The Narrow Land

"Intimate books are very tricky to write. I think it’s the balance between narrative impetus and quiet observation that often fails. Not here. The Narrow Land is a triumph of intimacy, an immersive experience, illuminating through different perspectives and revealing through layers. The book is all-absorbing as only a picture can be all-absorbing. You witness events, some small, some larger, from varying angles and through differing lights and shades, and all the way through, though the technique is invisible, the effect intense. Certainly, the complexities of the Hoppers’ relationship are explored in The Narrow Land —most dextrously, how these complexities bleed into Edward and Jo’s relationships with their Cape Cod neighbours, and particularly with the two boys, Michael and Richie. Get the weekly Five Books newsletter Turning to truth, I think evidence-based truth—who, what, when, where—is for the biographer. The novelist works mainly with ‘why’, an elusive truth even if you’re writing about yourself. Does the truth matter? Yes. But a novel is more painting than photograph. It’s truth re-imagined. After you’ve read The Narrow Land , take a look at Hopper’s ‘Cape Cod Morning’ and you’ll see exactly what I mean."