{"product_id":"the-hummingbird-9781474617482","title":"The Hummingbird","description":"\u003cb\u003eBook Synopsis\u003c\/b\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cp\u003e\u003cfont size=\"+1\"\u003e\u003cb\u003eA BOOK OF THE YEAR FOR THE \u003c\/b\u003e\u003cb\u003e\u003ci\u003eGUARDIAN\u003c\/i\u003e: ''DEEPLY PLEASURABLE''\u003c\/b\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003eA BOOK OF THE YEAR FOR THE \u003c\/b\u003e\u003cb\u003e\u003ci\u003eSPECTATOR\u003c\/i\u003e: ''WHAT A JOY''\u003c\/b\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003e\u003cbr\u003e''Magnificent'' \u003ci\u003eGuardian\u003c\/i\u003e\u003c\/b\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003e''A towering achivement'' \u003ci\u003eFinancial Times\u003c\/i\u003e\u003cbr\u003e''Inventive, bold, unexpected'' \u003ci\u003eSunday Times\u003c\/i\u003e\u003c\/b\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e''Everything that makes the novel worthwhile and engaging is here: warmth, wit, intelligence, love, death, high seriousness, low comedy, philosophy, subtle personal relationships and the complex interior life of human beings''\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003e\u003ci\u003eGuardian\u003c\/i\u003e\u003c\/b\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e''Not since William Boyd''s \u003ci\u003eAny Human Heart\u003c\/i\u003e has a novel captured the feast and famine nature of a single life with such invention and tenderness''\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003e\u003ci\u003eFinancial Times\u003c\/i\u003e\u003c\/b\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e''There is a pleasing sense of having grappled with the real stuff of life: loss, grief, love, desire, pain, uncertainty, confusion, joy, despair - all while having fun''\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003e\u003ci\u003eThe Sunday Times\u003c\/i\u003e\u003c\/b\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003eTrade Review\u003c\/b\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003eA masterpiece of love and grief ... E\u003c\/b\u003e\u003cb\u003everything that makes the novel worthwhile and engaging is here\u003c\/b\u003e: warmth, wit, intelligence, love, death, high seriousness, low comedy, philosophy, subtle personal relationships and the complex interior life of human beings ... \u003cb\u003emagnificent - moving, replete, beautiful ... \u003c\/b\u003ewhat makes the book special is that \u003ci\u003eThe Hummingbird\u003c\/i\u003e is such an intelligent meditation on life, family, the human heart and the \"dictatorship of pain\" that comes with grief -- Edward Docx * THE GUARDIAN *\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003eA masterpiece of articulation ... a towering achievement ... Not since William Boyd's \u003ci\u003eAny Human Heart\u003c\/i\u003e has a novel captured the feast and famine nature of a single life with such invention and tenderness.\u003c\/b\u003e Veronesi explores, with great humour, how the passage of time both expands and expunges the impact of events. And, he suggests, after the pounding of years it is only an individual's character that determines whether or not the edifice will hold -- Christian House * FINANCIAL TIMES *\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003eInstantly immersive, playfully inventive, effortlessly wise\u003c\/b\u003e... a family saga that pays homage to the quiet heroism required by day-to-day existence -- Hephzibah Anderson * THE OBSERVER *\u003cbr\u003eA big name in European literature ... Veronesi originally trained as an architect and, rather marvellously, it shows:\u003cb\u003e the structure is inventive, bold, unexpected \u003c\/b\u003e- slightly bonkers but elegant, and cohesive ... conveys life's messy unpredictability: joy and desperation, simple pleasures, moments of transcendence, much reeling and confusion ... \u003cb\u003eThere is a pleasing sense of having grappled with the real stuff of life: loss, grief, love, desire, pain, uncertainty, confusion, joy, despair - all while having fun\u003c\/b\u003e -- Lucy Atkins * SUNDAY TIMES *\u003cbr\u003e\u003cp\u003e\u003cb\u003eA tender, beguilingly epic novel\u003c\/b\u003e... The complex, subtle design of the novel, with a patchwork of key episodes moving back and forth through time, and its textual variety - partly made up of letters, emails, transcripts of phone calls - disguise its saga-like scale, its epic proportions catching you off guard. It's almost only once you emerge from its acutely painful ending that you realise how much of life you have witnessed - the vastness, as well as the richness, of the story.\u003c\/p\u003e * NEW STATESMAN *\u003cbr\u003eVeronesi's novel has been hotly anticipated by English readers. The bird of the title is Marco Carrera, blessed with the gift of being able to stay still while the world around him turns to chaos. \u003cb\u003eLife-affirming\u003c\/b\u003e * NEW EUROPEAN *\u003cbr\u003eAn inventive, a beautiful, complex book. * IRISH EXAMINER *\u003cbr\u003e\u003ci\u003eThe Hummingbird\u003c\/i\u003e is \u003cb\u003ea masterly novel\u003c\/b\u003e, a brilliantly conceived mosaic of love and tragedy. Veronesi creates a thought-rich and ultimately comic meditation on human error and lost chances. It's \u003cb\u003ea cabinet of curiosities and delights, packed with small wonders\u003c\/b\u003e, strange and sudden turns, insights of great poise and unusual cultural reference points. \u003ci\u003eThe Hummingbird\u003c\/i\u003e in an object lesson in authorial control. \u003cb\u003eVeronesi truly knows and loves all matters of the heart\u003c\/b\u003e. * Ian McEwan *\u003cbr\u003eSomehow or other Sandro Veronesi \u003cb\u003epulls off the extraordinary feat of making you believe he is writing for your ears alone\u003c\/b\u003e. I cannot tell you what \u003ci\u003eThe Hummingbird\u003c\/i\u003e is about because that would be to betray a confidence. But I can tell you it's \u003cb\u003ea mightily clever novel\u003c\/b\u003e. * Howard Jacobson *\u003cbr\u003eI love \u003ci\u003eThe Hummingbird\u003c\/i\u003e. A real masterpiece. \u003cb\u003eA funny, touching, profound book that made me cry like a little girl on the last page\u003c\/b\u003e. * Leïla Slimani *\u003cbr\u003eLong considered one of Italy's leading writers, Sandro Veronesi has dazzled both readers and critics with novels that are not only page-turners but profoundly literary. An heir to Italo Svevo, he explores, from book to book, intergenerational conflict, existential anguish and the passage of time. These themes, in Veronesi's hands, burst with vitality. Trained as an architect, he plays inventively with form, producing works that are unconventional, disarming, and profoundly humane. \u003cb\u003eWith his latest novel, \u003ci\u003eThe Hummingbird,\u003c\/i\u003e he has re-written the family saga. Ardent, gripping, and inventive to the core, it has already been hailed a classic\u003c\/b\u003e. * Jhumpa Lahiri *\u003cbr\u003e\u003ci\u003eThe Hummingbird \u003c\/i\u003eis a profound story about the myriad ways in which human passions collide with forces beyond human control.  From its first page to its last, it's as full of surprises as it is jolts of recognition.  Sandro Veronesi has overcome the ultimate, and most difficult, of any novelist's challenges-created a story of such depth and scope that it can stand unembarrassed alongside life itself.  It's \u003cb\u003ea remarkable accomplishment, a true gift to the world\u003c\/b\u003e. * Michael Cunningham *\u003cbr\u003eReading \u003ci\u003eThe Hummingbird\u003c\/i\u003e is \u003cb\u003ea spellbinding experience;\u003c\/b\u003e it's so \u003cb\u003eclever, funny and deeply moving.\u003c\/b\u003e * Roddy Doyle *\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003eMuch more than a novel about a family \u003c\/b\u003e- which its deceptively unadorned surfaces might suggest it to be - \u003ci\u003eThe Hummingbird\u003c\/i\u003e portrays a subtle and intriguing political vision, depicting the reach of history into the lives of people we might well believe are outside history's notice. * Richard Ford *\u003cbr\u003eSandro Veronesi is a writer I have always admired. He's f\u003cb\u003eunny, smart, rueful, deeply feeling\u003c\/b\u003e. \u003ci\u003eThe Hummingbird\u003c\/i\u003e stands with his finest work. It's \u003cb\u003esome of the most poignant contemporary writing I know of\u003c\/b\u003e. * Rick Moody *\u003cbr\u003eAn extremely beautiful and generous novel about time, family, home, love and loss, passion and pain. Funny, heart-breaking, eccentric, tender and completely brilliant. \u003cb\u003eA triumphant, life-affirming novel\u003c\/b\u003e. Now I want to read everything by Sandro Veronesi. * Edward Carey, author of LITTLE *\u003cbr\u003eI love Sandro Veronesi's book, \u003ci\u003eThe Hummingbird\u003c\/i\u003e. A real masterpiece. \u003cb\u003eA funny, touching, profound book \u003c\/b\u003ethat made me cry like a little girl on the last page. * Leila Slimani *\u003cbr\u003eSandro Veronesi's captivating novel is at once a gripping tale of family bonds and a provoking meditation on fate and choice, suffering and endurance, love and hatred, and the elusive nature of happiness. \u003cb\u003eI greatly admired its wit and erudition and its deep charm.\u003c\/b\u003e * James Lasdun, author of SEVEN LIES *\u003cbr\u003eI have known for quite some time that Sandro Veronesi was one of the most skillful and profound Italian storytellers of the past thirty years. But \u003ci\u003eThe Hummingbird\u003c\/i\u003e is the decisive proof of his sensitivity, of his \u003cb\u003eextraordinary strength as a writer\u003c\/b\u003e. * Domenico Starnone, National Book Award Finalist author of TIES and TRICK *\u003cbr\u003e\u003ci\u003eThe Hummingbird\u003c\/i\u003e is a book\u003cb\u003e full of that roller-coaster ride that is life itself\u003c\/b\u003e, a succession of defeats and unexpected ascents. Crucially, this is a novel that has the courage to pass the baton to the new generations: in the sea of cynicism in which we all risk to drown, it gives us a glimpse of a possible new future. * Nicola Lagioia, author of FEROCITY (winner of the Premio Strega) *\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003eOutstanding\u003c\/b\u003e. A perturbing masterpiece. Absolute beauty in the smallest detail. * CORRIERE DELLA SERA *\u003cbr\u003eThe novel flits back and forth between multiple decades of the twentieth and twenty-first centuries, and the narrative is interspersed with letters, emails and transcripts of telephone conversations. Instead of the familiar pattern of trauma, grief and healing, everything seems to happen at once and, indeed, keeps happening. Relationships end before they begin, characters die and are resurrected, only to die again. The reader's foreknowledge of certain events could rob the plot of suspense, but Veronesi uses dramatic irony to poignant effect, and still manages plenty of twists and revelations... \u003cb\u003eExcellent: Marco Carrera is a compelling main character, a devoted father an oblivious husband, a dutiful son and an inadequate brother. The novel's conclusion is a beautiful study of the resilient bonds of flawed love.\u003c\/b\u003e * TIMES LITERARY SUPPLEMENT *\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003eSandro Veronesi is a gracious, generous and mature writer\u003c\/b\u003e, and under his guidance the many narrative devices and chronological leaps back and forth (also into the future) grow and mature into \u003cb\u003ea remarkable novel\u003c\/b\u003e. This piecemeal approach shouldn't work, but Maestro Veronesi is in control: it's a clever structure and the plot twists and turns and thunders along. 'Il Colibrì' won the 2019 Premio Strega, Italy's top literary prize, and thanks to Elena Pala (who was obviously born to translate this novel) it has become \u003ci\u003eThe Hummingbird.\u003c\/i\u003e It is Veronesi's ninth novel and his second Strega. \u003cb\u003eIf you don't yet know the work of one of Europe's finest writers, start here\u003c\/b\u003e -- Rosie Goldsmith * EUROPEAN LITERATURE NETWORK *\u003cbr\u003eNo other writer in Italy today can tell a story like Sandro Veronesi. * LA STAMPA *\u003cbr\u003ePowerful and seductive. * REPUBBLICA *\u003cbr\u003eA great novel, vibrating with life and death, happiness and pain, nostalgia and hope for the future. * VANITY FAIR *\u003cbr\u003eReading \u003ci\u003eThe Hummingbird\u003c\/i\u003e is like getting on a rollercoaster: it's a vertiginous ride - almost to the point of physical pain - and then you are left in a state of wonder. * RADIO 24 *\u003cbr\u003eReading \u003ci\u003eThe Hummingbird\u003c\/i\u003e is not just a moving experience: it's almost like a therapy session, a lesson in persevering, in letting go of guilt to find ourselves again. * HUFFINGTON POST *\u003cbr\u003eEverything that has made Veronesi one of the greats is distilled in \u003ci\u003eThe Hummingbird\u003c\/i\u003e - just more mature and ambitious. * ESQUIRE *\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003eA wonderful book \u003c\/b\u003ethat covers so many bases, while the protagonist keeps his position and moves little in relation to all that is happening around him - he is 'the hummingbird'. The structure is inventive and varied, and contains a rainbow of emotions, played pizzicato across a lifetime of families at their best and worst. \u003cb\u003eIt's wry, eccentric, perceptive, creative, nostalgic \u003c\/b\u003e- you name it, there's many a bell inside the pages that will ring just for you. I\u003cb\u003et really is as good as the stellar list of authors on the back (Ian McEwan, Howard Jacobsen, Jhumpa Lahiri etc) who line up to sing the praises of both the author and this extraordinary book\u003c\/b\u003e -- David Roche * BOOKBRUNCH *\u003c\/font\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e","brand":"Orion Publishing Co","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":49084014035287,"sku":"9781474617482","price":9.49,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0817\/1739\/5799\/files\/9781474617482.jpg?v=1725550767","url":"https:\/\/bookcurl.com\/products\/the-hummingbird-9781474617482","provider":"Book Curl","version":"1.0","type":"link"}