Green Water, Green Sky — Mavis Gallant

An elegant, melancholic novella about memory, family and the meaning of home.  

This is the tale of the fractured family life of American divorcée Bonnie McCarthy and her daughter Flor. Uprooted and unmoored, the pair lead an itinerant existence, glamorous yet dependent, with Venice, Cannes and Paris as their backdrop. When Flor attempts to flee this untidy life and the oppressive rule of her eccentric mother, she instead succumbs to a gradual decline into insanity.

Green Water, Green Sky was Mavis Gallant’s debut and is a quietly dazzling example of her masterful shifts in narrative perspective and her visceral exploration of displacement and exile.

‘Sublimely executed . . . a triumph.’ Sunday Post 

‘Exquisite . . . has all the pleasure and tantalising mystery of her greatest short stories.’ Financial Times

‘Funny, vivid and very sad.’ Times

‘Canadian Mavis Gallant is best known for her 1950s short stories but this debut novel gives longer form to her dark, emotionally astute prose.’ Daily Mail