Nutshell

by Ian McEwan

Nutshell is a classic story of murder and deceit, told by a narrator with a perspective and voice unlike any in recent literature. A bravura performance, it is the finest recent work from a true master.

To be bound in a nutshell, see the world in two inches of ivory, in a grain of sand. Why not, when all of literature, all of art, of human endeavour, is just a speck in the universe of possible things.

Genres: Fiction, Book Club, Contemporary, Mystery, Literary Fiction, Audiobook, Thriller

208 pages, Hardcover

First published September 1, 2016

About the author

Ian McEwan studied at the University of Sussex, where he received a BA degree in English Literature in 1970 and later received his MA degree in English Literature at the University of East Anglia.

McEwan's works have earned him worldwide critical acclaim. He won the Somerset Maugham Award in 1976 for his first collection of short stories First Love, Last Rites; the Whitbread Novel Award (1987) and the Prix Fémina Etranger (1993) for The Child in Time; and Germany's Shakespeare Prize in 1999. He has been shortlisted for the Man Booker Prize for Fiction numerous times, winning the award for Amsterdam in 1998. His novel Atonement received the WH Smith Literary Award (2002), National Book Critics' Circle Fiction Award (2003), Los Angeles Times Prize for Fiction (2003), and the Santiago Prize for the European Novel (2004). He was awarded a CBE in 2000. In 2006, he won the James Tait Black Memorial Prize for his novel Saturday and his novel On Chesil Beach was named Galaxy Book of the Year at the 2008 British Book Awards where McEwan was also named Reader's Digest Author of the Year.

McEwan lives in London.

Reviews

[Jo March]

Quen me dera ter lembranzas intraútero, sobre todo de ter a lucidez do bebé de Trudy.
Este libro non ten unha historia moi orixinal, e a típica trama do asesinato para cobrar unha herdanza, pero o que o fai máis especial é o seu narrador, que é o feto que está medrando e formándose no útero de Trudy, unha das implicadas no asesinato. Aínda que biolóxicamente é bastante imposible isto, xa que ninguén ten lembranzas, alomenos conscientes, da vida intrauterina, e do mesmo xeito un feto, e nin sequera un bebé poden facer semellantes interpretacións e xuízos do que ocorre no mundo exterior a eles, isto pareceume algo moi orixinal e interesante. Pode que sexa bastante pouco críble, pero ó ser ficción pódense admitir bastantes licencias.
Na miña opinión, o que fai especial a este libro ademáis do seu inusual narrador son as reflexión que se fan do mundo do século XXI, do pesimismo e da esperanza que reflicten as súas páxinas. E gústame que McEwan non adoutrine, senon que dea ferramentas para incitar á reflexión.
Recomendado para quen queira un libro cun estilo áxil, pero profundo.