Tell Me Everything
Shortlisted for the Women’s Prize for Fiction 2025
-
-
4.3 • 88 Ratings
-
-
- $15.99
Publisher Description
THE INSTANT SUNDAY TIMES AND NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER FROM THE PULITZER PRIZE-WINNING, BOOKER-SHORTLISTED AUTHOR
SHORTLISTED FOR THE WOMEN'S PRIZE 2025
'Stunning, deeply felt and profoundly intelligent' Guardian
It’s autumn in Maine, and the town lawyer Bob Burgess has become enmeshed in an unfolding murder investigation, defending a lonely, isolated man accused of killing his mother. He has also fallen into a deep and abiding friendship with the acclaimed writer, Lucy Barton, who lives nearby in a house next to the sea. Together, Lucy and Bob talk about their lives, their hopes and regrets, and what might have been.
Lucy, meanwhile, befriends one of Crosby’s longest inhabitants, Olive Kitteridge, now living in a retirement community on the edge of town. They spend afternoons together in Olive’s apartment, telling each other stories. Stories about people they have known – “unrecorded lives,” Olive calls them – reanimating them, and, in the process, imbuing their lives with meaning.
Brimming with empathy and pathos, TELL ME EVERYTHING is Elizabeth Strout operating at the height of her powers, illuminating the ways in which our relationships keep us afloat. As Lucy says, “Love comes in so many different forms, but it is always love.”
'A superbly gifted storyteller and a craftswoman in a league of her own' Hilary Mantel
'A terrific writer' Zadie Smith
'Strout’s ability to reveal the wonder in unrecorded lives continues to astonish' Telegraph
OPRAH'S BOOK CLUB PICK: 'A beautiful read reminding us that there is extraordinary love in ordinary actions' Oprah Winfrey
Elizabeth Strout, Shortlisted for the Booker Prize, 2022
PUBLISHERS WEEKLY
The latest from Pulitzer winner Strout (Olive Kitteridge) brings together characters from her previous novels for a masterly meditation on storytelling. After 86-year-old Mainer Gloria Beach is found dead in a quarry, semi-retired lawyer Bob Burgess agrees to represent Gloria's son, Matthew, who is the prime suspect in her possible murder. Bob has grown close to author Lucy Barton, who moved to the area from New York City during the pandemic, and the duo spend hours walking together and chatting. After Bob takes Matthew's case, Lucy calls him a "sin eater," a term that came to her mind during a recent chat with Olive Kitteridge, who's been inviting Lucy over to her retirement community to gossip about their neighbors. As Bob works with Matthew on preparing his defense in the event of a murder charge, he begins to wonder if he's falling in love with Lucy. Though Olive doesn't say anything, she's been convinced all along that Lucy and Bob are developing feelings for each other. The narrative threads make for dishy small-town drama, but even more satisfying are the insights Strout weaves into the dialogue. Late in the novel, after Olive asks Lucy the point of writing stories, she responds, "People and the lives they lead. That's the point." Longtime fans and newcomers alike will relish this.
Customer Reviews
Simply wonderful
As with all of ES novels, this story is entrancing.
Beautiful!
Another moving book by this beautiful writer! She writes about ordinary people but with such special insights. A joy to read!
3 1/2
Plenty of homespun wisdom in this but too many threads and in some ways too much wisdom. It feels as if this has been written to pull all of Strout’s past writings together.. which it does but I would prefer that it didnt. Leave Olive and Lucy and Bob to lead their own lives… they don’t have to cross paths. Let them go their own way.