The Night Guest (novel) explained

The Night Guest
Author:Fiona McFarlane
Country:Australia
Language:English
Genre:Novel
Publisher:Penguin
Release Date:21 August 2013
Media Type:Print
Pages:304 pp.
Isbn:9781926428550

The Night Guest is a 2013 novel by the Australian author Fiona McFarlane.[1]

Synopsis

Widowed Ruth is living a solitary life in her New South Wales beach house when, one night, she believes she is visited by a tiger. The next morning a woman named Frida arrives at the house, stating that she has been sent by the government to help out.

Critical reception

Lucy Sussex, writing in The Sydney Review of Book, noted: "There is subterfuge, smuggling, in the writing of The Night Guest. It imports 'genre' techniques into the genre 'literary'. To achieve the necessary suspension of disbelief, the tiger displays no magic, does not talk. It is depicted with extreme realism...At the heart of this novel, McFarlane is describing a very sad and inevitable situation, one that even the highest in the land properly fear: to be old and helpless, and potentially someone else’s prey. Yet who is the predator: the imaginary beast or the post-colonial haunter? Here is domestic realism, the beach hamlet acutely observed, but with a resident tiger, secrets, lies, and a very banal but nonetheless venal conspiracy."[2]

In The Guardian reviewer Justine Jordan found much to like with the book: "In Fiona McFarlane's impressive debut, widowed Ruth senses a tiger prowling around her isolated New South Wales beach house: a flight of fancy that foreshadows the arrival of a far more dangerous beast. The tropes may not be new, but McFarlane puts them at the service of a powerfully distinctive narrative about identity and memory, the weight of a life and the approach of death...The achievement of McFarlane's book is to demonstrate with such clarity and measured compassion that the mind, in the end, is where all tigers live."[3]

Publishing history

After the novel's initial publication in Australia by Penguin in 2013, it was reprinted as follows:

The novel was also translated into Czech in 2013, Polish, Korean, Dutch, Catalan, Italian, German, Chinese and French in 2014, and Russian and Japanese in 2015.[7]

Awards

See also

Notes and References

  1. Web site: The Night Guest by Fiona McFarlane (Penguin 2013). National Library of Australia. 21 June 2024.
  2. Web site: "Here be tygers: The Night Guest by Fiona McFarlane" . The Sydney Review of Books, 8 April 2014. 21 June 2024.
  3. News: "The Night Guest by Fiona McFarlane – review" . The Guardian. 24 January 2014. The Guardian, 24 January 2014. 21 June 2024. Jordan. Justine.
  4. Web site: The Night Guest by Fiona McFarlane (Sceptre 2014). National Library of Australia. 21 June 2024.
  5. Web site: The Night Guest by Fiona McFarlane (FS&G 2013). National Library of Australia. 21 June 2024.
  6. Web site: The Night Guest by Fiona McFarlane (Penguin 2014). National Library of Australia. 21 June 2024.
  7. Web site: Austlit — The Night Guest by Fiona McFarlane . Austlit. 21 June 2024.
  8. Web site: "Barbara Jefferis Award" . Australian Society of Authors. 21 June 2024.
  9. News: "Guardian first book award 2014 shortlist covers neurosurgery, China, rural Ireland and more" . The Guardian. 14 November 2014. The Guardian, 15 November 2014. 21 June 2024. Flood. Alison.
  10. Web site: Winners 2014 NSW Premier's Literary Awards announced TONIGHT. State Library of NSW. 21 June 2024. dead. https://web.archive.org/web/20160201045923/http://blog.sl.nsw.gov.au/media/index.cfm/2014/5/19/winners-2014-nsw-premiers-literary-awards-announced-tonight. 1 February 2016.
  11. News: Shaw . Martin . 2014-12-11 . Prime minister's literary intervention makes a sham of peak event . en-GB . . 21 June 2024 . 0261-3077 . 8 December 2022 . https://web.archive.org/web/20221208110215/https://www.theguardian.com/books/australia-books-blog/2014/dec/11/prime-ministers-literary-intervention-makes-a-sham-of-peak-event . live .
  12. Web site: Shortlist 2014 . 21 June 2024 . Stella . en-US . 23 February 2023 . https://web.archive.org/web/20230223180038/https://stella.org.au/prize/2014-prize/shortlist-2014/ . live .

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