A family torn apart by war, geography, politics, religion, over the course of three generations
[extract] Each of us, telling the story of a life, narrates - creates - turning points, the events that shape us. We choose the plot, we make the meaning. Not that we control reality; nor necessarily that we strive to. Things happen, at home, in history; we grapple; make choices; adapt or fail to. But our stories, the beliefs and experiences we live by, consciously or not, link and tether us to others, to the world, to the imaginary, to the past and future. Everything is around us, with us, in us.
'A tour de force, This Strange Eventful History is one of those rare novels which a reader doesn't merely read but lives through with the characters. Call it the War and Peace of the 20th and 21st century, call it The Long View of a family migrating through many borders, worlds, and eras, call it anything and we fall short. Claire Messud is a magnificent storyteller, and the novel, an all-encompassing history of many human hearts and any human heart, will linger and haunt us as the best and the most heartbreaking memory' Yiyun Li
'Claire Messud captures the heartbreaking paradoxes of being in our world and in ourselves yet feeling separated from both with a precision and acuity like no other writer I know' Paul Harding
'An astonishment - rich and luminous, dense with life, wide with wisdom... Rarely has the private magic of familial love been so fully realized in a public act of literature. Just exquisite' Ayad Akhtar
'An engrossing tale with dizzying sweep, and beautifully written' Lionel Shriver
LONGLISTED FOR THE BOOKER PRIZE 2024
'[A] wise and insightful novel about identity and family' The Times, Book of the Day
'An epic family odyssey... Ambitious and compelling' Guardian, Book of the Day
'A rich, sprawling saga... This Strange Eventful History may be Messud's finest book' Sunday Telegraph
June 1940. As Paris falls to the Germans, Gaston Cassar - honorable servant of France, devoted husband and father, currently posted as naval attache in Salonica - bids farewell to his beloved wife, aunt and children, placing his faith in God that they will be reunited after the war. But escaping the violence of that cataclysm is not the same as emerging unscathed. The family will never again be whole.
A work of breathtaking historical sweep and vivid psychological intimacy, This Strange Eventful History charts the Cassars' unfolding story as its members move between Salonica and Algeria, the US, Cuba, Canada, Argentina, Australia and France - their itinerary shaped as much by a search for an elusive wholeness, as by the imperatives of politics, faith, family, industry and desire.
