The Riders
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3.8 • 85 Ratings
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- $15.99
Publisher Description
The Riders, the novel that brought Tim Winton his first Booker Prize shortlisting, charts an odyssey across Europe, a transfixing journey through the underworld of every lover's nightmare.
Fred Scully waits at the arrival gate of an international airport, anxious to see his wife and daughter. After two years in Europe they are finally settling down. He sees a new life before them, a stable outlook again, a fresh start, a cottage in the Irish countryside that he's renovated by hand. He's waited, sweated on this reunion. He does not like to be alone – he's that kind of man.
The flight lands, the doors at the airport hiss open . . . Scully's life falls apart.
Written with the pace of a thriller and the human understanding of a master novelist, The Riders is the novel that brought Tim Winton to international attention.
'At its breaking heart is a fearless exploration of how well we can ever really know each other . . . Winton is not a great Australian novelist; he is a great novelist full stop.' The Times (London)
'Winton has forced a different kind of thinking about men and their imperatives, about the value and meaning of action . . . The Riders is a grand, poised, metaphorical reconciliation.' Sydney Morning Herald
'There is more feeling in this book than can ever be paraphrased.' Village Voice
'The Riders is about the painful process of learning to live without illusions, without false anticipation . . . Furious and vital . . . a celebration - of the messiness of life and of the force of good fiction.' The Guardian
'Vivid and rewarding . . . Encompasses and transcends all the known world.' Thomas Keneally
'The curse of this haunting book is that you read it too fast.' The New Yorker
'If you're looking for a book that bolts you to your seat, this is it.' Sunday Age
PUBLISHERS WEEKLY
Elements of a psychological suspense thriller and a gut-wrenching love story blend into this irresistible narrative, Winston's 13th novel, written in supple, lyrically charged prose. Australian expatriate Scully is a working-class bloke with a ``wonky eye... Brillopad hair'' and a ``severely used face.'' All the more wonder that beautiful, upper-middle-class Jennifer married him eight years ago. The adoring Scully has since followed her every whim, trailing along with her and their seven-year-old daughter, Billie, across Europe. Jennifer decided they must buy the tiny, dilapidated cottage in rural Ireland that Scully now cleans and rebuilds with the demon energy of his love while awaiting his wife and child to return from Australia, where Jennifer has gone to sell their possessions. On the night before their arrival, Scully sees a troupe of ghost horsemen, their torches burning, arrayed before the ancient castle keep on his neighbor's land. The next day, a traumatized, mute Billie deplanes without her mother, who has somehow disappeared at Heathrow airport. To find her, Scully and Billie begin an odyssey to all the places they lived while Jennifer was aspiring to fulfill what she considered her artistic potential. Gradually, Scully realizes that there are things about Jennifer he could never admit to himself; tormented by fear, desperation and heartache, he almost loses his sanity. Precocious Billie, who knows things her father will never understand, uses the power of her love to redeem them both. Perhaps Billie is a little too wise and resilient and Scully not credibly protective of her welfare, dragging her into perilous situations. But Winton propels the narrative so quickly that one accepts Scully's obsession and Billie's compliance. Winton is particularly deft in creating the supporting characters in this powerful drama, all of whom assume vividly dimensional form. He also conjures up settings with a magician's hand: the frigid, barren Irish countryside; Australia drowsing in summer heat; a Greek island shorn of tourists in winter; Paris, Florence, Amsterdam. His terse, lyrical descriptions, the throbbing energy of his prose, can illuminate a scene like a lightning bolt, cut like a knife or wring the heart. Readers who met this stunning Australian writer in Cloudstreet or That Eye, the Sky, will find his talent fiercely honed. Author tour.
