Atonement
Discover the modern classic that has sold over two million copies.
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4.2 • 120 Ratings
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- £6.99
Publisher Description
‘Atonement is a masterpiece’ The Times
On the hottest day of the summer of 1935, thirteen-year-old Briony Tallis sees her sister Cecilia plunge naked into the fountain in the garden of their country house.
Watching her too is Robbie Turner who, like Cecilia, has recently come down from Cambridge. By the end of that day, the lives of all three will have been changed for ever.
Robbie and Cecilia will have crossed a boundary they had not even imagined at its start. Briony will have witnessed mysteries, and committed a crime for which she will spend the rest of her life trying to atone.
'The best thing he has ever written' Observer
**ONE OF THE GUARDIAN'S 100 BEST BOOKS OF THE 21st CENTURY**
APPLE BOOKS REVIEW
Romance, class tensions, the evils of war, struggles with the past—Atonement is a modernist masterpiece. During a heat wave in 1935, 13-year-old Briony falsely accuses her sister’s lover of sexual assault; the effects of her lie ripple for years to follow. Ian McEwan conjures scenes with such sensory nuance that we weren’t just imagining the languid, sunbaked afternoon at Briony's family estate—we were diving into the pool, feeling the bracing water on our faces. McEwan’s level of detail translates beautifully into the film starring Kiera Knightly.
Customer Reviews
Love to read this book
I have read this book three times and it never fails in bringing back nostalgic memories of jealousy, love and war. Nothing new but it feels so real. The characters have been chosen so well each bringing depth to the story line.
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a beautiful classic that everyone should read in their lifetime
A modern masterpiece
I don't say this often or lightly, but this novel is more than just a great book. It feels like a classic in the same way that Forster's Room With a View or Howard's End do. Beautifully and economically constructed; evocative of time and place. The big turning points are restrained and stunning. Everything in the plot revolves around a young girl's disturbance at adult experiences she can't comprehend. Her telling and retelling of the events of one summer's day - and the mistakes she makes that day - is her atonement for the tragedies she causes. McEwan says he used, for a great deal of the second phase of the novel, his grandfather's war experiences of the Dunkirk evacuation and a certain nurse's factual hospital accounts as his source material, which must be why they ring so true. In contrast with the opulence depicted in the first part, the second part is powerful in giving a full sense of the punishment both of traumatised soldiers trying to get out of the hell of war and of the freshly trained medics treating the injured who had been through it. I cannot overstate how much I loved this novel: no green, satin, backless evening gown could be more elegant!