The Land in Winter

image: Alex Harwood on Unsplash

Details

Author: Andrew Miller

First published: October 24, 2024

Pages: 365 pages

The Land in Winter was shortlisted for the Booker Prize 2025 .

Reading Guide

‘The novel is about the tensions within marriage and other relationships, and those tensions are the same today as they were back then. How to live: that’s the big human issue and it forms the spine of the book.

‘It’s a joy to read, a nerve-shredding pleasure.’

Synopsis

December 1962, the West Country. Local doctor Eric Parry, mulling secrets, sets out on his rounds, while his pregnant wife, Irene, sleeps on in the warmth of their cottage.

Across the field, Rita Simmons is also asleep – and also pregnant – her head full of images of a past life her husband Bill prefers to ignore. He’s been up for hours, tending to the needs of the small dairy farm where he hoped to create a new version of himself, a project that’s not going well.

When the ordinary cold of an English winter gives way to violent blizzards and deep snow, the two couples find their lives beginning to unravel. Where do you hide when you can’t leave the house? And where, in a frozen world, can you run to?