Author:James Wood
In this remarkable blend of memoir and criticism, James Wood has written a master class on the connections between fiction and life. He argues that, of all the arts, fiction has a unique ability to describe the shape of our lives, and to rescue the texture of those lives from death and historical oblivion. The act of reading is understood here as the most sacred and personal of activities, and there are brilliant discussions of individual works – among others, Chekhov’s story ‘The Kiss’, W. G. Sebald’s The Emigrants, and Fitzgerald’s The Blue Flower.
Wood reveals his own intimate relationship with the written word: we see the development of a provincial boy growing up in a charged Christian environment, the secret joy of his childhood reading, the links he makes between reading and blasphemy, or between literature and music. The final section discusses fiction in the context of exile and homelessness. The Nearest Thing to Life is not simply a brief, tightly argued book by a man commonly regarded as our finest living critic – it is also an exhilarating personal account that reflects on, and embodies, the fruitful conspiracy between reader and writer (and critic), and asks us to re-consider everything that is at stake when we read and write fiction.
The Nearest Thing to Life…[proves] that whether in short form or long, printed or spoken word, Wood is a voice worth listening to.
—— Malcolm Forbes , NationalThe Nearest Thing to Life is excellent: both insightful and sensible, a rare enough combination in criticism. Wood’s own noticings are as sharp as ever.
—— Theo Tait , Sunday TimesBrief but fascinating discourse.
—— Max Liu , Independent[Has] an elegant lightness of touch… [A] slim, appealingly modest collection.
—— Matilda Bathurst , Country Life[A] short but lovely volume.
—— Laurence Scott , Financial TimesAutobiographical, open-handed and endlessly engaging.
—— MonocleWood scrutinises devastatingly simple ideas. He does the work of the novelist in making his reader examine these concepts anew through gorgeously accomplished, apt language.
—— Totally DublinI can’t wait to read [it].
—— Stuart Kelly , The Times Literary SupplementA hugely enjoyable journey though the riches of [Wood’s] extraordinarily well-stocked mind.
—— Good Book GuideHis [Wood’s] concept of literature is generous, inclusive and fundamentally democratic.
—— Michael Lindgren , Washington PostAn exuberant coming of age novel in DMs and ripped tights
—— TatlerSo funny it hurts. How to Build a Girl is Adrian Mole meets Fear of Flying. I predict they’ll be tears a plenty – both of laughter and excruciating recognition – on sun-loungers this summer
—— Harper’s BazaarMoran is a brilliantly funny writer, and How To Build A Girl is brimful of jokes
—— FTThis very British (and very naughty) coming-of-age novel will have you in literal hysterics!
—— Companyterrific - funny, honest and deliciously rude
—— Alice O'Keefe , The BooksellerThis is going to be a bestseller…A sharp, hilarious and controversial read
—— The BooksellerI laughed aloud at this funny, outrageous story of a girl from Wolverhampton council estate who reinvents herself as Dolly Wilde
—— Woman & Homeas irreverent, amusing and vibrant as Moran herself
—— GQrowdy and fearless ... sloppy, big-hearted and alive in all the right ways
—— New York TimesMs. Moran['s] ... funny and cheerfully dirty coming-of-age novel has a hard kernel of class awareness ... sloppy, big-hearted and alive in all the right ways.
—— Dwight Garner , New York Timesthere’s so much real feeling too. Johanna’s vulnerability and bravado, as she moves out of her world and falls in love is beautifully done’ or ‘ and running through it all, with a visceral power that most writers should envy, is the shame and grinding anxiety of being poor
—— Sunday TimesMoran also writes brilliantly about music, and especially about what music can do. She carries Johanna through this novel with incredible verve, extravagant candour, and a lot of heart. Johanna is … a wonderful heroine. A heroine who cares, who bravely sallies forth and makes things happen, who gives of herself, who is refreshingly unashamed. She’s so confident, it’s glorious
—— The Independent on Sundayan entertaining read, with Moran in fine voice – hilarious, wild, imaginative and highly valuable…Moran is in danger of becoming to female masturbation what Keats was to Nightingales…
—— Barbara Ellen , The Observerrude, big-hearted, wise-cracking novel…so filthy she’ll make you blush
—— Christina Patterson , The Sunday TimesThis is going to be a bestseller…A sharp, hilarious and controversial read
—— The BooksellerAli Smith is a master of language. Vigorous, vivid writing that is Ali Smith incarnate
—— Alice Thompson , HeraldIngeniously conceived, gloriously inventive
—— NPRDizzyingly ambitious . . . endlessly artful, creating work that feels infinite in its scope and intimate at the same time. [A] swirling panoramic
—— AtlanticBrilliant . . . the sort of death-defying storytelling acrobatics that don't seem entirely possible
—— Washington PostHaving read this now twice, in both directions so to speak, I've decided - and I do not write this flippantly - that Ali Smith is a genius
—— Susan McCallum , LA Review of BooksApproaches the world as only a novel can. The book moves not so much in a straight line as in a twisting helix pattern . . . delivers the heat of life and the return of beauty in the face of loss
—— Kenneth Miller , Everyday EbookA unique conversation between past and present
—— Milwaukee JournalWildly inventive . . . lyrical, fresh
—— Bustle Magazine
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