The Long Take
Shortlisted for the Man Booker Prize
-
- €6.99
Publisher Description
Shortlisted for the Man Booker Prize
Winner of the Goldsmiths Prize
Winner of The Roehampton Poetry Prize
Winner of the Walter Scott Prize for Historical Fiction
‘Bold, brilliant . . . this is as poignant and visual as classic film noir’ - Ian Rankin
‘An incredible achievement’ - Irvine Welsh
‘This book will shift something in your soul’ - Elif Shafak
Walker is a D-Day veteran with post-traumatic stress disorder; he can’t return home to rural Nova Scotia, and looks instead to the city for freedom, anonymity and repair. As he moves from New York to Los Angeles and San Francisco we witness a crucial period of fracture in American history, one that also allowed film noir to flourish. The Dream had gone sour but – as those dark, classic movies made clear – the country needed outsiders to study and dramatize its new anxieties.
While Walker tries to piece his life together, America is beginning to come apart: deeply paranoid, doubting its own certainties, riven by social and racial division, spiralling corruption and the collapse of the inner cities.
Robin Robertson’s The Long Take is the story of a good man, brutalized by war, haunted by violence and apparently doomed to return to it – yet resolved to find kindness again, in the world and in himself.
NOW IN THE PICADOR COLLECTION
APPLE BOOKS REVIEW
The Long Take took us on an unforgettable journey through post-war America. With a hard-boiled flavour and absorbing narrative reminiscent of great noir fiction, Robin Robertson’s poem follows World War II veteran Walker as he wanders the country, trying to forget the horrors of combat and re-settle into society. Along the way, Walker encounters many troubled souls, giving Robertson the opportunity to mine deep into the human condition and ask challenging questions about guilt and redemption. Whether he’s describing one man’s desperation or swathes of the American landscape, Robertson’s prose is vivid, inventive and utterly gripping.