Zennor in Darkness
by Helen Dunmore
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In her prize-winning first novel, Zennor in Darkness, Helen Dunmore reimagines the plight of D.H. Lawrence and his German wife hiding out in Cornwall during the First World War. Spring, 1917, and war haunts the Cornish coastal village of Zennor: ships are being sunk by U-boats, strangers are treated with suspicion, and newspapers are full of spy stories. Into this turmoil come D. H Lawrence and his German wife, Frieda hoping to escape the war-fever that grips London. They befriend Clare show more Coyne, a young artist struggling to console her beloved cousin, John William, who is on leave from the trenches and suffering from shell-shock. Yet the dark tide of gossip and innuendo means that Zennor is neither a place of recovery nor of escape . . . 'Helen Dunmore mesmerizes you with her magical pen' Daily Mail 'A beautiful and inspired novel' John le Carré 'Secrets, unspoken words, lies that have the truth wrapped up in them somewhere make Dunmore's stories ripple with menace and suspense' Sunday Times Helen Dunmore has published eleven novels with Penguin: Zennor in Darkness, which won the McKitterick Prize; Burning Bright; A Spell of Winter, which won the Orange Prize; Talking to the Dead; Your Blue-Eyed Boy; With Your Crooked Heart; The Siege, which was shortlisted for the 2001 Whitbread Novel of the Year Award and for the Orange Prize for Fiction 2002; Mourning Ruby; House of Orphans; Counting the Stars and The Betrayal , which was longlisted for the Man Booker Prize 2010. She is also a poet, children's novelist and short-story writer. show lessTags
Recommendations
Member Recommendations
Becchanalia Both novels are written with a familiarity, understanding and love of the setting which is deeply felt in the perceptively evocative descriptions of Cornish coastal villages. The changes wrought on close-knit communities by events outside of their control are plotted on a smaller scale through the experiences of characters who have been brought up in the heart of their respective villages and who must choose between following their own path or taking the safer more insular one prescribed by their community. You will require a tissue for both!
Member Reviews
It's May 1917 in a small village by the Cornish coast. Cousins Clare and Hannah hear that Hannah's brother John William is coming home for leave before going to officer training. The visit, however, doesn't quite go how they expected. Elsewhere, the village gossips about the writer and his strange German wife living in a tiny cottage.
I enjoyed the book, its language and the characters, but felt it could have benefited from a tighter focus on Clare and her artistic ambitions.
I enjoyed the book, its language and the characters, but felt it could have benefited from a tighter focus on Clare and her artistic ambitions.
This is an amazing first novel by Helen Dunmore. It was hard to track down a copy but I perservered because I read that the setting is Cornwall during WWI (interesting time period) and that D.H.Lawrence (a favorite) and his wife are secondary characters. Dunmore captures the period and as far as I can remember about Lawrence (it's been awhile) his persona. Dunmore's switches in narrator flow smoothly. She convincingly captures the sense of place and time so that the reader feels the spray of the sea on the craggy inlets and feels the war's effect on all the characters.
A beautifully written re-imagining
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20th Century Literature
1,161 works; 55 members
Author Information
70+ Works 8,513 Members
Helen Dunmore was born in Beverley, England on December 12, 1952. She received a degree in English from the University of York in 1973. She taught English in Finland before moving to Bristol, England, where she taught literature and creative writing. She was a poet, novelist, and children's author. Her collections of poetry include The Apple Fall, show more The Raw Garden, and Inside the Wave. Her books include Talking to the Dead, Your Blue-Eyed Boy, House of Orphans, The Greatcoat, The Siege, The Betrayal, The Lie, and Birdcage Walk. She won the McKitterick Prize for debut novelists in 1994 for Zennor in Darkness, the inaugural Orange Prize for Fiction in 1996 for A Spell of Winter, and the Costa Award for Poetry in 2017 for Inside the Wave. She died of cancer on June 5, 2017 at the age of 64. (Bowker Author Biography) show less
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Common Knowledge
- Original title
- Zennor In Darkness
- Original publication date
- 1993
- People/Characters
- Clare Coyne; Francis Coyne; John William Treveal; D. H. Lawrence; Frieda Lawrence
- Important places
- Zennor, Cornwall, England, UK
- First words
- One faint shriek.
- Last words
- (Click to show. Warning: May contain spoilers.)He goes to the table, shoves the muddle of their things aside, pulls paper and pen towards him, and begins to write.
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- Members
- 231
- Popularity
- 141,591
- Reviews
- 5
- Rating
- (3.83)
- Languages
- Dutch, English, French
- Media
- Paper, Audiobook, Ebook
- ISBNs
- 13
- ASINs
- 2
