by Ali Smith (Author)
The Accidental is Ali Smith's dazzling novel about a family holiday and a stranger who upends it. Arresting and wonderful, The Accidental pans in on the Norfolk holiday home of the Smart family one hot summer. There a beguiling stranger called Amber appears at the door bearing all sorts of unexpected gifts, trampling over family boundaries and sending each of the Smarts scurrying from the dark into the light. A novel about the ways that seemingly chance encounters irrevocably transform our understanding of ourselves, The Accidental explores the nature of truth, the role of fate and the power of storytelling. "A beguiling page-turner ...a brilliant creation. To read The Accidental is to be excited from first to last". (Independent). "Joyous, a shot across the bows...writing as rapture, as giddy delight". (The Times). "Brilliant and engaging, frequently hilarious...Smith makes one look at the world afresh". (Sunday Telegraph).
Format: Paperback
Pages: 305
Edition: First printing of this edition
Publisher: Penguin
Published: 06 Apr 2006
ISBN 10: 0141010398
ISBN 13: 9780141010397
Prizes: Winner of Whitbread Book Awards: Novel Category 2005. Shortlisted for Scottish Arts Council Book of the Year Award 2006 and Orange Prize 2006 and Man Booker Prize for Fiction 2005.
From the Hardcover edition.