Cloud Cuckoo Land
THE SUNDAY TIMES BESTSELLER AND NATIONAL BOOK AWARD FINALIST
‘A dazzling epic of love, war and the joy of books’ Guardian
‘Ingenious, hopefuly and totally absorbing’ Financial Times
‘Buoyant with humanity’ Daily Mail
When everything is lost, it’s our stories that survive
How do we weather the end of things? Cloud Cuckoo Land brings together an unforgettable cast of dreamers and outsiders from past, present and future to offer a vision of survival against all odds.
Constantinople, 1453:
An orphaned seamstress and a cursed boy with a love for animals risk everything on opposite sides of a city wall to protect the people they love.
Idaho, 2020:
An impoverished, idealistic kid seeks revenge on a world that’s crumbling around him. Can he go through with it when a gentle old man stands between him and his plans?
Unknown, Sometime in the Future:
With her tiny community in peril, Konstance is the last hope for the human race. To find a way forward, she must look to the oldest stories of all for guidance.
Bound together by a single ancient text, these tales interweave to form a tapestry of solace and resilience and a celebration of storytelling itself. Like its predecessor All the Light We Cannot See, Anthony Doerr’s new novel is a tale of hope and of profound human connection.
‘Wonderment and despair, love and destruction and hope – all find their place in its sumptuously plotted pages’ Observer
‘This engagingly written, big-hearted book is a must-read’ Daily Mirror
‘Serious novels are rarely this fun’ The Times
Praise for Cloud Cuckoo Land: -
”'Sets him comfortably alongside Tolkien, Rowling and David Mitchell, and he is a much more elegant writer than two of those … Cloud Cuckoo Land is an impressive achievement and a joy to read. Serious novels are rarely this fun.” - The Times
”'There is a kind of book a seasoned writer produces after a big success: large-hearted, wide in scope and joyous. Following his Pulitzer winner All the Light We Cannot See, Anthony Doerr’s Cloud Cuckoo Land is a deep lungful of fresh air - and a gift of a novel” - Guardian
”'A paean to stories as a source of sustenance and solace, and to the sweetness of our shared terrestrial home, Doerr’s narrative is buoyant with humanity and its author’s palpable pleasure in invention” - Daily Mail
”'A humane and uplifting book for adults that’s infused with the magic of childhood reading experiences. Cloud Cuckoo Land is ultimately a celebration of books, the power and possibilities of reading” - New York Times
”'Cloud Cuckoo Land is a fascinatingly ambitious tale that’s worth the seven year wait” - Stylist
”'Pulitzer Prize-winner Anthony Doerr’s new novel traverses time and space, unifying his characters through a text written by Diogenes in the first century AD. Cloud Cuckoo Land begins there and sweeps through the millennia in a huge, imaginative arc that celebrates the outsiders, the writers and the keepers of books. An ultimately hopeful and life-affirming novel about the essence of love, literature and art” - Irish Independent
”'This is a dazzling epic of love, war and the joy of books - one for David Mitchell fans” - Guardian
”'Wonderment and despair, love and destruction and hope - all find their place in its sumptuously plotted pages” - Observer