From Mark Haddon, the bestselling author of The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-Time, comes a dazzlingly inventive novel about modern family life.
Richard, a wealthy doctor, invites his estranged sister and her family to join his family for a week at a vacation home in the English countryside. Against the backdrop of a strange family gathering, Haddon skillfully weaves together the stories of eight very different people forced into close quarters. The Red House is a symphony of long-held grudges, fading dreams and rising hopes, tightly guarded secrets and illicit desires, painting a portrait of contemporary family life that is at once bittersweet, comic, and deeply felt.
Industry Reviews
"Absorbing. . . . Brilliant. . . . Haddon wends a careful path in this novel between the effervescent comedy of quirky families and the bitter tragedy of dysfunctional ones."
--The Washington Post "Haddon delivers a story of remarkable complexity, exploring the rich interior lives of his characters. . . . Impressive."
--USA Today
"Particularly fresh and true."
--O, the Oprah Magazine
"A chaotic but truthful portrait of what family means in this narcissistic age: less a cohesive whole than a group of individuals bumping against each other with their own needs, disappointments and . . . victories."
--The Seattle Times
"In this absorbing, Virginia Woolf-esque novel . . . an extended family gathers for a week in the English countryside. Perfect (or not) for that holiday with the in-laws." --People Magazine
"The story unfolds from all eight characters' points of view, a tricky strategy that pays off, letting Haddon dig convincingly into all of the failures, worries, and weaknesses that they can't leave behind."
--Entertainment Weekly
"Engaging. . . . The quality of the writing allows us to know this extended clan, who are on a week's holiday, better than they know each other."
--The Independent (London)
"The language of [The Red House] is wonderful--particular, vivid, attentive."
--The Plain Dealer
"Mark Haddon is terrifyingly talented."
--The Times (London)
"Each of the characters acts as a splintered bit of mirror for the others, so that the reader sees them all from multiple perspectives. . . . Satisfying and believable. . . . Haddon writes with a gentle, compassionate sense of irony."
--The Columbus Dispatch
"[A] hugely enjoyable, sympathetic novel. . . . It is a book of minor revelations and slow-release secrets."
--The Observer (London)
"Haddon peers inside the messy dynamics of a group of relatives, each grappling with their own fears and trying to make sense of themselves as a family. . . . [The novel] braids together themes of sexual identity, parental insecurity and sibling rivalry, and no one gets away unscathed."
--NPR
"Haddon delights in winkling . . . social misfits out of their natural habitats and thrusting them into very English comedies of discombobulation and befuddlement." --The New York Times
"[Haddon] writes like a dream. Never showy, but often lyrically descriptive, he takes the reader with him to the core of this crazy family. . . . He has a true understanding of the human heart."
--The Spectator (London)
