An intoxicating novel set on Leonard Cohen's Hydra in 1960, a place and a bohemian society that has captivated the world for decades
Polly Samson is the author of two short story collections and two previous novels. Her work has been shortlisted for numerous prizes, translated into several languages and has been dramatised on BBC Radio 4. A Theatre for Dreamers debuted at number 2 on the Sunday Times bestseller list. She has written lyrics for four Number One albums, and is a Fellow of the Royal Society of Literature. Most recently Polly Samson has written introductions to Muswell Press's 2021 reissues of Charmian Clift's Mermaid Singing and Peel Me a Lotus. pollysamson.com @PollySamson
Samson is an intensely sensual writer, conjuring up blue skies, the
tang of wild herbs, the vivid splash of bougainvillea ... As good
as a Greek holiday, and may be the closest we get this year
*Financial Times*
As dreamily nostalgic as Cohen’s song Famous Blue Raincoat
*Observer, New Year Highlights*
Sleazy, evocative, beautiful and entertaining
*Guardian Summer Reading Picks*
A thoroughly enjoyable drama of hedonism, enchantment and emotional
beastliness
*Times Literary Supplement*
A coming of age story set among a group of artists and poets,
including Leonard Cohen, on the Greek island of Hydra in 1960. She
is so good at mentally indelible imagery
*Guardian*
This well-crafted novel beautifully captures the texture of a
halcyon age in which anything seems possible
*Mail on Sunday*
Spellbinding … An immersive read, steeped in nostalgia. Samson’s
poetic prose is so evocative that, by the end, you find yourself
googling those entrancing images of Hydra, 1960, just to wallow
further in the poignancy of it all
*Vanity Fair*
The novel has a lightly worn heft to it, as it probes freedom and
creativity … By the end of this enjoyable novel, which makes vivid
an interesting moment and place, you discover people have paid a
price – a heavy one – for that freedom in the sun
*The Times*
Samson recreates one heady summer there with impeccably ripening
prose …This is a slow, deliberately languorous novel that mixes
real-life figures with fictional counterparts. It is sunbaked,
stewed in alcohol, and wonderfully gossipy
*i paper*
Intoxicating ... Highly accomplished ... A testament to Samson’s
transportive prose
*Spectator*
A surefire summer hit ... Feels at once like a gift and an escape
route ... At once a blissful piece of escapism and a powerful
meditation on art and sexuality – just the book to bring light into
these dark days
*Observer*
Heady armchair escapism ... An impressionistic, intoxicating rush
of sensory experience
*Sunday Times*
By the end the reader may be unable to decide whether Hydra
enchanted or cursed those attracted by its primitive beauty, cheap
rents and easy access to sex, drugs and performance poetry … A
novel about the treatment of women by artistic men
*The Times*
Beautiful ... Perfect if you want to escape the drudgery of another
lentil dinner and dream of 1960s Hydra with Leonard Cohen
*Dolly Alderton*
It is a grand read and the prose falls translucently like the air
... Superb work and a delightful novel
*Thomas Keneally*
Such a lyrical, elegant and beautifully told story
*Joanna Cannon*
So vivid that you can see the sun-washed white houses and blue
seas
*Good Housekeeping, Book of the Month*
I cannot tell you how much I needed this beautiful book to
transport me back to 1960s Greece! Lyrical, sexy, tender and sad in
places. Highly recommended
*Erin Kelly*
This radiant novel will transport you straight to Greece - a
blessing at a time when most of us are stuck in our homes
*Cosmopolitan*
Delicious
*Nigella Lawson*
This well-crafted novel beautifully captures the texture of a
halcyon age in which anything seems possible
*Daily Mail*
A coming of age story set among a group of artists and poets,
including Leonard Cohen, on the Greek island of Hydra in 1960. She
is so good at mentally indelible imagery
*Guardian*
Dreamily nostalgic
*Observer, Fiction to look out for in 2020*
About real people living in Hydra in 1960. Steeped in nostalgia
that's both sad and beautiful. It's fascinating, immersive and so
MOVING
*Marian Keyes*
Hands down the best book I've read all year. Luminous, immersive,
gorgeous, profound
*Joanne Harris*
Her best work yet, so evocative and alive with the scents and
colours of a Greek summer ... Among the best prose writers of her
generation. The writing is just delicious
*Cressida Connolly*
I was utterly entranced. It feels entirely true and effortless and
compelling – in the way that all great novels do
*Justine Picardie*
If summer was suddenly like a novel, it would be like this one.
Immaculate
*Andrew O'Hagan*
A seductive story, suffused with nostalgia
*Sunday Mirror*
This is a sheer delight - I’ve never been to Hydra but this book
transports you and miraculously, you are there in 1960
*Jenny Eclair*
A glorious novel
*Kate Mosse*
A beautifully written, evocative, inspiring novel. I devoured
it
*Kathy Lette*
Polly Samson has created such a dazzling evocation of an era and
its mindset. Here, the island of Hydra is a geographical place but
a psychological one too, populated by beautiful and damaged
characters who pull you down into its pages for another café
gossip, another moonlit swim, another drink. This book is a
bohemian idyll meticulously drawn, and unsparingly exposed. It is
like going away to paradise, then coming back rather wiser. You
don’t read this book – you live it
*Marina Hyde*
A luscious seduction of a book
*Sofka Zinovieff*
Samson's story sizzles with the Greek sun and seduction
*The i*
Praise for The Kindness: ‘An addictive, cleverly structured and
intriguing relationship story of lies and flawed communication
*SUNDAY TIMES Book of the Week*
Annoyingly close to perfection
*SUNDAY TIMES*
A story that entices you to revel in its languid, beautifully
written prose while demanding that you turn the page to discover
the secrets it holds
*OBSERVER Paperback of the week*
Beautifully written, with twists engineered like a thriller
*OBSERVER Books of the Year*
A book to cherish, to recommend, to return to
*FINANCIAL TIMES*
Brilliant, tender and beautiful
*ANDREW O'HAGAN*
Beautifully written and plotted with serpentine cunning, Samson’s
novel is what might be called a love story for adults:
unsentimental, at times harsh, but ultimately uplifting
*MAIL ON SUNDAY*
Gorgeously chilling … Samson seems to write in colours
*INDEPENDENT ON SUNDAY*
Shining, poetic and sumptuous … Polly Samson is a writer of great
insight and sensitivity
*JOANNE HARRIS*
A richly sensory writer … A sumptuous, serious story
*DAILY MAIL*
Lush, lyrical prose … The Kindness is to be read more than once,
not merely to enjoy again the beauty of the writing and the
considerable insights into human experience, but to test the
earlier narrative with the knowledge of what is to come
*INDEPENDENT*
Compelling … Atmospheric and vividly told, the book is a poignant
examination of love, guilt, betrayal and the deception that can lie
at the heart of every relationship
*TATLER*
Family proves far from idyllic in this poetic, sensual story of
betrayal and lies. Writer and lyricist Samson’s prose is dazzlingly
evocative, as she explores how relationships are rarely what they
seem
*GLAMOUR*
Secrets and misunderstandings fuel Polly Samson’s involving,
melancholy and cleverly constructed second novel … This is a mature
and haunting novel about love and loss that asks if we all, in the
end, see what we want to see
*METRO*
This is elegant, witty writing, informed throughout by generosity
and wise perceptiveness. Dealing with many kinds of love, and with
misunderstanding, betrayal, grief and forgiveness, the novel dares
to posit, ultimately, the possibility of redemption. It is a book
to cherish, to recommend, to return to
*FT WEEKEND*
Intensely evocative … Samson treats this difficult subject with
candour and compassion … The novel’s effortlessness, its
readability, sweeps everything in its wake … This is a book to
relax into
*DAILY TELEGRAPH*
Polly Samson’s mastery of the English language is powerful and
impressive
*DAILY EXPRESS*
Fills the back of your eyes with light like an Aegean sky, and has
that rare and lovely quality of making you nostalgic for something
you never had ... It perfectly takes the reader into a different
world. Which we could all do with
*Louisa Young*
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