Benjamin Wood – författare

*LONGLISTED FOR THE BOOKER PRIZE 2025**WINNER OF THE NERO BOOK AWARDS 2025**WINNER OF THE WINSTON GRAHAM HISTORICAL PRIZE 2026**SHORTLISTED FOR THE WALTER SCOTT PRIZE FOR HISTORICAL FICTION 2026*'A huge talent' HILARY MANTEL'A magnificent writer' DOUGLAS STUART'One of the finest novelists of his generation' THE TIMESThomas lives a slow, deliberate life with his mother in Longferry, working his grandpa’s trade as a shanker. He rises early to take his horse and cart to the grey, gloomy beach to scrape for shrimp; spending the rest of the day selling his wares, trying to wash away the salt and scum, pining for Joan Wyeth down the street and rehearsing songs on his guitar. At heart, he is a folk musician, but it remains a private dream.When a striking visitor turns up, bringing the promise of Hollywood glamour, Thomas is shaken from the drudgery of his days and begins to see a different future. But how much of what the American claims is true, and how far can his inspiration carry Thomas?Haunting and timeless, this is the story of a young man hemmed in by his circumstances, striving to achieve fulfilment far beyond the world he knows.***MORE PRAISE FOR SEASCRAPER:'A book about dreams, an exploration of class and family, a celebration of the power and the glory of music, a challenge to the limits of realism, and - stunningly - a love story' BOOKER PRIZE 2025 JUDGES'It's a senuous treat, this novel . . . A language of the sea washes over every page' ROSS RAISIN'A tale so richly atmospheric you can almost taste the tang of brine and inhale the sea fog . . . [Wood] transforms the quotidian into the poetic, making the exactitude of each task sing on the page' GUARDIAN‘Wood is up there with the very best. He packs more poetry into his opening paragraph than many a Booker-winner achieves in their entire oeuvre’ JOHANNA THOMAS-CORR, THE TIMES'Seascraper shimmers, salt-flecked and rippling' SPECTATOR

*LONGLISTED FOR THE BOOKER PRIZE 2025**WINNER OF THE NERO BOOK AWARDS 2025**WINNER OF THE WINSTON GRAHAM HISTORICAL PRIZE 2026**SHORTLISTED FOR THE WALTER SCOTT PRIZE FOR HISTORICAL FICTION 2026*'A huge talent' HILARY MANTEL'A magnificent writer' DOUGLAS STUART'One of the finest novelists of his generation' THE TIMESThomas lives a slow, deliberate life with his mother in Longferry, working his grandpa’s trade as a shanker. He rises early to take his horse and cart to the grey, gloomy beach to scrape for shrimp; spending the rest of the day selling his wares, trying to wash away the salt and scum, pining for Joan Wyeth down the street and rehearsing songs on his guitar. At heart, he is a folk musician, but it remains a private dream.When a striking visitor turns up, bringing the promise of Hollywood glamour, Thomas is shaken from the drudgery of his days and begins to see a different future. But how much of what the American claims is true, and how far can his inspiration carry Thomas?Haunting and timeless, this is the story of a young man hemmed in by his circumstances, striving to achieve fulfilment far beyond the world he knows.***MORE PRAISE FOR SEASCRAPER:'A book about dreams, an exploration of class and family, a celebration of the power and the glory of music, a challenge to the limits of realism, and - stunningly - a love story' BOOKER PRIZE 2025 JUDGES'It's a senuous treat, this novel . . . A language of the sea washes over every page' ROSS RAISIN'A tale so richly atmospheric you can almost taste the tang of brine and inhale the sea fog . . . [Wood] transforms the quotidian into the poetic, making the exactitude of each task sing on the page' GUARDIAN‘Wood is up there with the very best. He packs more poetry into his opening paragraph than many a Booker-winner achieves in their entire oeuvre’ JOHANNA THOMAS-CORR, THE TIMES'Seascraper shimmers, salt-flecked and rippling' SPECTATOR

'Britain's answer to Donna Tartt' Sunday Times'A huge talent' Hilary Mantel'Was this how it was going to be for ever? Wrapping things for customers in womenswear, no conversation. Polishing the counters so her face reflected in the brass and sweeping floors at closing time until the boss said she could leave. How much worse off would she be if she went driving with a stranger for a while?'When sixteen-year-old Joyce Savigear absconds from work to go out with a man she barely knows, she hopes a new, exciting life is just beginning. But, two years later, she is waiting on a railway station in the tranquil English countryside. It's the summer of 1952 and she and her younger brother Charlie have just been released from borstal. Another fresh start awaits - but can Joyce ever outrun the darkness of her past?'What a writer' Richard Osman 'An involving tale of revenge and responsibility, which, while it devastates, also tells us that new lives can be built among the ashes' FT 'The Young Accomplice shows the difference between a book that slides down the surface of things, and one that digs its claws into you and sticks there' The Times

The debut novel from the 2025 Booker-longlisted author of Seascraper'One of the finest British novelists of his generation' Times'A huge talent' Hilary Mantel'Benjamin Wood is a magnificent writer and I intend to read everything he has written' Douglas Stuart'What a writer' Richard Osman'A stunningly good debut ... that will keep readers up all night' Steven Galloway, author of the Cellist of Sarajevo'The novel has at its lodestone Brideshead Revisited. Donna Tartt's The Secret History is also in the DNA here ... Readers will find themselves transfixed by this richly drawn cast of characters' IndependentBright, bookish Oscar Lowe has grown to love the quiet routine of his life as a care assistant at a Cambridge nursing home, until the fateful day when he is lured into King's College chapel by the otherworldly sound of an organ. There he meets and falls in love with Iris Bellwether and her privileged, eccentric clique, led by her brother Eden. A troubled but charismatic music prodigy, Eden convinces his sister and their friends to participate in a series of disturbing experiments. However, as the line between genius and madness begins to blur, Oscar fears that danger could await them all ...Benjamin Wood's brilliant debut novel will delight fans of The Secret History and Never Let Me Go. Praise for The Bellwether Revivals:'Read it. Quite a debut' Patrick Neate'Suffused with intelligence and integrity' Guardian'Effortlessly vivid ... Wood's confident, sometimes creepy novel draws you in ... and then, once you're inside, holds on, ever tightening the grip' Independent on Sunday'There's more than a hint of Donna Tartt's The Secret History about this novel … highly effective' Daily Mail

Get ahead! Medicine: 300 SBAs for Finals, fully revised and updated in this second edition, provides invaluable revision for all medical students preparing for finals exams through plentiful practice questions, similar to those you can expect in the real exam. It features:300 SBA questions written in a similar style to the Medical Schools Council Assessment Alliance (MSC-AA) bankExamples of harder stems for students aiming for honoursEponymous details and derivatives for added interestFull explanatory answers including succinct subject summariesCovering the entire syllabus in a clear and comprehensive style, this book provides reliable and effective revision practice to help you pass your final medical exams.

Get ahead! Medicine: 300 SBAs for Finals, fully revised and updated in this second edition, provides invaluable revision for all medical students preparing for finals exams through plentiful practice questions, similar to those you can expect in the real exam. It features:300 SBA questions written in a similar style to the Medical Schools Council Assessment Alliance (MSC-AA) bankExamples of harder stems for students aiming for honoursEponymous details and derivatives for added interestFull explanatory answers including succinct subject summariesCovering the entire syllabus in a clear and comprehensive style, this book provides reliable and effective revision practice to help you pass your final medical exams.

From the 2025 Booker-longlisted author of Seascraper'One of the finest British novelists of his generation' Times'A huge talent' Hilary Mantel'Benjamin Wood is a magnificent writer and I intend to read everything he has written' Douglas Stuart'What a writer' Richard OsmanShortlisted for the Sunday Times PFD Young Writer of the Year Award and the Encore Prize'Stunning... Wood has created one of the most moving and human characters in recent fiction' Emily St. John Mandel, author of Station ElevenThe mesmerising new novel from the acclaimed author of The Bellwether Revivals: a rich and immersive story of love, obsession, creativity and disintegration.On a forested island off the coast of Istanbul stands Portmantle, a refuge for beleaguered artists. There, a curious assembly of painters, architects, writers and musicians strive to restore their faded talents. Elspeth 'Knell' Conroy is a celebrated painter who has fled the dizzying art scene of 1960s London; on the island, she spends her nights wrestling with her elusive masterpiece. Then a disaffected teenager named Fullerton arrives at the refuge and disrupts its routines. He is plagued by nightmares that steer him into danger, and Knell is left to pick apart the chilling mystery: where did the boy come from, what is 'The Ecliptic', and how does it relate to their abandoned lives in England?Praise for The Ecliptic:'A novelist to watch' The Times 'A resounding achievement . . . Rich, beautiful and written by an author of great depth and resource' Edward Docx, Guardian'Full of suspense and beautifully written, superbly imagined and constructed . . . A terrifically gripping and playful book' Sunday Times'Exhilarating, earthy, cerebral, frank and unflinching . . . A masterfully paced and suspenseful read' Independent'A rich, intricate and layered work' Observer'Haunts the imagination long after the final page' Independent on Sunday

From the 2025 Booker-longlisted author of Seascraper'One of the finest British novelists of his generation' Times'A huge talent' Hilary Mantel'Benjamin Wood is a magnificent writer and I intend to read everything he has written' Douglas Stuart'What a writer' Richard Osman‘With his third novel, Wood’s talent has burgeoned spectacularly. The book is a tremendous achievement, an unputdownable domestic thriller that is also subtle and moving … travelling well beyond his earlier fiction, Wood has produced a tour de force that marks his creative arrival’ David Grylls, SUNDAY TIMES ‘A novel written from the gut, and with a correspondingly visceral power. A superbly unsettling account of trauma and cautious recovery’ SARAH WATERS'Elegant and disturbing … this is a novel of expertly woven tension and frightening glimpses into the mind of the deranged other’ John Burnside, GUARDIANThe acclaimed author of Seascaper, Benjamin Wood writes a novel of exceptional force and beauty about the bond between fathers and sons, about the invention and reconciliation of self – weaving a haunting story of violence and love.For twenty years, Daniel Hardesty has borne the emotional scars of a childhood trauma which he is powerless to undo, which leaves him no peace.One August morning in 1995, the young Daniel and his estranged father Francis – a character of ‘two weathers’, of irresistible charm and roiling self-pity – set out on a road trip to the North that seems to represent a chance to salvage their relationship. But with every passing mile, the layers of Fran’s mendacity and desperation are exposed, pushing him to acts of violence that will define the rest of his son’s life.Praise for The Ecliptic, shortlisted for the Sunday Times/PFD Young Writer of the Year Award:'A resounding achievement . . . Rich, beautiful and written by an author of great depth and resource' Edward Docx, Guardian'Full of suspense and beautifully written, superbly imagined and constructed . . . A terrifically gripping and playful book' Sunday Times'Exhilarating, earthy, cerebral, frank and unflinching . . . A masterfully paced and suspenseful read' Independent'A rich, intricate and layered work' Observer'Haunts the imagination long after the final page' Independent on Sunday 'A gorgeous and harrowing work' Emily St. John Mandel, author of Station Eleven

In 2014 the jihadists of the Islamic State of Iraq and Syria (ISIS) were consolidating their control over a vast area of the Middle East. They singled out the Yazidis, adherents of an ancient monotheistic religion, for annihilation. Unlike Christians or Jews, who were seen as "people of the book," Yazidis were classified as pagans and therefore subject to extermination. The men were to be executed and the women and children enslaved. In August ISIS fighters attacked Sinjar, an Iraqi city inhabited mostly by Yazidis. Some 50,000 panic-stricken civilians fled to Mount Sinjar in 110° heat with no food or water. The ISIS militants quickly surrounded the mountain and after several days people began to die of exposure, exhaustion, and dehydration.This is a history of the ISIS attack on the Yazidis and the American response, which represented the opening salvo in the war against ISIS. With a potential genocide looming, President Barack Obama ordered the U.S. military into action in order to save the thousands of men, women and children desperately calling for help from Mount Sinjar. While the U.S. Air Force dropped tons of food, water, and supplies to those stranded, U.S. Navy aircraft attacked ISIS positions at the base of the mountain. In the following months the United States assembled a coalition of nations which, along with Kurdish militias, eventually destroyed the Islamic State, saved the Yazidis and liberated millions from the brutal rule of ISIS.

In the second decade of the twenty-first century, Quakers are increasingly divided over matters of theology, religious belonging, and the status of Friends’ Christian past. Recent controversies over Theism, Non-Theism and Universalism have highlighted deep-rooted transformations of Quaker self-understanding. In contrast to earlier decades, many contemporary Quakers hanker after an intensely inclusive community, unhampered by the particulars of Christian theology. Many British Friends no-longer see the Quaker movement as an expression of the Gospel nor a manifestation of the Universal Church. What might Friends be missing by re-imagining Quakerism in these resolutely post-Christian terms? Author Benjamin Wood argues that, far from limiting the bounds of Quaker identity, a selective return to Quakerism’s seventeenth-century roots can restore to modern Liberal Friends a shared story capable of deepening their spiritual life and worship-practice. Based neither on doctrinal agreement nor inflexible religious borders, the Quaker narrative recovered in The Living Fountain: Remembrances of Quaker Christianity is drawn together by sacred experiments in mutual love and enduring hope. Through a series of extended reflections on God, Jesus, and the language of salvation, Wood seeks to uncover a dynamic faith ncommitted to universal healing, reconciliation, and the crossing of religious and cultural boundaries. At the centre of this retrieval is the insistence that the God revealed in Quaker worship cherishes our differences and delights in our diversity.