Out in the Open
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- £4.99
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- £4.99
Publisher Description
'A...humane and very beautiful book'
Garth Greenwell, author of What Belongs to You
A young boy has fled his home. Crouched in his hiding place he hears the shouts of the men hunting him. When the search party has passed, what lies before him is an infinite, arid plain, one he must cross in order to escape those from whom he’s fleeing. One night he crosses paths with an old goatherd and from that moment nothing will ever be the same for either of them.
Out in the Open tells the story of a boy in a drought-stricken country ruled by violence. A closed world where names and dates don’t matter, where morals have drained away with the water. In this landscape the boy, not yet a lost cause, has the chance to learn the painful basics of judgement, or to live out forever the violence with which he grew up.
Winner of the European Union Prize for Literature 2016
PUBLISHERS WEEKLY
Carrasco's debut novel offers a vague, terrifying, and violent tale told in sparse, taut prose reminiscent of Cormac McCarthy. An unnamed boy is on the run from his harsh father and a sadistic bailiff. He flees into a vast, drought-riddled expanse in his unnamed country with a vague plan to simply get as far from home as possible. After he bumps into an old man with a small herd of goats and an overly friendly dog, the two become travelling companions, heading north to the mountains, where water is supposedly more prevalent. They endure sunstroke, dehydration, and the shocking cruelty of local authorities while slowly growing fond of each other despite their stoic reservations. Details are hazy, and although there are hints of a collapsed civilization barely hanging on after catastrophic climate change, the lack of specificity leaves little to focus on but brutality and survival. The boy's traumatic history appears as rapid, disconnected flashes, blunting the emotional impact. The violence will make some readers balk, but passages of lovely writing coupled with the jaw-clenching tension and moments of hope make this a welcome introduction a new voice.
