Autumn

The first novel in Ali Smith's Seasonal Quartet is an unforgettable story about aging and time and love-and stories themselves.

Autumn. Season of mists and mellow fruitfulness. Two old friends-Daniel, a centenarian, and Elisabeth, born in 1984-look to both the future and the past as the United Kingdom stands divided by a historic, once-in-a-generation summer. Love is won, love is lost. Hope is hand-in-hand with hopelessness. The seasons roll round, as ever.

A luminous meditation on the meaning of richness and harvest and worth, Autumn is the first installment of Ali Smith's Seasonal Quartet, and it casts an eye over our own time: Who are we? What are we made of? Shakespearean jeu d'esprit, Keatsian melancholy, the sheer bright energy of 1960s pop art. Autumn is wide-ranging in time-scale and light-footed through histories.

"Beautiful, subtle. … Brimming with humanity and bending, despite everything, toward hope."-New York Times Book Review

MAN BOOKER PRIZE FINALIST • A Washington Post Notable Book • One of the Best Books of the Year: NPR, The New York Times, Martha Kearney/The Guardian, Slate, Chicago Tribune, Southern Living, Milwaukee Journal-Sentinel, The Morning News, Kirkus Reviews • Long-listed for the Gordon Burn Prize