that it manages to explain the complexity of the war in Syria through Sami's eyes, without getting bogged down by exactly who did what and when.

An artistically flawless novel, written as an act of protest, but also as a poetic declaration of love.

The Stray Cats of Homs is a study in survival and a portrayal of the utter hell of the Syrian war. The novel reveals what can never be told by the news reports.

An extraordinary novel, filled with grief, warmth and love, that I recommend everyone to read.

Dazzling. Mind-blowing. About as much fun as you can have without risking arrest

A deeply funny, very moving book . . . Ferris's hijinks are serious; his play is profound. There is magic in these pages

A touching tale about the love between fathers and sons

A passionate, well-constructed, often hilarious and, at times, profound plunge into grief, both civic and intimate, as well as a culmination (so far) of the literary explorations he has been undertaking since he arrived

A Calling for Charlie Barnes is wonderful: fast and deep, urgent and brilliant . . . A hilarious, intimate, and scathing takedown of so many American vanities

He has proved that he's one of the best American authors of comic fiction working today. His humour is on full display but so are his intelligence and compassion. It's a masterpiece that shines a revealing light on both family and fiction itself

Ferris's work cuts to the heart of who we are by focusing very painfully on who one man was . . . Consider this book not just a work of grief or love or memoir, then, but a work of hope, too.

A warmly bullish but measured and reflectful voice that brings out all the humour and wisdom of the novel

Intriguing and intelligent . . . the humour throughout is exquisitely judged . . . and the descent into metafiction, the novel's true crowning glory, is extremely well done without ever feeling hammy or clunky

A relentlessly self-reflective book

Joshua Ferris has proved his astonishing ability to spin gold from ordinary air . . . As brave and adept as any writer out there

Not too many authors have written the Great American Office Novel... Then We Came to the End feels like a readymade classic of the genre. . . . A truly affecting novel about work, trust, love, and loneliness

Dismayingly funny in the way that only really serious books can be

Brilliant, funny, stomach-turningly accurate

Very funny, intense and exhilarating

A marvelously told story of devotion, desire and ambition in the heart of a female utopia

Matrix is another masterpiece from a writer whom few at this point can best

Through Marie, Groff explores how a society's religious and gendered constraints can be turned on their head to create a utopia

[A]n electric reimagining . . . feminist, sensual, magisterial, de France's saga is one of hardship and triumph, an unforgettable character whose far-seeing vision and devotion to the nuns in her community enable them to transcend what threatens to erase and silence them

Matrix focuses less on Marie the author and more on Marie the abbess - and if you think that doesn't sound like the obvious angle for a fun and engaging story, you underestimate the scope of Groff 's imagination and talent

In these incandescent pages, Groff reverently imagines her way into the life and lore of Marie de France . . . Woven from Groff's trademark ecstatic sentences and brimming with spiritual fervor, Matrix is a radiant work of imagination and accomplishment

Thrilling and heartbreaking, Groff crafts an electric work of historical fiction

A transportive and meditative tale that will swallow you up from the very start

Groff, a premier stylist . . . .continues to grow, taking on a medieval foremother's story in her latest novel. The voice she finds for Marie de France . . . .will hold readers fast as the exiled Angevin royal becomes abbess of a convent, leading her charges through historic upheavals

Feverishly exhilarating stuff

With her unparalleled gift for sumptuous, sublime prose, Groff paints an engrossing portrait of a woman who, despite living in a world bound by constraints, experiences a life rich with passion and creativity. Surrounded by a supportive sisterhood, Marie uses strength and ingenuity to subvert the oppression of the patriarchy

Utterly absorbing

Splendid with rich description and period vocabulary, this courageous and spin-tingling novel shows an incredible range for Groff (FLORIDA, 2018), and will envelop readers fully in Marie's world, interior and exterior, all senses lit up. It is both a complete departure and an easy-to-envision tale of faith, power, and temptation.

In this bildungsroman about the real-life 12th-century poet Marie de France, a teenage Marie is exiled to a blighted Benedictine nunnery, where she finds strength and power as a prioress

Powerful, sapphic historical novel . . . Richly realized with historical details that don't overwhelm

Readers will recognize her stunning prose and grand, mythic perspective. . . . in a tale that feels both ancient and urgent, as holy as it is deeply human

The pages are almost completely devoid of men - seen, but not heard - with Groff using poetic, melodic and yet fierce writing to breathe volume into themes of power, ambition and success from the perspective of women

[A] propulsive, enchanting, and emotionally charged read

A clever spin on the story of Marie de France

I loved this accomplished piece of storytelling. So much so, I added it to my Booker wish list at the last minute, a wish not fulfilled, of course

Matrix is a rich, beautifully written novel about ambition and desire, and also witchy separatist medieval nuns

Mesmerizing and inspiring

Medieval life can seem far from our modern grasp, but Groff vividly describes the daily workings of the convent, from prayers to practical chores. She has done her research and it shows in the rich details she provides of working the fields, preparing meals, governing novices . . . magical, a beautiful evocation of what women can achieve and what they can mean to each other

[A] feminist foray into a medieval nunnery that is stunning in its labyrinthine artistry and sensual tracing of life as lived during the era of the poet Marie de France and the legendary Eleanor of Aquitaine

Must-read

A[n] artful writer, Groff has no need for fantastic artifice to construct a world without men. She . . . gives us an extraordinary protagonist . . . Anyone who has read Groff's previous novels and stories knows that this author's greatest virtue is her economy of prose. A disciplined writer . . . If "Eleanor's best currency is story," that goes double for Groff . . . Groff's "Matrix" simultaneously transports us to a backward world that once was and the grim future that seems inevitable. And all this through the eyes of a group of extraordinary women who decline to live lives of quiet desperation

[A] transcendently beautiful novel with sensuality, religious ecstasy, gender and power explorations, and a fair bit of tasteful gore. It's surprisingly delicious to read fiction about a historical figure we know so little about

I'm on page 17 and now nothing else matters . . . Once you have this book in your hands I feel certain you too will be consumed

[D]reamy prose . . . At its heart, the book's message is simple: joy can exist in darkness

Richly imaginative

[A] relentless exhibition of Groff's freakish talent . . . an unforgettable book . . . ecstatic, refulgent, God-struck, heretical

[A] creative, intelligent work that will last

The real Marie de France may continue to elude historians but the speculative fiction in Matrix combine to produce an unfailingly absorbing novel

An uplifting novel in its own unique way, and up there with Groff's best work

Matrix forms an intensely focused character study, but also succeeds as a probing exploration of female power

A beautiful and beguiling novel that transports the listener utterly and completely to another world

Against a convincingly filthy and precarious medieval backdrop, Marie is a figure of dazzling complexity