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Cursed Bread

Cursed Bread

Longlisted for the Women’s Prize

Summary

GRANTA BEST OF YOUNG BRITISH NOVELISTS
LONGLISTED FOR THE WOMEN'S PRIZE 2023
LONGLISTED FOR THE NOTA BENE PRIZE 2024


From the Booker Prize-nominated author of The Water Cure comes a chilling new feminist fable based on the true story of an unsolved mystery . . .

'A shimmering fever-dream of a novel' Telegraph


Spring, 1951. Four people meet in a small French town: the baker and his wife; the ambassador and his wife. Two belong to the town, two are outsiders.

Some time later, strange things start happening. Horses drop dead in the fields. Children grow wild and unbiddable. Ghosts are sighted after dark. Someone is playing a dangerous game of cat and mouse – but who is the predator and who their prey?

Audacious and mesmerizing, Cursed Bread is a darkly erotic mystery about a town gripped by madness, envy like poison in the blood, and desire that burns and consumes.

'A dreamy sapphic romp' The Times

'Gauzy [and] gripping, a quietly rich maturation of Mackintosh's skill' Guardian

The Spectator Book of the Year 2023

Reviews

  • A shimmering fever-dream of a novel, teasing the reader [..] while finding a fresh narrative framework for the relationship between monotonous small-town life and repressed female desire. Cursed Bread contains more riches than many a novel twice its length
    Telegraph

About the author

Sophie Mackintosh

Sophie Mackintosh is the author of three novels: The Water Cure, Blue Ticket and Cursed Bread. Her debut novel was longlisted for the Man Booker Prize 2018 and won a Betty Trask Award 2019. Cursed Bread was longlisted for the Women's Prize 2023. She has been published in Granta, The White Review and TANK magazine among others.
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