The Book of Goose

'A dazzling, subtle, skilful knockout – I loved it' Charlotte Mendelson‘One of our finest living authors … propulsively entertaining’ New York Times‘Wonderfully strange and alive’ Jon McGregor A propulsive, seductive new novel about friendship, exploitation and intimacy from the prize-winning author of Where Reasons End

Fabienne is dead. Her childhood best friend, Agnès, receives the news in America, far from the French countryside where the two girls were raised – the place that Fabienne helped Agnès escape ten years ago. Now, Agnès is free to tell her story.

As children in a backwater town, they’d built a private world, invisible to everyone but themselves – until Fabienne hatched the plan that would change everything, launching Agnès on an epic trajectory through fame, fortune, and terrible loss.

A dark, ravishing tale winding from the rural provinces to Paris, from an English boarding school, to the quiet Pennsylvania home where Agnès can live without her past. The Book of Goose is a story of intimacy and obsession, friendship and rivalry perfect for fans of Elena Ferrante, Ottessa Moshfegh and Kamila Shamsie.

‘Beguiling … A shimmering, unsettling tale of exploitation and manipulation’ Daily Mail

‘Brilliant … A novel of deceptions and cruelty’ Spectator

‘For all its surface lushness, this is a novel of meticulous philosophical inquiry…resonant with echoes of… My Brilliant Friend, as well Elizabeth Strout… electrifying’ Observer

© 2022 Fourth Estate (Audiobook): 9780008531843

Release date

Audiobook: 20 September 2022