Description
Book SynopsisThe Whitbread-shortlisted novel from the bestselling author of THE PROMISE OF HAPPINESS
Trade ReviewA work of literary art, a mellow, beautifully constructed fable about the human hunger for goodness, it is by far the best thing Cartwright has done . . . [He] has caught to perfection the perplexities of a good man struggling for self-awareness' * Sunday Telegraph *
Brilliant, dazzling, unsettling; subtle and haunting; complex and multi-layered; deeply moving * Suzi Feay,
Independent on Sunday *
One of the finest novelists currently at work ... An altogether stunning achievement * D.J. Taylor,
Guardian *
Hauntingly brilliant ... It is the best novel I have read this year. * Mick Brown,
Daily Telegraph *
Justin Cartwright's new novel may well be his finest - in an already accomplished oeuvre. Wry, achingly true and profound without being sententious, it's a moving and bleakly funny look at life's hellish demands and occasional moments of happiness. * William Boyd,
Guardian Books of the Year *
Apart from being a profoundly serious writer, Cartwright can also be an abrasively amusing one. Scarcely a page of this book fails to yield some pleasure. WHITE LIGHTNING is a book of substantial merit. * Francis King,
Literary Review *
This is fictional skill of the highest order. * Penelope Lively,
Independent *
Beguiling. With this novel, Cartwright, a former Whitbread Award winner has put it all together - style, story, theme - to produce something exceptional. * Giles Newington,
Irish Times *
Subtle and moving...Cartwright weaves the story of the man and the baboon with a magicians's delicacy...White Lightning underlines the intelligence and breadth of imagination that this former Whitbread Novel of the Year winner brings to every single paragraph of his work. *
Daily Mail *
Cartwright is a wise and perceptive novelist, keen to probe the dark places of the human heart and the complexities of post-colonial Africa, and possessed of a laudable ability to capture life as it rushes past at terrible speed. * James Smart,
Sunday Herald *
This is a moving story of a man totally alone, and a powerful evocation of a country yet to come to terms with its tragedy-strewn destiny. * Ros Drinkwater,
LiveWire *
Cartwright is a beautifully evocative writer; also one who makes you think... The rhythm is perfect, and almost every page offers such delights. * Allan Massie,
Scotsman *
No amount of irony or humour can blunt the remorseless message contained in this tender, terrible tragedy. * Rosemary Goring,
Glasgow Herald *
Cartwright's portrayal of the relationship between the man and the baboon is masterly. You know it is going to end in tears - WHITE LIGHTNING is, above all else, a book of echoes - but still the ending packs a punch of frustration and sadness. * Claudia FitzHerbert,
Daily Telegraph *
Cartwright is a hugely skilled writer and his novels are always interesting. [He] can produce passages of uncommon beauty. * Michael Thompson-Noel,
Financial Times *
Exquisitely moving. * Edwina Currie,
New Statesman Books of the Year *
Cartwright is a brilliant observer and writes extremely well. [He] has produced an X-ray of modern man's soul. * Anthony Daniels,
Evening Standard *
Cartwright manages to combine the thrilling readability of genre fiction with the unpredictability and strangeness of a literary master. It's astonishing that he still isn't spoken of in the same breath as Amis and McEwen: he ought to be. * Suzi Feay,
Independent on Sunday *
This questioning, elegiac novel is much more than just another portrayal of mid-life crisis. It deserves a place beside those accounts of Africa, from Conrad to Naipaul, which encapsulate an outsider's sense of this world as both alluring and forbidding, and always only half-understood. * David Horspool,
Times Literary Supplement *
