The Book of Guilt
A BBC RADIO 2 BOOK CLUB PICK 2025
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4.8 • 15 Ratings
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- £5.99
Publisher Description
MORNING, AFTERNOON, NIGHT. THE MOTHERS ARE ALWAYS WATCHING . . .
'Brilliant . . . Chidgey's luxurious and unhurried prose stokes tension in a compulsive thriller' Observer
'Written with insight and brio, deftly balancing darkness and light, depth and pace' Guardian
'Grand and devastating, and packed with perfectly timed revelations . . .This involving, humane novel brims with vitality - and soul' New York Times
'Chidgey writes with surgical precision and emotional weight . . . quietly devastating, fiercely intelligent and unforgettable' Irish Times
'Eloquent prose, rich characterizations, and knotty concepts - an emotional and intellectual tour de force' Kirkus
'Brilliant . . . you will race through this book in a single, breathless sitting' Literary Review
England, 1979. Vincent, Lawrence and William are the last remaining residents of a secluded New Forest home, part of the government's Sycamore Scheme. Every day, the triplets do their chores, play their games and take their medicine, under the watchful eyes of three mothers: Mother Morning, Mother Afternoon and Mother Night.
Their nightmares are recorded in The Book of Dreams.
Their lessons are taken from The Book of Knowledge.
And their sins are reported in The Book of Guilt.
All the boys want is to be sent to the Big House in Margate, where they imagine a life of sun, sea and fairground rides. But, as the government looks to shut down the Sycamore Homes, the triplets begin to question everything they have been told.
Gradually surrendering its dark secrets, The Book of Guilt is a profoundly unnerving exploration of belonging in a world where some lives are valued less than others.
'What a book! Tense, inventive, mysterious and moving, The Book of Guilt poses big questions in the context of a rocketing plot. I loved it completely' Karen Joy Fowler, author of Booth
'Original, dark, clever and compelling' Mary Ann Sieghart, author of The Authority Gap
'This is a compelling and terrifying novel whose alternative history engages chillingly with current possibilities. No one writes children better than Chidgey. She exactly gets their experimental cruelty and related innocence as they attempt to piece their world together' Elizabeth Cook, author of Lux
PUBLISHERS WEEKLY
In this devastating dystopian novel from Chidgey (Pet), WWII ended in a stalemate and by 1979 the horrifying results of German death camp experiments have led to a profound ethical dilemma in England. A set of 13-year-old triplets, unwitting products of genetic tinkering, are the only children left at an orphanage in Hampshire, looked after by three "mothers" who keep the outside world at bay. The brothers are sickly but relatively happy, until girls with similar origins and ailments arrive for an official visit and one of them makes the disturbing suggestion that the medicine they're being given makes them ill, not better. Among the alternating narrators are Vincent, one of the triplets; a girl named Nancy, who lives with strange, overprotective "parents" in a house she's never allowed to leave; and the Minister of Loneliness, who's been tasked with phasing out the government's involvement in a scandalous human engineering scheme. As the government begins dismantling the program, both Vincent and the Minister suspect that his life and the lives of other children may be imperiled. Chidgey's clear-eyed narrative about the abuses of exploitive state-sponsored experiments builds to a devastating denouement. It adds up to an intriguing morality tale.
