The Infinities

by JohnBanville (Author)

• Used

  Hardcover
  2009

  $3.35

  One long, languid midsummer's day, the Godleys gather at the family home of Arden to attend their father's bedside. Adam, the elder child, and Petra, only nineteen, find that relations with their mother, Ursula, and their dying father, old Adam, are as strained as ever. Adam's relationship with his wife, Helen, seems too on the brink of collapse and Petra, fragile and deeply troubled, finds deepest relief in her own pain. The gods, those mischievous spirits, watch silently, flitting through this dark menage. Unable to resist intervening in the mortals' lives, they spy, tease and seduce, all the while looking upon the antics of their playthings with a mixture of mild bafflement and occasional envy. Old Adam husband, father and esteemed mathematician has made his name grappling with the concept of the infinite. His own time on earth seems to be running out, and his mind runs to disquieting memories. Little does he realize, as he lies mute but alert in the Sky room, that the gods are capable of interposing themselves in the action, and even changing time itself when it pleases them. Overflowing with a bawdy humour, and a deep and refreshing clarity of insight, The Infinities is at once a gloriously earthy romp and a delicately poised, infinitely wise look at the terrible and wonderful plight of being human. In electrifying prose, Banville captures the aching intensity, the magic and enchantment, of a single midsummer's day in Arden.

• Used

  Paperback
  2009

  $5.96

  From the writer of the Booker Prize-winning The Sea , comes a new novel, a major literary event of the Autumn. John Banville is one of the finest and most critically-acclaimed writers of his generation. With elegance, insight and wit, he has secured a devoted readership and there can be few more eagerly anticipated literary events than a new John Banville novel. Having written several crime novels under the pen name Benjamin Black, this is the first novel under his own name since he won the 2005 Booker Prize with The Sea . First Light is a bitter-sweet erotic comedy with magical overtones, a sort of demotic Midsummer Night's Dream . Set across one single summer's day, from dawn to the early hours of the next day, this is a funny, moving and accessible novel that will delight Banville fans as well as bringing new readers to this most assured of writers.

• Used

  Hardcover
  2010

  $14.48