Fleeing the dark undercurrents of contemporary life in Britain, Hilary Byrd takes refuge in Ooty, a hill station in South India. There he finds solace in life's simple pleasures, travelling by rickshaw around the small town with his driver Jamshed and staying in a mission house beside the local presbytery where the Padre and his adoptive daughter Priscilla have taken Hilary under their wing.
The Padre is concerned for Priscilla's future, and as Hilary's friendship with the young woman grows, he begins to wonder whether his purpose lies in this new relationship. But religious tensions are brewing and the mission house may not be the safe haven it seems.
The Mission House boldly and imaginatively explores post-colonial ideas in a world fractured between faith and non-belief, young and old, imperial past and nationalistic present. Tenderly subversive and meticulously crafted, it is a deeply human fable of the wonders and terrors of connection in a modern world.
About the Author
Carys Davies is the author of the novel West and two collections of short stories, Some New Ambush and The Redemption of Galen Pike (published in Australia as the single collection The Travellers and Other Stories), which won the 2015 Frank O'Connor International Short Story Award and the 2015 Jerwood Fiction Uncovered Prize. She is also the recipient of the Royal Society of Literature's V. S. Pritchett Prize, the Society of Authors' Olive Cook Short Story Award and a Cullman Fellowship at the New York Public Library. Born in Wales, she lives in Lancaster in northwest England.
Industry Reviews
'Tender, playful, piercing, light-footed-this is an irresistible novel.' * Michelle de Kretser *
'A subtle, masterly treasure.' * Robbie Arnott *
'A compelling read. Carys Davies has an amazing gift for summoning up a place, a situation, the characters. Her skill is that of brevity, nailing a personality with a few lines of dialogue, saying most by saying least.' * Penelope Lively *
'A wonderfully written tale of subtle repetitions from multiple points of view set in India - it has the simplicity of fairy tale, the heft of fable and contains all the human sadness and joy of misfits.' * Bernard MacLaverty *
'An astonishingly assured and gripping piece of work and a worthy follow-up to West. Davies has a voice unlike any I've read: clean, otherworldly, eerily original, and capable of devastating effect.' * Julie Myerson *
'I felt, reading this extraordinary novel, that the thorough oddity of its chief characters, their strange innocence, amounts to a revolt, on our behalf too, against the stupidity, cruelty, fanaticism and bigoted violence of the world in which they more or less successfully live their eccentric lives.' * David Constantine *
'The Mission House is an absolute triumph. That rare type of book-resoundingly tender, and gently heart-wrenching. Carys Davies doesn't drop a sentence. I was deeply moved, and spellbound.' * Cynan Jones *
'Davies' lapidary prose is a marvel-she creates worlds in a few deft pen strokes.' * The Times *
'Brilliantly crafted...Having subtly prepared the ground, Davies finally springs the jaws of her plot, revealing, heartbreakingly, to us, and the tragically blinkered Hilary, what kind of story this really is.' * Daily Mail *
'A delicately political tale that keeps the real drama largely below the surface.' * Metro *
'Subtle with nuance and alive with immediacy, again adroitly using small-scale effects to enlarge understanding and extend empathy, the resulting novel is a masterly achievement.' * The Times *
'A novel about the pitfalls of human connection in contemporary India...An interesting take on a familiar trope...The Mission House truthfully reveals that the new realities of India will increasingly have their revenge on these tired old romances.' * Guardian *
'The Mission House puts [the genre of] Raj fiction to fresh purposes...the prevailing tone modulates between gentle humour and low key poignancy. The small, often dashed hopes of the under-privileged...are affectingly noted...Embroidered on a placard in the bungalow is the motto "Lean Not on Thine Own Understanding". It's a message that pervades the book. Misunderstandings and misinterpretations fatefully mesh. Sudden shifts into another's mind tilt things into unsettling new perspectives...Subtle with nuance and alive with immediacy, again adroitly using small-scale effects to enlarge understanding and extend empathy, the resulting novel is a masterly achievement.' * The Times *
'A delicately political tale that keeps the real drama largely below the surface, leaving the reader to gauge the extent of the protagonist's self-deluding solipsism.' * Metro *
'Brilliantly crafted...Having subtly prepared the ground, Davies finally springs the jaws of her plot, revealing, heartbreakingly, to us, and the tragically blinkered Hilary, what kind of story this really is.' * Daily Mail *
'This beautifully crafted story reveals the clash between old and new ways, imperial past and nationalistic present.' * Bookseller *
'Davies weaves her story with brevity and to devastating effect, drawing a portrait of an odd group of lonely people struggling to find a connection in a changing world' * Radio Times *
