The Great Fire

"Beauty is felt in almost every line of this austerely gorgeous work."—Chicago Tribune

"Stunning . . . Shirley Hazzard has gifted us, in The Great Fire, a novel of indispensable happiness and sorrow. I loved this novel beyond dreams."—Howard Norman, The Washington Post Book World

"A classic romance . . . the greatest pleasure is [Hazzard] subtle and unexpected prose."—Regina Marler, Los Angeles Book Review

"What better gift . . . than a novel that confirms the value of the individual—the individual heart, mind, spirit—even amidst the obfuscating demands of history and politics and culture . . . [The Great Fire] is a novel of incredible emotional wisdom, full of authentic characters, vivid places, and language that is both precise and beautiful."—Alice McDermott, Commonweal

"The Great Fire is a perfect book, without a superfluous word . . . radiant."—Eve Claxton, Time Out (New York)

"I wish there were a set of words like 'brilliant' and 'dazzling' that we saved for only the rarest occasions, so that when I tell you The Great Fire is brilliant and dazzling you would know it is the absolute truth. This is a book that is worth a twenty-year wait."—Ann Patchett, author of Bel Canto

"Shirley Hazzard has written an hypnotic novel that unfolds like a dream: Japan, Southeast Asia, the end of one war and the beginning of another, the colonial order gone, and at the center of it all, a love story."—Joan Didion

"A striking timeless novel with an aura of aged profundity . . . extraordinary [and arresting] . . . Flashes of violence cut through the contemplative narrative, but in her exquisitely cut sentences, Hazzard concentrates on the subtler movements of these hearts cauterized by violence. Her story is eerily quiet, filled with despair but also traces of hope, caught indirectly, as astronomers locate dark matter by the way it bends light."—Ron Charles, The Christian Science Monitor

"The Great Fire is a brilliant, brave and sublimely-written novel that allows the literate reader ‘the consolation of having touched infinity.' This wonderful book, which must be read at least twice simply to savor Hazzard's sentences and set-pieces, is among the most transcendent works I've ever had the pleasure of reading."—Anita Shreve

"The most interesting novel published this year . . . Exquisitely crafted . . . Every sentence hits its mark."—The Economist

"A new novel from Hazzard is a literary event. It's been two decades between the publication of The Transit of Venus and this magnificent book, but her burnished prose has not diminished in luster nor has her wisdom about the human condition . . . Hazzard writes gently, tenderly, yet with fierce knowledge of how a dearth of love can render lives meaningless. The purity of her sentences, each one resonant with implication, create an effortless flow. This is a quiet book, but one that carries portents well beyond its time and place, suggesting the disquieting state of our current world."—Publishers Weekly

"This almost indescribably rich story (which will remind many of Michael Ondaatje's The English Patient) moves from strength to strength, and no reader will be unmoved by its sorrowing, soaring eloquence. One of the finest novels ever written about war and its aftermath, and well worth the 23-year wait."—Kirkus Reviews