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Overview
From the prodigiously talented A. L. Kennedy comes a flamboyantly stylish and fiercely emotional novel about fathers and daughters, creation and self-destruction, and love’s paradoxical power to heal its most devastated victims. One such victim is Nathan Staples, a writer whose hilarious contempt for humanity is surpassed only by his corrosive self-loathing. Along with five equally dysfunctional colleagues Nathan lives on an island retreat off the coast of Wales, where he yearns for the daughter he lost years before. Now, in defiance of all his hopes, Mary Lamb–herself an aspiring writer–is about to join him as the seventh member of the colony.
As Nathan tortuously wins the trust of the child who has no inkling of their true relationship, Mary comes to a gradual understanding of her gift. In Everything You Need, A. L. Kennedy combines the mythic resonance of Arthurian legend with a sensibility as lyrical as it is profane.
Synopsis
From the prodigiously talented A. L. Kennedy comes a flamboyantly stylish and fiercely emotional novel about fathers and daughters, creation and self-destruction, and love’s paradoxical power to heal its most devastated victims. One such victim is Nathan Staples, a writer whose hilarious contempt for humanity is surpassed only by his corrosive self-loathing. Along with five equally dysfunctional colleagues Nathan lives on an island retreat off the coast of Wales, where he yearns for the daughter he lost years before. Now, in defiance of all his hopes, Mary Lamb–herself an aspiring writer–is about to join him as the seventh member of the colony.
As Nathan tortuously wins the trust of the child who has no inkling of their true relationship, Mary comes to a gradual understanding of her gift. In Everything You Need, A. L. Kennedy combines the mythic resonance of Arthurian legend with a sensibility as lyrical as it is profane.
Library Journal
Nathan Staples is a successful middle-aged novelist who feels that he has squandered his talent writing thrillers. He also regrets having abandoned his wife and daughter many years ago. When Staples discovers that his daughter is now an aspiring writer herself, he secretly arranges for her to win a fellowship to study with him on Foal Island, a writer's colony off the coast of Wales. Mary Lamb has no idea that Staples is her father, and Staples spends the next seven years trying to work up the nerve to tell her. Here, Scottish author Kennedy (So I Am Glad) reworks the story line of A Star Is Born, substituting literary fame for Hollywood celebrity. Mary's career quickly takes off, while Staples succumbs to writer's block and depression. Kennedy offers some devastating insider criticism of the current publishing scene, but her main objective is to examine the self-imposed obstacles that stand in the way of true intimacy. This hugely ambitious novel has an edgy, post-punk surface that only partly conceals the old-fashioned family values at its core. Recommended for most fiction collections. Edward B. St. John, Loyola Law Sch. Lib., Los Angeles Copyright 2001 Cahners Business Information.