The remarkable new work of fiction from the Booker Prize-winning author of Last Orders
Waterland and Mothering Sunday ' His archly modulated precise prose reminiscent at times
of his friend Kazuo Ishiguro's has lost none of its power ... immensely readable late-career
Swift from start to finish Twelve Post-War Tales is a marvel of the storyteller's art.'
Financial Times 'There can surely be no better contemporary writer to take on history's
circularities that Graham Swift. ... "Growing up in the 1950s there was all the evidence of
war." Swift has said. This beautiful cluster of stories shows how vital it remains in
recollection.' Observer 'Skilful generous and humane these 12 tales suggest the complexity
and heartbreak of being engaged on such an uncertain journey.' Guardian 'The characters in
this collection share their thoughts and memories with the reader as though with a close friend
and the warmth of their confidences balances against their sadness. We feel we've been in the
trenches with them even when a story has gone no farther than the living room.' Wall Street
Journal ' These stories depth charges of love anguish resentment each in their way relating
to the effects of WW2 are so good. Swift at his best - and he's on top form here - has the
humanity and wry humour of William Trevor' Patrick Gale 'Quite wonderful. Such grace and
clarity - I'm filled with admiration' Philip Pullman In the aftermath of the Second World
War Private Joseph Caan a young Jewish soldier stationed in Germany seeks the truth about
lost family members in the 1960s a father focuses on his daughter's wedding even as the Cuban
Missile Crisis brings the world to the brink of disaster in 2001 while planes fly into the
Twin Towers a maid working for US Embassy staff in London wonders if her birth on the day of
the Kennedy assassination shaped her life and at the height of a pandemic lockdown Dr. Cole
a retired specialist in respiratory disease returns to work and recalls a formative childhood
encounter with illness and much more. These are just a few of the challenged characters we meet
in Graham Swift's Twelve Post-war Tales . Tender humane funny and moving Swift's latest
work of fiction displays his quietly commanding ability to set the personal and the ordinary
against the harsh sweep of history. It is an outstanding achievement confirming his status as
one of the great and subtlest voices of our age.
