Out Of This World

By Graham Swift

FROM THE BESTSELLING AUTHOR OF LAST ORDERS AND MOTHERING SUNDAY, reissued for the first time in Scribner

In 1972, Robert Beech, First World War veteran and prominent figure in the arms industry, is killed by a car bomb. The event cuts short the career of his son Harry, a news photographer, and comes close to destroying his granddaughter Sophie. Ten years later, Harry, now working in aerial photography, and Sophie, visiting an analyst in New York, remain scarred and divided by the event. Around their broken relationship and Harry’s memories of his truncated career and his father, the novel builds a story that is acutely private yet sweepingly public, at the heart of which lies Harry’s lifelong dedication of the camera.

Out of This World spans many of the twentieth century’s scenes of conflict, but also contains some of Graham Swift’s most achingly intimate scenes of personal confrontation—scenes that, powerful and haunting as photographs can be, no photographs can capture.

‘Deserves to be ranked in the forefront of contemporary literature’ New York Times

‘Superb, profound’ Sunday Times
 

• Language: English
• Publisher: Simon & Schuster
• Release date: Jul 11, 2019
• ISBN: 9781471187483

Graham Swift

Graham Swift was born in 1949 and is the author of eleven novels, two collections of short stories, including the highly acclaimed England and Other Stories, and of Making an Elephant, a book of essays, portraits, poetry and reflections on his life in writing. His most recent novel, Mothering Sunday, became an international bestseller and won The Hawthornden Prize for best work of imaginative literature. With Waterland he won the Guardian Fiction Prize, and with Last Orders the Booker Prize. Both novels were made into films. His work has appeared in over thirty languages.

Reviews for Out Of This World

[pilgrimjess · Rating: 2 out of 5 stars]

Set in 1982 just as a Task Force is sailing to the South Atlantic to repel the Argentinian invasion of the Falkland Islands, Out of this World is a family drama that features most of Britain's major conflicts of the 20th century and centres around two main characters; Harry Beech, a former war photographer, and his estranged daughter, Sophie. Harry served in the RAF during WWII whilst his father won a Victoria Cross in WWI and was the owner of a successful armaments factory until he is killed in a terrorist bomb blast. The coronation of Queen Elizabeth II and the first moon landing also make an appearance.Harry was a successful news photographer until packing it all in to live quietly in Dorset and is about to get re-married to a much younger woman. Meanwhile Sophie lies on a psychiatrist's couch in Brooklyn, venting her hostility towards her father and complaining about the short-comings of her own marriage to her analyst.Snippets of the family's history is revealed by Harry and Sophie alternately in flashbacks showing the power struggles and shifting loyalties within the family . These snippets aren't revealed chronologically but are gradually teased out seemingly at random rather than appearing in any particular order.This is my fifth book produced by this author but is almost certainly my least favourite. It lacks the evocative portrayal of the landscape, as seen in Waterland, despite Harry now being an aerial photographer working on an archaeological project. Similarly I didn't particularly like the way the story swung between the viewpoints of Harry and Sophie, never feeling that either was a particularly reliable as a narrator. This was certainly true with Sophie who appeared especially erratic. Harry is more credible but never really felt like a fully rounded character. After enjoying the author's other works that I've read I found this one rather disappointing.

[lynnb_64 · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

Graham Swift is one of my favourite authors because of his ability to write about people with such depth. He can write about monumental issues and ordinary lives that are lived because of, or in spite of, them. This book is no exception.This is the story of a war photographer, his estranged daughter and his arms manufacturer father. Harry, at 64, is thinking about his father's death years ago, is about to marry a much younger woman, and reaches out by letter to his estranged daughter, Sophie. Sophie is struggling to deal with the death of her grandfather, and her distant relationship with her father. This is a story of family, and the ties that persist despite everything. It is also a story of war; of the morality of arms making, and of photo-journalism. And these issues are part of what makes the relationships among Harry, Sophie and Robert so very complex.The book is sparsely written, and is something I will probably read again.

[steve38 · Rating: 2 out of 5 stars]

First published in 1988 and, interestingly enough, it shows. Estranged father and daughter tell their sides of the story in alternate chapters with the Grandfather butting in from time to time. As the father was a well known war photographer all the wars of the era are namechecked, Algeria, Vietnam, the Northern Ireland Troubles the Falkland Islands. A heavy topic but a bit of a lightweight treatment.

[adrianburke_1 · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

Interesting writer - deals more in feelings about events than the events themselves and then maybe the memories of those events. Therefore the plot is shared by different characters. But the bombing is never explained = should it have been?