Clock Dance

BOOK OF THE YEAR IN 7 NATIONAL NEWSPAPERS

** The Sunday Times bestseller ** BBC Radio 4 Book at Bedtime **


A bittersweet novel of family and self-discovery from the Sunday Times bestselling, award-winning author of A Spool of Blue Thread

Willa Drake can count on one hand the defining moments of her life- when she was eleven and her mother disappeared, being proposed to at twenty-one, the accident that would make her a widow at forty-one. At each of these moments, Willa ended up on a path laid out for her by others.

So when she receives a phone call telling her that her son's ex-girlfriend has been shot and needs her help, she drops everything and flies across the country. The spur-of-the moment decision to look after this woman - and her nine-year-old daughter, and her dog - will lead Willa into uncharted territory. Surrounded by new and surprising neighbours, she is plunged into the rituals that make a community, and takes pleasure in the most unexpected things.

A bittersweet novel of hope and regret, fulfilment and renewal, Clock Dance brings us the everyday life of a woman who decides it's never too late to change direction, and choose your own path.

'She is and always will be my favourite author' Liane Moriarty

About the Author :
Anne Tyler was born in Minneapolis, Minnesota, in 1941 and grew up in Raleigh, North Carolina. Her bestselling novels include Breathing Lessons, The Accidental Tourist, Dinner at the Homesick Restaurant, Ladder of Years, Back When We Were Grownups, A Patchwork Planet, The Amateur Marriage, Digging to America, A Spool of Blue Thread, Vinegar Girl and Clock Dance.

In 1989 she won the Pulitzer Prize for Breathing Lessons; in 1994 she was nominated by Roddy Doyle and Nick Hornby as 'the greatest novelist writing in English'; in 2012 she received the Sunday Times Award for Literary Excellence; and in 2015 A Spool of Blue Thread was a Sunday Times bestseller and was shortlisted for the Baileys Women's Prize for Fiction and the Man Booker Prize.



Review :
If Anne Tyler isn't the best writer in the world, who is? One of our greatest living fiction writers and if I was in charge, she'd have a Nobel by now Brims with the qualities that have brought her legions of fans and high critical acclaim. Characters pulse with lifelikeness. The tone flickers between humorous relish and sardonic shrewdness. Dialogue crackles with authenticity. Beneath it all is an insistence that it's never too soon to recognise how quickly life can speed by and never too late to make vitalising changes How does she do it? Her style is deceptively simple. Even though she performs narrative cartwheels that would lead other novelists to be praised as experimental... she does it with such ease that it seems closer to life than to art. it is almost as though we are there to witness time passing, and people changing A writer sharp-eyed as a butcher-bird, skewering complacency... an immensely funny writer... a quiet writer, in that much of her skill goes toward the excision of anything that reminds the reader they are reading Clock Dance, rife with the hurts and joys of living, is far more than merely very good... For readers Anne Tyler is a life force; for writers she is simply the best A smart, touching exploration of altruism and the nature of a meaningful life A beautifully crafted, bitter-sweet story about regret, empty nest syndrome, loneliness within a relationship and seeking purpose and fulfilment in life. Kick back and lose yourself in this gem of a novel My favourite author… She writes such absorbing, wise, tender books, devastatingly acute about human nature… She never fails The loneliness and confusion of childhood are wonderfully rendered...reminiscent of Tyler's best work, such as Dinner at the Homesick Restaurant Classic Tyler; she captures the defining moments of love and loss in one middle-aged woman's life and combines it with the ultimate upbeat ending, proving it's never too late to live the life you want Tyler remains my most trusted literary companion… Freedom, flight, oxygen, breath, space: these themes whistle through Clock Dance's pages Full of small delights... She has a keen eye and an alert ear, sympathy for her characters, an awareness of both life's comedy and its tragedy In Anne Tyler’s skilled hands the everyday becomes significant… With beautifully observed characters and infused with quiet humour, this is another triumph Tyler's tenderness with her protagonists shouldn't be undervalued; this, along with her attention to detail when it comes to the minutiae of quotidian life, is what makes one keep reading Funny and interesting… Tyler’s novel presents a moving portrait of a woman, late in life, discovering an environment in which she can flourish The book we'll all be reading this summer A stellar addition to Tyler's prodigious catalogue The most dependably rewarding novelist now at work in our country... Ms. Tyler’s career reveals a surpassing steadiness – of ambition, theme, output I adore her and find her books immensely comforting. I loved her latest [Clock Dance]. It's such a bold book... a novel that encourages you to play the shrink