LONGLISTED FOR THE BOOKER PRIZE
SHORTLISTED FOR THE WOMEN’S PRIZE AND COSTA BOOK AWARDS
At her first sight of the Nautilus, it was as if the lustre of the building filled her heart and ran through her veins.
Stranded in suburban London, the Nautilus is an eccentric Modernist house built as a haven for bohemian artists, intellectuals and refugees. Now the Nautilus is past its heyday, its residents few and ageing: Celeste, a hippie architect-turned-activist; Francis, a poet of a bygone era; and bric-a-brac dealer Gus Crabb.
And then comes Rowena Snow. She has always been an outsider: an Indian orphan raised in Scotland, a lover of poetry shut out of intellectual circles. Rowena turns up at the Nautilus’ door, anxious but curious, like a hermit crab seeking a home – searching for her own utopia.
‘Elegant, elusive . . . The writing is superb’ GUARDIAN
‘A national treasure . . . She has achieved that rarest of things for a writer’ DAILY TELEGRAPH
‘Tender, funny and wonderfully realised’ SUNDAY EXPRESS
SHORTLISTED FOR THE WOMEN’S PRIZE AND COSTA BOOK AWARDS
At her first sight of the Nautilus, it was as if the lustre of the building filled her heart and ran through her veins.
Stranded in suburban London, the Nautilus is an eccentric Modernist house built as a haven for bohemian artists, intellectuals and refugees. Now the Nautilus is past its heyday, its residents few and ageing: Celeste, a hippie architect-turned-activist; Francis, a poet of a bygone era; and bric-a-brac dealer Gus Crabb.
And then comes Rowena Snow. She has always been an outsider: an Indian orphan raised in Scotland, a lover of poetry shut out of intellectual circles. Rowena turns up at the Nautilus’ door, anxious but curious, like a hermit crab seeking a home – searching for her own utopia.
‘Elegant, elusive . . . The writing is superb’ GUARDIAN
‘A national treasure . . . She has achieved that rarest of things for a writer’ DAILY TELEGRAPH
‘Tender, funny and wonderfully realised’ SUNDAY EXPRESS
Reviews
With what tenderness, rage, wit and accuracy Mackay writes about loneliness and belonging . . . What a brilliant novel this is
A slender, intelligent fiction written in ravishing prose . . . If I read a better novel this year, I shall think myself lucky
Elegant, elusive . . . The writing is superb . . . [Mackay's] gentle mastery of language is quite beyond showy displays of technique
An intriguing, witty and provocative story
Shena Mackay is a national treasure . . . She has achieved that rarest of things for a writer: creating a world that is utterly her own
Tender, funny and wonderfully realised
Around the millennium, these lives are sweetened by the arrival of a different class of tenant: Jack-the-lad junk dealer Gus Crabb, and half-Indian, half-Scottish and late middle-aged Rowena, the novel's central characte
