This is an auction for THE GREAT FIRE by Shirley Hazzard.

“The most interesting novel published this year . . . Exquisitely crafted … Every sentence hits its mark.” ?The Economist (UK)

“The Great Fire is a perfect book, without a superfluous word . . . radiant.” ?Time Out (New York)

“Brilliant and dazzling . . . A book that is worth a twenty-year wait.” ?Ann Patchett

“Stunning . . . Shirley Hazzard has gifted us, in The Great Fire, a novel of indispensable happiness and sorrow. I loved this novel beyond dreams.” ?Washington Post Book World

“Beauty is felt in almost every line of this austerely gorgeous work.” ?Chicago Tribune

Amazon.com review:

“The Great Fire is an extraordinary love story set in the immediate aftermath of the great conflagration of the Second World War. In war-torn Asia and stricken Europe, men and women, still young but veterans of harsh experience, must reinvent their lives and expectations, and learn, from their past, to dream again. Some will fulfill their destinies, others will falter. At the center of the story, a brave and brilliant soldier finds that survival and worldly achievement are not enough. His counterpart, a young girl living in occupied Japan and tending her dying brother, falls in love, and in the process discovers herself. In the looming shadow of world enmities resumed, and of Asia's coming centrality in world affairs, a man and a woman seek to recover self-reliance, balance, and tenderness, struggling to reclaim their humanity. The Great Fire is a story of love in the aftermath of war by "purely and simply, one of the greatest writers working in English today." (Michael Cunningham)

More very favourable reviews on Amazon.com.

Large format (trade) paperback 2004.

314 pages.

Very good condition.

The cost of shipping is $8.95.

There is of course no charge for shipping if you collect this book from my shop in Palmerston North following the auction.

Payment within seven days, please.