Tragic Shores: A Memoir of Dark Travel by Thomas Cook

Tragic Shores: A Memoir of Dark Travel by Thomas Cook

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Summary

A memoir of a lifetime's travel to some of the darkest places on earth: a first work of non-fiction from this much-admired and award-winning crime writer

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Tragic Shores: A Memoir of Dark Travel by Thomas Cook

'I have come to thank dark places for the light they bring to life.' Thomas Cook has always been drawn to dark places, for the powerful emotions they evoke and for what we can learn from them. These lessons are often unexpected and sometimes profoundly intimate, but they are never straightforward. With his wife and daughter, Cook travels across the globe in search of darkness - from Lourdes to Ghana, from San Francisco to Verdun, from the monumental, mechanised horror of Auschwitz to the intimate personal grief of a shrine to dead infants in Kamukura, Japan. Along the way he reflects on what these sites may teach us, not only about human history, but about our own personal histories. During the course of a lifetime of traveling to some of earth's most tragic shores, from the leper colony on Molokai to ground zero at Hiroshima, he finds not darkness alone, but a light that can illuminate the darkness within each of us. Written in vivid prose, this is at once a personal memoir of exploration (both external and internal), and a strangely heartening look at the radiance that may be found at the very heart of darkness. 'A fascinating, troubling memoir from a fine writer' Mick Herron
A fascinating, troubling memoir from a fine writer -- Mick Herron * Geographical Magazine *
Tragic Shores is, in a way, not tragic at allIt is a love story, and a hymn to our ability to go on, in the face of the ultimate darkness * Times Literary Supplement *
Cook writes movingly, perceptively, fulfilling his assertion that "there is much to be gained where much has been lost" * Irish Times *
Sometimes it takes writing of great power to provide the insight into what it means to be human, as well our place on this planet. Thomas H Cook's Tragic Shores is one such work -- Ali Karim * Shots magazine *
Cook writes with a tender precision . . . a stunning and revelatory book that will haunt you for months to come * Catholic Herald *
A beautifully written and poignant memoir that will make you want to pack your bags and visit * Crime Review *
Evocative and emotional * Writing Magazine *
Every Thomas H Cook novel is a subtle mind game ... positively haunting * New York Times *
Cook can achieve a palpable, vivid sense of place, often in a few sentences, sometimes in a few words, while smoothly integrating the factual background data into his narrative * Bookbag *
Cook remains one of the most accomplished writers in the crime/thriller genre * Financial Times *
A suspense writer working at the top of his form * LA Times *
Cook's style is very quiet, reminiscent of Kazuo Ishiguro in its subtlety and understatedness * Historical Novel Society *
One of the best at what he does * Publishers Weekly *
One of our greatest chroniclers of the human heart * Goodreads *
Thomas H. Cook is one of North America's most respected crime writers. He won an Edgar award for his novel The Chatham School Affair and has been shortlisted for the award six times, most recently with Red Leaves (Quercus 2006). He lives in California and Cape Cod, Massachusetts.
SKU Unavailable
ISBN 13 9781849163262
ISBN 10 184916326X
Title Tragic Shores: A Memoir of Dark Travel
Author Thomas Cook
Condition Unavailable
Binding Type Hardback
Publisher Quercus Publishing
Year published 2017-04-06
Number of pages 384
Cover note Book picture is for illustrative purposes only, actual binding, cover or edition may vary.