Description

A stunning collection of nine stories that teases out the delicate and difficult strands woven between mothers and sons.

‘Beautifully captured moments of longing and loss’ – The Guardian

‘Truly remarkable’ – Richard Ford

Mothers and Sons is a sensitive meditation on the dramas surrounding this most elemental of relationships. Psychologically intricate and emotionally incisive, each story focuses on a moment in which an unspoken balance shifts; in which a mother or son do battle, or experience a sudden crisis, thus leaving their conception of who they are subtly or seriously altered.

An acute, masterful and moving collection from Colm Toibin.

Part of the Picador Collection, a series showcasing the best of modern literature.

Read Long Island, the Sunday Times bestselling sequel to Colm Toibin’s beloved Brooklyn.

Publisher Review

Colm Toibin is a writer of extraordinary emotional clarity. Each of the nine stories is a snapshot of a point of crisis . . . Toibin perfectly understands the instantaneous nature of the ideal short story; the sense that the pen is going straight into a major vein. These are beautiful stories, beautifully crafted. — Kate Saunders * Literary Review * The last story in this excellent collection is a superbly powerful tale of betrayal and desertion. Quintessential Toibin. * Spectator * Moving . . . beautifully captured moments of longing and loss . . . Toibin is a subtle, intelligent and deeply felt writer. * Guardian * By turns surprising and illuminating, always beautifully written, Mothers and Sons places Toibin in the front rank of modern Irish fiction . . . It may not be going too far to suggest Irish fiction has found its first Master of the new century. * Scotland on Sunday * It’s truly remarkable that a writer of Toibin’s great felicity, immense seriousness and general large awareness – a writer so naturally gifted as a novelist – can deliver short stories of such subtle empathy and brilliance. He’s dazzling. — Richard Ford Toibin is a master of understated emotions. From wintry landscapes, bereft of human life, to crowded pubs filled with musicians, every scene has the ring of truth. * Mail on Sunday * All the stories share a miraculous density. Short but weighty, they contain whole lives. * Sunday Times * Subtly and exquisitely written, the language never forced but utterly rooted in real worlds. Each story is haunting and memorable. — Dermot Bolger * Evening Herald * Some of the most accomplished and nuanced soundings contemporary fiction has to offer. * New York Times *