Toby's Room

Toby's Room

Summary

From the Booker Prize-winning and Women's Prize-shortlisted author of The Silence of the Girls

The second novel in Pat Barker's acclaimed 'Life Class' trilogy - a dark and compelling examination of desire, friendship and the horror of war, from one of our greatest writers on war and the human heart

'Heart-rending... Toby's Room anatomises a world where extreme emotion shatters the boundaries of identity, behaviour, gender' Independent

'Once again Barker skilfully moves between past and present, seamlessly weaving fact and fiction into a gripping narrative' Sunday Telegraph


When Toby is reported 'Missing, Believed Killed', another secret casts a lengthening shadow over Elinor's world: how exactly did Toby die - and why? Elinor determines to uncover the truth. Only then can she finally close the door to Toby's room. Moving from the Slade School of Art to Queen Mary's Hospital, where surgery and art intersect in the rebuilding of the shattered faces of the wounded, Toby's Room is a riveting drama of identity, damage, intimacy and loss.

The Life Class trilogy:
Life Class
Toby's Room
Noonday

About the author

Pat Barker

Pat Barker was born in Yorkshire and began her literary career in her forties, when she took a short writing course taught by Angela Carter. She has published sixteen novels, including her masterful Regeneration Trilogy which includes the Booker Prize-winning The Ghost Road. The Silence of the Girls was shortlisted for the Women's Prize for Fiction and won an Independent Bookshop Award 2019. The Women of Troy was a number one Sunday Times bestseller. The Voyage Home continues the series.
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