Transit: A Novel (Outline Trilogy, 2) - Hardcover

Cusk, Rachel

Hardcover

ISBN 10: 0374278628 ISBN 13: 9780374278625

Publisher: Farrar, Straus and Giroux, 2017

Synopsis

National Bestseller · A Finalist for the Scotiabank Giller Prize · A Finalist for the Goldsmiths Prize · Longlisted for the International DUBLIN Literary Award · One of Time Magazine's Top 10 Fiction Books of the Year

A New York Times Book Review Notable Book · Named a Best Book of the Year by Time, The Guardian, BOMB Magazine, San Francisco Chronicle, Commonweal, Southern Living, NOW Magazine, The Washington Independent Review of Books, Book Depository, The Globe and Mail, and The National Post (Canada)

The stunning second novel of a trilogy that began with Outline, one of The New York Times Book Review’s ten best books of 2015

In the wake of her family’s collapse, a writer and her two young sons move to London. The process of this upheaval is the catalyst for a number of transitions―personal, moral, artistic, and practical―as she endeavors to construct a new reality for herself and her children. In the city, she is made to confront aspects of living that she has, until now, avoided, and to consider questions of vulnerability and power, death and renewal, in what becomes her struggle to reattach herself to, and believe in, life.

Filtered through the impersonal gaze of its keenly intelligent protagonist, Transit sees Rachel Cusk delve deeper into the themes first raised in her critically acclaimed novel Outline and offers up a penetrating and moving reflection on childhood and fate, the value of suffering, the moral problems of personal responsibility, and the mystery of change.

In this second book of a precise, short, yet epic cycle, Cusk describes the most elemental experiences, the liminal qualities of life. She captures with unsettling restraint and honesty the longing to both inhabit and flee one’s life, and the wrenching ambivalence animating our desire to feel real.

About this title

From the Back Cover

In the wake of family collapse, a writer moves to London with her two young sons. The process of upheaval is the catalyst for a number of transitions—personal, moral, artistic, practical—as she endeavours to construct a new reality for herself and her children. In the city she is made to confront aspects of living she has, until now, avoided, and to consider questions of vulnerability and power, death and renewal, in what becomes her struggle to reattach herself to, and believe in, life.

Filtered through the impersonal gaze of its keenly intelligent protagonist, Transit sees Rachel Cusk delve deeper into the themes first raised in her critically acclaimed novel Outline, and offers up a penetrating and moving reflection on childhood and fate, the value of suffering, the moral problems of personal responsibility, and the mystery of change. In this precise, short, and yet epic novel, Cusk manages to describe the most elemental experiences, the liminal qualities of life, through a narrative near-silence that draws language towards it. She captures with unsettling restraint and honesty the longing to both inhabit and flee one’s life and the wrenching ambivalence animating our desire to feel real.

About the Author

Rachel Cusk is the author of three memoirs―A Life’s Work, The Last Supper, and Aftermath―and several novels: Saving Agnes, winner of the Whitbread First Novel Award; The Temporary; The Country Life, which won a SomersetMaugham Award; The Lucky Ones; In the Fold; Arlington Park; The Bradshaw Variations; and Outline. She was chosen as one of Granta’s 2003 Best of Young British Novelists. She lives in London.

Edition details

• Publisher: Farrar, Straus and Giroux
• Publication date: 2017
• ISBN 10: 0374278628
• ISBN 13: 9780374278625
• Binding: Hardcover
• Language: English
• Edition number: 1
• Number of pages: 272