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Amber - thirtysomething and barefoot - shows up at the door of the Norfolk cottage that the Smarts are renting for the summer. She talks her way in. She tells nothing but lies. She stays for dinner. Writer Eve Smart things Amber is a student with whom her husband, Michael, is sleeping. Michael knows only that her car broke down. Astrid, age twelve, thinks she's her mother's friend. Son Magnus, seventeen, thinks she's an angel. As Amber insinuates herself into the family, the questions of who she is and how she'd come to be there drop away. A tour-de-force of literary improvisation, The Accidental explores the nature of truth, the role of chance, and the transformative power of storytelling.
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Previews available in: English Lithuanian Dutch
Subjects
literary fiction, Literature, Summer resorts, Truthfulness and falsehood, Strangers, Social conditions, Fiction, Women biographers, psychological fiction, domestic fiction, Large type books, Great britain, fiction, Fiction, general, 18.05 English literature, Fiction, psychological, English literature, Young women, fictionPlaces
Norfolk (England), Great Britain, Norfolk, EnglandShowing 10 featured editions. View all 23 editions?
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01
The Accidental
2020, Penguin Books
Paperback
in English
- Penguin Essentials Edition (001)
0241989116 9780241989111
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02 |
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05
the accidental
2007-04, Anchor Books
Paperback
in English
- 1st Anchor books ed. (1)
1400032180 9781400032181
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06
the accidental
2007-04, Anchor Books
Paperback
in English
- 1st Anchor books ed. (1)
1400032180 9781400032181
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07
The accidental
2006, Pantheon Books
Hardcover
in English
- First American Edition (1)
0375422250 9780375422256
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08
the accidental
2006, Thorndike Press
Hardcover
in English
- Large Print Edition
0786285745 9780786285747
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09
The Accidental
2006?, Pantheon Books
Hardcover
in English
- First American Edition (1)
0375422250 9780375422256
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10 |
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Book Details
Edition Notes
Originally published: New York : Pantheon Books, 2005.
Classifications
The Physical Object
ID Numbers
Source records
Internet Archive item recordmarc_openlibraries_sanfranciscopubliclibrary MARC record
Library of Congress MARC record
amazon.com record
Work Description
The Accidental is a 2005 novel by Scottish author Ali Smith. It follows a middle-class English family who are visited by an uninvited guest, Amber, while they are on holiday in a small village in Norfolk. Amber's arrival has a profound effect on all the family members. Eventually she is cast out the house by the mother, Eve. But the consequences of her appearance continue even after the family has returned home to London.
The novel was shortlisted for the Orange Prize, the Man Booker Prize and James Tait Black Memorial Prize, and it won the Whitbread Award.
Excerpts
of things -- when is it exactly?
first sentence.
Links outside Open Library
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- Created February 18, 2009
- 14 revisions
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October 31, 2022 | Edited by ImportBot | import existing book |
August 8, 2021 | Edited by Lisa | Edited without comment. |
December 14, 2020 | Edited by MARC Bot | import existing book |
July 15, 2019 | Edited by MARC Bot | import existing book |
February 18, 2009 | Created by ImportBot | Imported from San Francisco Public Library record |