Magnificent ... full of wit, sharp insight and vivid description.

Wonderfully entertaining

A fantastically tart and readable account of life in eastern Europe at the start of the war

So glittering is the overall parade ... and so entertaining the surface that the trilogy remains excitingly vivid; it amuses, it diverts and it informs, and to do these things so elegantly is no small achievement'

One most salute the brilliance ... the exactness of sights and sounds, the precise touches of light and scent, the gestures and entrances.

A delicate, tough, mesmerising epic that grabs you by the hand and takes you straight into war, flight, and a complex and vulnerable young marriage

I shall be surprised, and, I must admit, dismayed if the whole work is not recognized as a major achievement in the English novel since the war. Certainly it is an astonishing recreation.

Glittering characterisation, sharp and eloquent writing.

An important 20th-century writer who paints a complex relationship between gender and power with wit and sensitivity.

Lush and lyrical - and darkly funny even at its most gut-punching - Olivia Manning's Balkan Trilogy manages to simultaneously be a sweeping panorama of a Europe in crisis and a discomfitingly intimate portrait of a no-less-broken marriage.

An addictive, gripping literary saga ... A sharp portrait of a young marriage under pressure and a vivid picture of being a Brit in an increasingly hostile and impoverished corner of Europe.

Olivia Manning takes autobiographical writing to a refreshingly new dimension. In The Balkan Trilogy she follows the well-worn mantra that authors should write about what they know, but she does so without sounding self-centred, a quality that so often dogs memoirs. Her's reads like wholly invented fiction with made-up, yet believable characters. It has been such a joy to re-read Manning's Trilogy...Manning's characterisation throughout the Trilogy is excellent. Her most astute depiction of a person in genuine inner conflict with himself is Guy Pringle...The author's depiction of Bucharest and the places Harriet and Guy visit are bold and colourful.

The Suffragette movement and pre-war country cricket might seem an odd couple for a novel but Anthony Quinn marries them perfectly in a nostalgic and compelling tale whose themes of love and friendship on and off the pitch will appeal to lovers of romance and cricket alike.

Trench warfare is vividly described: the agonizing wait for dawn, the despairing bravery of those going 'over the top', the futility, the waste, the sadness. Anthony Quinn tells this part of his tale faultlessly, and without a cliché... poetic.

Not just an exhilarating love story... a bold, impressive novel

With crisp prose and evocative description, Anthony Quinn's second novel embodies early 20th century Britain with aplomb and exhumes a political plight that still has great relevance

Set at the same time as E. M. Forster's novels, this intelligent antidote to Downton Abbey is written with wit, narrative craft and elegant prose.

Quinn’s novel concerns the stalling romance between a suffragette and a cricketer, set amid war and middle-class Edwardian mores. This chalk-and-cheese couple and their stifling environment are equally well crafted

The characters are subtly drawn and the period touches, particularly the sporting passages, have an authentic ring

Is a heartbreaking, riveting portrait of modern Israel. A family story, a rich character study, a story of war. Unmissable.

A work of art

First-rate writing about the craziness of modern-war.

Breathtaking skill...an extraordinary emotional charge.

David Grossman laid bare the flayed soul of Israel

Articulates the pain and complexity of being born in Israel so powerfully that it will unquestionably be studied by future generations.

Magnificent

Often impressive, sometimes touching

He is the finest living novelist I have read. His work is visceral and clear-headed. Though I loved Franzen's Freedom, Grossman's novel is better

To define David Grossman's masterly new novel as the ultimate anti-war oeuvre would not do it justice...To the End of the Land is richer and more complex than a chronicle of war. It is an intimate portrayal of a woman and mother, Ora, who has been compared to Flaubert's Emma or Tolstoy's Anna...With characters with whom the reader can empathise, a powerful if disturbing theme and an element of suspense and the unknown, Grossman's novel, while not easy to read, is well worth the effort

Further proof the Very Long Novel is in rude health with David Grossman's fine book about the seemingly endless conflict between Israel and Palestine

Movingly evokes the strains of war and peace in one Israeli household

Grossman's soaring, wrenching journey through Israel ... grapples with the largest of themes: memory and identity, community and nationhood. Yet through its picaresque plot, it always remains a mother's story and a family romance... Grossman aims high, digs deep, and returns from inner and outer voyages with darkly glittering jewels of insight

An intimate and national epic

A stunning, powerful novel

To the End of the Land is a novel of relationships: personal, moral and political: all reviewed against a muted landscape of pain, threat and hostility... Grossman list his youngest son Uri in the final hours of the second Lebanon war and his personal connection to the trauma of conflict adds weight to this substantial work