Small Island

Small Island is an international bestseller.  It won the Orange Prize for Fiction, The Orange Prize for Fiction: Best of the Best, The Whitbread Novel Award, The Whitbread Book of the Year Award, and the Commonwealth Writers' Prize.  It has now been adapted for the screen as a coproduction of the BBC and Masterpiece/WGBH Boston.

Hortense Joseph arrives in London from Jamaica in 1948 with her life in her suitcase, her heart broken, her resolve intact. Her husband, Gilbert Joseph, returns from the war expecting to be received as a hero, but finds his status as a black man in Britain to be second class. His white landlady, Queenie, raised as a farmer's daughter, befriends Gilbert, and later Hortense, with innocence and courage, until the unexpected arrival of her husband, Bernard, who returns from combat with issues of his own to resolve.  Told in these four voices, Small Island is a courageous novel of tender emotion and sparkling wit, of crossings taken and passages lost, of shattering compassion and of reckless optimism in the face of insurmountable barriers---in short, an encapsulation of that most American of experiences: the immigrant's life.

Born in 1956 to Jamaican parents, Andrea Levy is the author of three previous novels and has received a British Arts Council Writers Award in addition to the Orange Prize and Whitbread distinctions. She lives works in London.

Winner of the Orange Prize for Fiction

Winner of the Whitbread Book of the Year Award

Winner of the Commonwealth Writers' PrizeA Publishers Weekly Top 10 Novel of the YearWinner of the National Book Critics Circle Award Hortense Joseph arrives in London from Jamaica in 1948 with her life in her suitcase, her heart broken, her resolve intact. Her husband, Gilbert Joseph, returns from war expecting to be received as a hero, but finds his status as a black man in Britain to be second class. His white landlady, Queenie, raised as a farmer's daughter, befriends Gilbert, and later Hortense, with innocence and courage, until the unexpected arrival of her husband, Bernard, who returns from combat with issues of his own to resolve.

Told in these four voices, Small Island is a courageous novel of tender emotion and sparkling wit, of crossing taken and passage lost, of shattering compassion and of reckless optimism in the face of insurmountable barriersin short, an encapsulation of that most American of experiences: the immigrant's life. Winner of the Orange Prize for Fiction

Winner of the Whitbread Book of the Year Award

Winner of the Commonwealth Writers' Prize

"A perfectly crafted tale of crossed lives and oceans. Big themesabandonment, survival, racial awareness, forgivenessare not always weighty enough to chart a smooth course over constant shifts in voice, time, and place. Levy's outstanding talent is her ability to control these upheavals. From Kingston to London to Calcutta, Levy deftly directs her story with twin reins of violence and humor."San Francisco Chronicle "Levy's greatest achievement in Small Island is to convey how English racism was all the more heartbreaking for its colonial victims because it involved the crushing of their ideals . . . Small Island is too thoughtful a novel to promise its characters a happy ending, but it is generous enough to offer them hope."Fatema Ahmed, The New York Times Book Review

"A perfectly crafted tale of crossed lives and oceans. Big themesabandonment, survival, racial awareness, forgivenessare not always weighty enough to chart a smooth course over constant shifts in voice, time, and place. Levy's outstanding talent is her ability to control these upheavals. From Kingston to London to Calcutta, Levy deftly directs her story with twin reins of violence and humor."San Francisco Chronicle

"In the shabby remnants of post-blitz London, three near-strangers find themselves in a single house. Queenie Bligh is a spirited Yorkshirewoman waiting for her husband to return from the war and taking in tenants to make ends meet. Gilbert Joseph, a Jamaican RAF veteran, is struggling to establish himself in England, a country that he'd been taught was his motherland but which regards him as an interloper; his bride, Hortense, has just arrived in London and is bewildered that her education and class can't transcend the color of her skin. The narrative voice jumps between the characters, a technique that embeds familiar cultural observations in closely observed and surprising lives . . . Levy's writing deftly illuminates the complex and contradictory motives behind each character's behavior."The New Yorker

"Levy tells a good story, and she tells it wellusing narrative voices across time and space as she revisits the conventions of the historical novel and imagines the hopes and pains of the immigrant's saga anew. Levy's novel is no mere flight of fantasy, for it is rooted in the past and mired in the complicated stuff of empire. At the same time the memorable characters are radically unhinged from any sense of national fixity as their lives become intermeshed in strangely unexpected yet predictable ways . . . Prize-winning is an arbitrary sport, but the recognition bestowed upon Levy's work is a testament to her talentsher formidable craft and staying power in an otherwise faddish business."Louise Bernard, The Washington Post Book World

"Don't be deceived by the modest size of Andrea Levy's Small Island when you see it on bookstore shelves . . . The truth is that it's a sizable epic spanning three hemispheres and several decadesa revealing and accomplished novel . . . Levy deftly and generously captures the moment when the arrival of immigrants from far-flung parts of the [British] Empire was shockingly fresh to all involved."Seattle Times

"This splendid, well-told novel follows four intertwined lives that collide in post-war London and culminate in the birth of multicultural England. Levy's novel will find happy readers among fans of Michael Ondaatje and Kazuo Ishiguroor anyone who enjoys a good, long read. It's all here: exceptional dialogue, clever narrative, and a rich story that tells us something new about our shared history on a planet that is increasingly small and yet will always be inhabited by individuals possessed, at our best, by singular consciousness and desire. That Small Island creates such a world, so peopled, is its great success: With their graciousness in conflict and comedy in moments of despair, Levy's characters enlarge our lives even as their own life shrinks around them."Minneapolis Star Tribune

"Levy writes with remarkable insight into . . . lives circumscribed by race, class, and circumstance. There is passion and anger, but also warmth and humor in her acute observation of their workings . . . Panic and emptiness, the failure to connect lurk beneath the surface. This is a largely neglected period. Levy, in this great novel, does it justice."Rt. Hon. Paul Boateng, MP, cited on Small Island's receipt of the Orange Prize

"Here is the book I have been waiting for . . . an ample, sprawling story mirroring an expansive inner and outer landscape, spanning two islands and three continents, and incorporating a hybrid cast of humanity cast of human

"It's all here: exceptional dialogue, clever narrative, and a rich story that tells us something new about our shared history on a planet that is increasingly small and yet will always be inhabited by individuals possessed, at our best, by singular consciousness and desire."--Star Tribune (Minneapolis) "There is a great skill in the way she presents characters and dialogue; she has powers of observation and an ear for language that make her books a pleasure to read."--Times Literary Supplement (UK) "Andrea Levy gives us a new, urgent take on our past."--Vogue "A perfectly crafted tale of crossed lives and oceans . . . Happily, the hype is warranted--Small Island is a triumph."--San Francisco Chronicle "Andrea Levy's beautifully wrought novel is a window into 1948 England. . . . A bristling, funny, angry tale of love and sacrifice."--Entertainment Weekly "Levy tells a good story, and she tells it well--using narrative voices across time and space as she revisits the conventions of the historical novel and imagines the hopes and pains of the immigrant's saga anew."--The Washington Post "Familiar cultural observations in closely observed and surprising lives . . . Levy's writing deftly illuminates the complex and contradictory motives behind each character's behavior."--The New Yorker Jay Strafford - Hallie Ephron - Daniel Mallory - Robert Charles Wilson - Cory Doctorow - Ellen Kanner - Orson Scott Card - L.E. Modesitt, Jr. - Kevin J. Anderson - Katherine Kurtz - David Farland - Janet Maslin - Harlan Coben, author of No Second Chance - Andrew Klavan, author of True Crimes - Robert B. Parker, author of Back Story - Nelson DeMille, author of Up Country - Lisa Scottoline, author of Dead Ringer - Daniel Silva, author of The Confessor - Ronnie H. Terpening, Univ. of Arizona, Tucson - Patrick Anderson - Sharon Sala, New York Times bestselling author of Out of the Dark - Lori Foster, New York Times bestselling author of Say No to Joe? - Publishers Weekly - Mystery News - Chicago Tribune - Washington Post - Kirkus Reviews - Library Journal - New York Daily News - Publishers Weekly - The Dallas Morning News - The Guardian [UK - ] - The New York Times - The Times [UK - ] - Library Journal - Publishers Weekly (Starred Review) - The New York Times - Entertainment Weekly (A-) - USA Today - People Magazine - New Orleans Times-Picayune - Library Journal, Starred Review - Publishers Weekly (Starred Review) - Romantic Time Bookclub Magazine - Bookpage - Rocky Mountain News - Booklist - Publishers Weekly - USA Today - Pages Magazine - Booklist - Publishers Weekly - Fangoria - Romantic Times - El Paso Herald-Post - Kathleen O'Neal Gear and W. Michael Gear, USA Today bestselling authors - Kirkus Reviews - Library Journal - Max Evans - Norman Zollinger - Publishers Weekly - Richard Wheeler - Rocky Mountain News - Tony Hillerman - Tulsa World - The Washington Post - Library Journal - Booklist - Entertainment Weekly - Boston Globe - Richmond Times-Dispatch

"It's all here: exceptional dialogue, clever narrative, and a rich story that tells us something new about our shared history on a planet that is increasingly small and yet will always be inhabited by individuals possessed, at our best, by singular consciousness and desire."--Star Tribune (Minneapolis) "There is a great skill in the way she presents characters and dialogue; she has powers of observation and an ear for language that make her books a pleasure to read."--Times Literary Supplement (UK) "Andrea Levy gives us a new, urgent take on our past."--Vogue "A perfectly crafted tale of crossed lives and oceans . . . Happily, the hype is warranted--Small Island is a triumph."--San Francisco Chronicle "Andrea Levy's beautifully wrought novel is a window into 1948 England. . . . A bristling, funny, angry tale of love and sacrifice."--Entertainment Weekly "Levy tells a good story, and she tells it well--using narrative voices across time and space as she revisits the conventions of the historical novel and imagines the hopes and pains of the immigrant's saga anew."--The Washington Post "Familiar cultural observations in closely observed and surprising lives . . . Levy's writing deftly illuminates the complex and contradictory motives behind each character's behavior."--The New Yorker

Winner of the 2004 Orange Prize for Fiction

A Picador Original Trade Paperback

Hortense Joseph arrives in London from Jamaica in 1948 with her life in her suitcase, her heart broken, her resolve intact. Her husband, Gilbert Joseph, returns from the war expecting to be received as a hero, but finds his status as a black man in Britain to be second class. His white landlady, Queenie, raised as a farmer's daughter, befriends Gilbert, and later Hortense, with innocence and courage, until the unexpected arrival of her husband, Bernard, who returns from combat with issues of his own to resolve.

Told in these four voices, Small Island is a courageous novel of tender emotion and sparkling wit, of crossings taken and passages lost, of shattering compassion and of reckless optimism in the face of insurmountable barriers---in short, an encapsulation of that most American of experiences: the immigrant's life.

Born in 1956 to Jamaican parents, Andrea Levy is the author of three previous novels and has received a British Arts Council Writers Award in addition to the Orange Prize and Whitbread distinctions. She lives and works in London.

Small Island has sold a million copies worldwide. This new edition of the award-winning novel ties in with the BBC /Masterpiece theatre adaptation, and the publication of her new novel The Long Song (FSG)

This new edition of Levy's award-winning novel about Jamaicans and Londoners involved in World War II ties in with the BBC "Masterpiece Theatre" adaptation, and the publication of her new novel, "The Long Song."

Born in 1956 to Jamaican parents, Andrea Levy is the author of three previous novels and has received a British Arts Council Writers Award in addition to the Orange Prize and Whitbread distinctions. She lives and works in London.