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Fiction Literary

Room

by (author) Emma Donoghue

Publisher
HarperCollins
Initial publish date
Jul 2011
Category
Literary
  • Paperback / softback

    ISBN
    9781443413695
    Publish Date
    Jun 2012
    List Price
    $10.99
  • Paperback / softback

    ISBN
    9781554688326
    Publish Date
    Jul 2011
    List Price
    $19.99

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Description

To five-year-old Jack, Room is the world. . . . It’s where he was born. It’s where he and Ma eat and sleep and play andlearn. There are endless wonders that let loose Jack’s imagination -- the snake under Bed that he constructs out of eggshells;the imaginary world projected through the TV; the coziness ofWardrobe beneath Ma’s clothes, where she tucks him in safelyat night, in case Old Nick comes.

Room is home to Jack, but to Ma, it’s the prison whereshe’s been held since she was nineteen -- for seven long years.Through her fierce love for her son, she has created a life forhim in that eleven-by-eleven foot space. But Jack’s curiosity isbuilding alongside Ma’s own desperation, and she knows thatRoom cannot contain either indefinitely. . . . Told in the inventive,funny and poignant voice of Jack, Room is a celebration of resilience -- and a powerful story of a mother and son whose love lets them survive the impossible.

About the author

EMMA DONOGHUE was born in Dublin and lived in England for many years before moving to Canada. She writes in many genres, including theatre, radio drama and literary history, but is best known for her fiction, both historical (SlammerkinThe Sealed LetterAstrayFrog Music) and contemporary (Stir-FryHoodLandingTouchy Subjects). Her seventh novel, Room, won the Rogers Writers’ Trust Fiction Prize and the Commonwealth Writers’ Prize (Canada and the Caribbean region) and was shortlisted for the Man Booker and Orange Prizes. It sold more than two million copies. Donoghue scripted the film adaptation, a Canadian-Irish film by Lenny Abrahamson starring Brie Larson, which was nominated for four Academy Awards, including Best Picture. And her most recent novel, The Wonder, was shortlisted for the Scotiabank Giller Prize in 2016.

Emma Donoghue's profile page

Awards

  • OLA Evergreen Award

Editorial Reviews

“Claustrophobic, controversial, brilliant . . . inventive, tense, and stringently intelligent.” — Maclean's

“Remarkable . . . heartrending. . . . Both gripping and poignant, it’s a tribute to human resourcefulness and resilience and extremity, and a stirring portrait of a mother’s devotion.” — Toronto Star

“An astounding, terrifying novel.” — The New Yorker

“Thrilling and at moments palm-sweatingly harrowing.” — New York Times Book Review

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