Love As A Stranger – Owen Marshall

READ FOR NZ BOOK AWARDS

Middle-aged strangers Sarah and Hartley meet by chance in an Auckland graveyard and arrange to have coffee. Sarah’s husband is undergoing cancer treatment. They begin an affair which soon turns into an obsession.

◉ “I loved this book from the very first sentence. The deceptively simple storyline was strung out at such a perfect pace, the slow reveals were done so well and it was just a great read. The sense of foreboding was there early on in the book and I loved it. My one quibble…. one of the characters was in Auckland (from Hamilton) for medical treatment. Would this really be necessary?? Waikato is a tertiary hospital and should be able to do all of this treatment. Hmmm, evidently I’m a health nerd. Anyway, fantastic book and would definitely recommend.” – Suzy

◉ “Love As A Stranger is about just that. Strangers who meet and begin an affair. And really, that just about sums it all up. It’s not a complicated plot. But there is so much more to it. It is a moody, suspenseful book with a simmering dread underlying it. Everything is perfectly explained and described viscously as if the author is actually a character in the book describing everything he sees. I hated to put this book down, as if the characters’ lives would continue on without me. My only disappointment was the urgency of the ending. I expected more earlier on. But that’s just me and it wouldn’t stop me recommending this fantastically written novel.” – Rachel

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Published 2016
Penguin Random House
286 pages