Summary and Reviews of Weathering by Lucy Wood

Weathering by Lucy Wood

Weathering

by Lucy Wood
  • BookBrowse Review:
  • Critics' Consensus (7):
  • First Published:
  • Jan 19, 2016, 304 pages
  • Paperback:
  • Mar 2017, 304 pages
  • Rate this book

About This Book

Book Summary

A dreamlike tale tale that explores big topics - belonging, mortality, love - though the lives of three women (one who is dead), and old house, and a river....

Pearl doesn't know how she's ended up in the river - the same messy, cacophonous river in the same rain-soaked valley she'd been stuck in for years. But here her spirit swirls and stays ... Ada, Pearl's daughter, doesn't know how she's ended up back in the house she left thirteen years ago - with no heating apart from a fire she can't light, no way of getting around apart from an old car she's scared to drive, and no company apart from her own young daughter, Pepper. She wants to clear out Pearl's house so she can leave and not look back. Pepper has grown used to following her restless mother from place to place, but this house, with its faded photographs, its boxes of cameras and its stuffed jackdaw, is something new. Fascinated by the scattering of people she meets, by the river that unfurls through the valley, and by the strange old woman who sits on the bank with her feet in the cold, coppery water, Pepper doesn't know why anyone would ever want to leave.

As the first frosts of autumn herald the coming of a long winter and Pepper and Ada find themselves entangled with the life of the valley, with new companions who won't be closed out, each will discover the ways that places can take root inside us, bind us together, and become us.

Membership Advantages
  • Reviews
  • "Beyond the Book" articles
  • Free books to read and review (US only)
  • Find books by time period, setting & theme
  • Read-alike suggestions by book and author
  • Book club discussions
  • and much more!
  • Just $60 for 12 months or $20 for 3 months.
  • More about membership!

Reviews

BookBrowse Review

BookBrowse

For all its atmosphere, Weathering does begin to meander aimlessly, suggesting it might be better at nearer 200 pages than 300. However, Wood's enchanting prose is full of inventive metaphors: "the trees wearing mist as scarves. The light curdled like old milk" and "threadbare hair and deep rings slung hammocks under his eyes." In the end the most memorable "characters" of all are the house and the river, which take on life and power of their own. With its vivid picture of the English countryside and its clear-eyed look at family dynamics, Weathering reminds me most of recent works by Tessa Hadley, Ross Raisin, and Polly Samson (three authors perhaps less well known in the United States than in their native England). Lucy Wood is an up-and-coming talent whose gently eerie first novel speaks of great things to come...continued

Full Review Members Only (776 words)

(Reviewed by Rebecca Foster).

Membership Advantages
  • Reviews
  • "Beyond the Book" articles
  • Free books to read and review (US only)
  • Find books by time period, setting & theme
  • Read-alike suggestions by book and author
  • Book club discussions
  • and much more!
  • Just $60 for 12 months or $20 for 3 months.
  • More about membership!

Beyond the Book



A Selection of Literary Prizes

Lucy Wood, the author of Weathering, won a Somerset Maugham Award, named after the famous author.

What does it take to get a literary prize named after you? Some amount of money and/or influence in the literary world, to be sure, but also a personal connection to the prize being offered and its specific criteria. Here are a few examples of prizes you might not be aware of or might not realize were named after real people.

Somerset Maugham Awards

Recognizing published works of fiction, non-fiction, and poetry, the Somerset Maugham Awards are available to British writers under the age of 35. Administered by the Society of Authors, the fund was started by novelist W. Somerset Maugham in 1947 to allow young writers "to enrich their ...

Membership Advantages
  • Reviews
  • "Beyond the Book" articles
  • Free books to read and review (US only)
  • Find books by time period, setting & theme
  • Read-alike suggestions by book and author
  • Book club discussions
  • and much more!
  • Just $60 for 12 months or $20 for 3 months.
  • More about membership!

Read-Alikes

Read-Alikes Full readalike results are for members only

If you liked Weathering, try these:

  • The Other Side of the World jacket

    The Other Side of the World

    by Stephanie Bishop

    Published 2017

    About this book

    In the tradition of The Hours and Revolutionary Road comes a novel set in the 1960s about marriage, motherhood, identity, nostalgia, and the fantasy of home.

  • Spill Simmer Falter Wither jacket

    Spill Simmer Falter Wither

    by Sara Baume

    Published 2017

    About this book

    More by this author

    A debut novel already praised as "unbearably poignant and beautifully told" (Eimear McBride) this captivating story follows - over the course of four seasons - a misfit man who adopts a misfit dog.

We have 8 read-alikes for Weathering, but non-members are limited to two results. To see the complete list of this book's read-alikes, you need to be a member.
Search read-alikes
How we choose read-alikes
Membership Advantages
  • Reviews
  • "Beyond the Book" articles
  • Free books to read and review (US only)
  • Find books by time period, setting & theme
  • Read-alike suggestions by book and author
  • Book club discussions
  • and much more!
  • Just $60 for 12 months or $20 for 3 months.
  • More about membership!

BookBrowse Book Club

  • Book Jacket
    Death at the Sign of the Rook
    by Kate Atkinson
    Jackson Brodie returns in a gripping new mystery! Welcome to Rook Hall. By night’s end, a murderer will be revealed.

Members Recommend

  • Book Jacket

    A Club of One's Own
    by BookBrowse

    Dreaming of starting or reviving a book club? A Club of One’s Own is the essential guide to doing it right.

  • Book Jacket

    The Magician of Tiger Castle
    by Louis Sachar

    The author of Holes returns with a magical adult debut about forbidden love and a kingdom on the brink of collapse.

  • Book Jacket

    Too Old for This
    by Samantha Downing

    A retired killer's secret is at risk when a visitor arrives—her only option? Another murder.

  • Book Jacket

    This Here Is Love
    by Princess Joy L. Perry

    Three people—two enslaved, one indentured—struggle to overcome the limits and labels of their painful shared pasts.

Win This Book
Win All the Men I've Loved Again

All the Men I've Loved Again by Christine Pride

Christine Pride's solo debut explores a woman's love triangle in her 20s that unexpectedly resurfaces in her 40s.

Enter

Book
Trivia

  • Book Trivia

    Can you name the title?

    Test your book knowledge with our daily trivia challenge!

Wordplay

Solve this clue:

I N R S

and be entered to win..