The next book to be featured on the Sara Cox Radio 2 Book Club is Time of the Child, the heartfelt new novel from bestselling author Niall Williams. The book was released on 24 October and Niall’s interview with Sara is on BBC Sounds from Tuesday 3 December.
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We have an exclusive extract available for you to read.
Time of the Child
Doctor Jack Troy was born and raised in the little town of Faha, but his responsibilities for the sick and his care for the dying mean he has always been set apart from his community. A visit from the doctor is always a sign of bad things to come.
His youngest daughter, Ronnie, has grown up in her father’s shadow, and remains there, having missed her chance at real love – and passed up an offer of marriage from an unsuitable man.
But in the advent season of 1962, as the town readies itself for Christmas, Ronnie and Doctor Troy’s lives are turned upside down when a baby is left in their care. As the winter passes, father and daughter’s lives, the understanding of their family, and their role in their community are changed forever.
About the author
Niall Williams was born in Dublin. His bestselling fiction has been shortlisted for the Irish Times Literature Prize and longlisted for the Man Booker Prize, the Walter Scott Prize and the IMPAC Award. Williams’ debut novel Four Letters of Love has been adapted by the author for screen and will star Helena Bonham Carter, Pierce Brosnan and Gabriel Byrne. He lives in Kiltumper, County Clare.
A word from Niall
My writing life began with libraries. Once a fortnight my father would say he was going to the library after tea. I remember those car journeys in the dark, the excitement and anticipation, because I had long finished the books of two weeks ago and because once you stepped inside the doors of the library you were in an absolutely free space. Everything that was known about the world was on those shelves, I thought. You were in an exalted company of minds and imaginations, and by the age of fourteen I knew this was where I wanted to be. Not behind the desk, but on the shelf.
So, I am really delighted that Time of the Child has been chosen for the BBC Radio 2 Book club. Like This is Happiness before it, it is set once more among the ordinary and extraordinary people of the fictional west Clare parish of Faha. This time it is the Advent season of 1962, when, at the Christmas Fair, a baby is found. It is a story about love, about how when it arrives it is always a surprise, and demands that you rise to meet it. It is a book about community, how each of us must find a way to live with others, and the small acts of goodness that define our humanity.
I am deeply grateful to The Reading Agency and the Radio 2 Book Club for choosing it and for bringing more readers to Faha.
Get involved
To hear Niall’s interview, and all the author interviews and other Book Club features, subscribe to the BBC Sounds podcast.
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