The River Capture
Mary Costello
“He can feel the river's presence on his right. It never leaves him; it is there, always, on the edge of his consciousness. Even in sleep, it flows through his dreams, watching, waiting, coaxing his attention to something he cannot fathom.”
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The new novel about love, loyalty and nature, from the author of Academy Street, Irish Book Awards Book of the Year 2014
A BOOK OF THE YEAR IN THE IRISH TIMES and IRISH INDEPENDENT
Shortlisted for Novel of the Year at the Irish Book Awards
Shortlisted for Novel of the Year, Dalkey Literary Awards
Shortlisted for the Kerry Group Irish Novel of the Year Award
Luke O’Brien has left Dublin to live a quiet life on his family land on the bend of the River Sullane. Alone in his big house, he longs for a return to his family’s heyday and turns to books for solace.
One morning a young woman arrives at his door and enters his life with profound consequences. Her presence presents him and his family with an almost impossible dilemma.
In a novel that pays glorious homage to Joyce, The River Capture tells of one man’s descent into near madness, and the possibility of rescue. This is a novel about love, loyalty and the raging forces of nature. More than anything, it is a book about the life of the mind and the redemptive powers of art.
“One of the most surprising and original novels of 2019 … Exceptional … This is a sensory book that draws on the body to feed the mind”
the Times
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“Elegantly written … Exquisite and impressionistic prose”
observer
“A self-confessed homage to James Joyce … Costello writes insightfully”
sunday Times
“Luminous … Unexpected … An audacious act of literary ventriloquism and one that Costello pulls off astonishingly successfully … Joyce devotees will discover much to enjoy in this clever homage, while fans of contemporary Irish literature will find a subtle, slightly melancholy, engrossing read”
Melissa Harrison
guardian
”The River Capture is breathtaking. It is profound in the most bruising way; elegant, and then thrillingly savage; expansive, but masterfully precise, and full of sentences that made me choke on jealous rage. Costello is in a different class altogether”
Lisa Mcinerney
Mary Costello
Mary Costello lives in Galway. Her short story collection, The China Factory (2012), was nominated for the Guardian First Book Award and shortlisted for an Irish Book Award. Her first novel, Academy Street (2014), won the Irish Novel of the Year Award at the Irish Book Awards and was named overall Irish Book of the Year. It was serialised on BBC Radio 4’s Book at Bedtime and was shortlisted for the International Dublin Literary Award, the Costa First Novel Prize, the EU Prize for Literature and the Prix Littéraire des Ambassadeurs de la Francophonie en Irlande, and has been translated into several languages. The River Capture is her second novel.