**SHORT-LISTED FOR THE MAN BOOKER PRIZE
A Christian Science Monitor Best Book of the Year
**
On the morning after harvest, the inhabitants of a remote English
village awaken looking forward to a hard-earned day of rest and feasting
at their landowner's table. But the sky is marred by two conspicuous
columns of smoke, replacing pleasurable anticipation with alarm and
suspicion.
One smoke column is the result of an overnight fire that has damaged the
master's outbuildings. The second column rises from the wooded edge of
the village, sent up by newcomers to announce their presence. In the
minds of the wary villagers a mere coincidence of events appears to be
unlikely, with violent confrontation looming as the unavoidable outcome.
Meanwhile, another newcomer has recently been spotted taking careful
notes and making drawings of the land. It is his presence more than any
other that will threaten the village's entire way of life.
In effortless and tender prose, Jim Crace details the unraveling of a
pastoral idyll in the wake of economic progress. His tale is timeless
and unsettling, framed by a beautifully evoked world that will linger in
your memory long after you finish reading.
