Pathways

(Hardback)

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Description

Cara is a dedicated neuroscientist with a research post at Cambridge. Heather is her almost-stepdaughter, drifting towards the end of school, trying to picture a future that fits her. Paul is Cara's partner and Heather's father - and when he suddenly disappears with no explanation, these two very different women, legally and biologically unrelated, need to figure out their place in each other's life.

Set in Cambridge and Las Vegas, each place in its way as artificial as the other, Pathways is about connections forged and connections failed, and how people struggle to understand themselves and each other. A novel of both the heart and the head, it is perceptive, wry and unexpectedly moving, a love story of deep originality and intelligence.

Reviews

Each of the stories are completely different from each other, but make a truly wonderful arc and a lovely whole. It's such a satisfying piece of work, and brave * Caroline Quentin, TV Book Club, praise for Girl Reading *
It's so delicately nuanced and as you go through each chapter, suddenly all the recurring themes start weaving themselves together so by the end chapter, I was so moved * Meera Syal, TV Book Club, praise for Girl Reading *
A debut of rare individuality and distinction. Katie Ward inhabits each of her seven scenes, her seven eras, with a fluent and intuitive touch, and sentence by sentence, deft and mercurial, she surpasses the readers' expectations. What is set down on the page has a rich and allusive hinterland, so that the reader's imagination has a space to work, and what is unsaid has its own fascination. The writing is full of light and shadow, alive with fresh and startling perceptions. Ward is wise, poised, and utterly original * Hilary Mantel, praise for Girl Reading *
A real wow of a first novel. The premise is alarmingly simple and yet somehow stunning ... It's a book packed full of adventures and stories and you completely lose yourself in them as Ward races from the 1300s into the future ... Each story is beautifully self-contained. This is the book's great strength: the perfect, separate, involving worlds it creates. Like [David] Mitchell, Ward is equally adept at shifting between completely different registers and voices. But though this novel is both technically accomplished and intellectually challenging, it doesn't show off and is not intimidating, which gives it a real beating heart ... her talent sings off the page * Viv Groskop, The Times, praise for Girl Reading *
A panel painting teeming with life ... Ms. Ward renders her settings in bright detail and shows her characters at captivating moments * Wall Street Journal, praise for Girl Reading *
An impressive debut ... each vignette is a masterfully drawn miniature * Telegraph, praise for Girl Reading *
Katie Ward's assured debut is inspired by that mysterious and provocative subject of a thousand visual images: a woman reading ... In each chapter Ward twists a story around real works of art. Her seven unpredictable tales serve up a lively, irreverent and even feminist journey through history * Time Out Book of the Week, praise for Girl Reading *
This isn't a novel - it's a time machine! Well, nearly. As each chapter transports you to a completely different century, you'll find yourself wondering if Ward has her very own Tardis ... I guarantee the stories will relate to your own life in some way * Cosmopolitan Book of the Week, praise for Girl Reading *
Not for Katie Ward the coming-of-age first novel starring a barely disguised over-sensitive heroine airing her resentments: Girl Reading reads as though its author is five books down. She has plunged straight into a series of difficult challenges, her handling of time and place accomplished with authority, skill and knowledge. If the basic idea is simple, reminiscent of the classic writing class exercise in which students are made to produce a tale inspired by an art postcard, the result is a complex showcase for Ward's talents * Joanna Briscoe, The Guardian, praise for Girl Reading *
This is a rich debut that fans of David Mitchell's Cloud Atlas will enjoy * Psychologies, praise for Girl Reading *

Author Bio

Katie Ward is the author of Girl Reading, which was a Cactus TV Bookclub selection, and was the recipient of the Clarissa Luard Award in 2013, for which she was nominated by Hilary Mantel. She has worked in the public and voluntary sectors and lives in Suffolk.