The Blue Book: A Novel

From one of the U.K.’s most dazzling novelists — whom Richard Ford has called “a profound writer” — comes this daring new novel set in the unsteady, self-contained world of a luxury liner. While on a transatlantic trip with her soon-to-be-fiancé Derek, Elizabeth unexpectedly runs into ex-lover Arthur, with whom she shares a shady past: the pair once worked as traveling spiritual mediums who conned the vulnerable by pretending to contact the spirits of departed loved ones. While Derek remains seasick and cabin-bound, Elizabeth wanders the ship, alternately avoiding and seeking out Arthur. Unable to avoid memories of their fractured past, she must face the deception they practiced even as she accepts the peace they brought to the grief-stricken who sought their services. Intimately addressed to “you,” the listener, The Blue Book is both a portrait of two methodical con artists and a meditation on “how love is a private language, a set of codes, to which the outside world ought not admit impediment” (Telegraph). Irresistibly written, by turns comically wry and stunningly lyrical, with “some of the most unashamedly erotic writing since Nicholson Baker first contemplated a telephone receiver” (New Statesman), the book slowly, deliberately, and devastatingly reveals itself to the listener. The heartbreaking stakes are ultimately nothing less than fact and fiction, life and death.

About the Author

Twice named one of Granta’s Best Young British Novelists, A. L. Kennedy is the author of twelve other books, including the novels Paradise, So I Am Glad, and Day, which won the Costa Book of the Year Award. Kennedy is an associate professor of creative writing at the University of Warwick, the recipient of a Lannan Literary Award, and a well-received standup comic. She lives in London, where she contributes to many British publications.Rosalyn Landor has worked as an actress since the age of seven, both in Europe and the United States in feature films, theater, and audio productions. Her extensive list of credits include leading roles for the BBC, and PBS Masterpiece Theater,including "Rumpole of the Bailey" and the Sherlock Holmes mystery "The Speckled Band", as well as mini-series and guest roles on all major networks. She lives in Los Angeles.

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