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NOW A MAJOR NETFLIX SERIES starring Anya Taylor-Joy from Academy-Award nominee Scott Frank and BAFTA nominee Allan Scott

‘Superb’ Time Out
‘Mesmerizing’ Newsweek
‘Gripping’ Financial Times
‘Sheer entertainment. It is a book I reread every few years – for the pure pleasure and skill of it’ Michael Ondaatje
‘Don’t pick this up if you want a night’s sleep’ Scotsman

When she is sent to an orphanage at the age of eight, Beth Harmon soon discovers two ways to escape her surroundings, albeit fleetingly: playing chess and taking the little green pills given to her and the other children to keep them subdued. Before long, it becomes apparent that hers is a prodigious talent, and as she progresses to the top of the US chess rankings she is able to forge a new life for herself. But she can never quite overcome her urge to self-destruct. For Beth, there’s more at stake than merely winning and losing.

‘Few novelists have written about genius – and addiction – as acutely as Walter Tevis’ The Telegraph

Publisher Review

Walter Tevis's most consummate and heartbreaking work -- Jonathan Lethem Tevis was a great storyteller -- Lionel Shriver Walter Tevis is famous for writing The Hustler and The Man Who Fell to Earth, but this is my favorite book of his. It is about a girl who, guided by her somewhat unreliable mother, becomes a child prodigy at chess. Even if you do not know how to play chess, it is a great thriller * Literary Hub * A psychological thriller * NEW YORK TIMES * What Walter Tevis did for pool in The Hustler, he does for chess in The Queen's Gambit * PLAYBOY * More exciting than any thriller I've seen lately; more than that, beautifully written Don't pick this up if you want a night's sleep * SCOTSMAN * Mesmerizing * NEWSWEEK * The Queen's Gambit is sheer entertainment. It is a book I reread every few years - for the pure pleasure and skill of it Gripping reading . . . Nabokov's The Defense and Zweig's The Royal Game are the classics. Now joining them is The Queen's Gambit * FINANCIAL TIMES * Superb * TIME OUT *