James Clarke, Hollow in the Land

Description

Out walking Ada Robinson’s dog while his wife drinks herself into a forgetful fug, Harry Maiden discovers an intricate system of caves beneath the wind turbines. Over at the Woolpack one night, Rosco re-encounters friendships he thought he’d left behind at the Stubbins paper mill. Mad old Gos leads a mysterious treasure hunt to the Bronze Age burial site at Whitelow Cairn. This is the Hollow in the Land: a corner of England teeming with mystery and intrigue and filled with real, flesh-and-blood characters, each of them at a different point along life’s journey through childhood hopefulness, faded first love and middle-aged disillusionment. Hollow in the Land uncovers the small everyday mysteries of their lives – and ours.

‘Full of insight, empathy and wry laughter’ ― Guardian

‘A joy to read . . . Like McGregor, Clarke is attuned to landscape in a way that is both mineral and metaphysical’ — Catherine Taylor, Times Literary Supplement

James Clarke grew up in the Rossendale Valley, Lancashire. His debut novel The Litten Path won the 2019 Betty Trask Prize. Hollow in the Land, a set of inter-connected short stories, appeared in 2020. He lives in Manchester.