Wanting

“In confident, expert hands, fiction can liberate the past… Richard Flanagan is an exemplary case in point. [A] dense and fascinating novel.”

—The New York Times Book Review

“Flanagan’s prose grasps the jugular of history… A startling meditation on the tragic cost of emotional repression and the physical violence and psychic disfigurement to which the constraint of self-expression give rise.”

—The Times (London)

“A compelling novel about love and loss.”

—ELLE Canada

“A beautifully constructed fugue on desire and its denial, on the protean forms assumed by passionate natures wrestling with 19th century dictates of reason and duty.”

—The Times Literary Supplement

“As usual, Flanagan is brilliant at re-creating this ‘weird land predating time, with its vulgar rainbow colours, its vile, huge forests and bizarre animals that seemed to have been lost since Adam’s exile.’”

—The Washington Post

“The novel is stylishly, even beautifully written, and one stops to savour many a well-turned phrase.”

—Edmonton Journal

“This is the best novel I have read this year or expect to read for several more…Flanagan’s storytelling puts the heart back into history. It is infused with a massive strength of feeling, with anger and compassion.”

—Sydney Morning Herald

“In Wanting, Richard Flanagan has written an exquisite, profoundly moving, intricately structured meditation about the desire for human connection in its many forms.”

—Los Angeles Times

“A novel of singular beauty. Flanagan’s virtuoso handling of historical fact and storytelling, combined with his understanding of human nature, confirms that in works such as this, fiction achieves high art.”

—The Irish Times

“Flanagan sets his novel in the wilds of nineteenth-century Tasmania and evokes its inhabitants with exquisite precision…Flanagan forges…an entirely unified meditation on desire, ‘the cost of its denial, the centrality and force of its power in human affairs.’”

—The New Yorker

“Flanagan is a beautiful writer and Wanting is a beautiful and considered addition to his oeuvre.”

—The Age (Australia)

“Passionate and eloquent.”

—The Sunday Times (London)

“Complex and riveting fiction… An ingenious, thoughtful and potent demonstration of this assured author’s imaginative versatility.”

—Kirkus Reviews

“Astounding… A stunning book… Wanting deserves the highest accolades.”

—Sunday Tasmanian

“Flanagan’s prose is beautifully crafted, at once elegant and astonishing… Highly recommended.”

—Library Journal (a Best Book of 2009)

“Flanagan’s control of his material is awe-inspiring, and he writes beautifully to boot.”

—Time Out (London)

“The novel boasts many symmetries and ironies, which are the stuff of poetry rather than history.”

—The Australian

“[Flanagan’s] depiction of desire’s effects is sublime.”

—Publishers Weekly

“Moving seamlessly through time, across two continents and between three storylines, Wanting is a marvel of precision and cohesion.”

—The Sun-Herald (Sydney)

“Wanting is a novel you never want to end. As a reader, I can think of no greater accolade.”

—The Canberra Times