The Unlikely Pilgrimage of Harold Fry

Our book of the month is the hit novel from Rachel Joyce, which comes garlanded with praise (see some of it below). Rachel answered your questions about her book here.

It's the story of Harold Fry - who would be the first to admit that he could have been better prepared. He had no walking boots nor map, let alone a compass or a mobile phone. The least planned part of his journey, however, was the journey itself.

Leaving his wife hoovering upstairs, Harold nipped out to post a letter. He had no idea he was going to walk from one end of the country to the other until he started.

Wrestling with his past, not to mention the weather and all manner of strangers, Harold Fry is going to walk over five hundred miles in yachting shoes. And he is going to save a life.

It all starts when recently-retired Harold Fry sets out one morning to post a letter to a dying friend. Quite unexpectedly, in a moment of impulse, Fry finds himself at the start of an extraordinary journey which will lead him to walk hundreds of miles from home.

Tender, funny and heart-stopping, The Unlikely Pilgrimage of Harold Fry was longlisted for The Man Booker Prize 2012, shortlisted for the Desmond Elliott Award 2012 and has been sold in 40 countries worldwide.
 

About Rachel Joyce

Rachel has written over twenty original afternoon plays for BBC Radio 4 and has created major adaptations for the Classic series and Woman’s Hour, as well as a TV drama adaptation for BBC2. In 2007 she won the Tinniswood Award for Best Radio Play. Joyce moved to writing after a twenty-year career in theatre and television, performing leading roles for the RSC, the Royal National Theatre, The Royal Court and Cheek by Jowl; and winning a
Time Out Best Actress Award and the Sony Silver. She currently lives in Gloucestershire with her family and is at work on her second novel.

Rachel says:“This began as a radio play that I wrote for my father seven years ago when he was dying of cancer. I knew he would never hear it – and he didn’t – but there was so much I wanted to say about living, and dying, and letting go, and connecting too. The way two strangers can meet and somehow go away with a little piece of the other. How you keep going when you’ve lost hope."

Praise for The Unlikely Pilgrimage Of Harold Fry:

“From the moment I met Harold Fry, I didn't want to leave him. Impossible to put down.” Erica Wagner, The Times

"Deploying meticulously precise and deceptively light-as-air prose, Joyce takes Harold across the
bitter wastelands of regret to the sunlit uplands of emotional redemption with a clarity that is at times
almost unbearably moving." The Sunday Times

"Joyce has an unerring ability to convey profound emotions in simple, unaffected language... An
original, quietly courageous testament to the inhuman effort of being normal." Alfred Hickling, The Guardian

The free books have now gone but you can still get a copy from Amazon.