It's been a while since I've reacted as emotionally to a novel ... An epic the north has long deserved: ambitious, dreamy, earthy, dark, welcoming and not ... There are readers like me who will not just enjoy this book but feel deeply grateful for its existence

FINANCIAL TIMES

A millennium-spanning polyphonic flight through history ... Myers creates characters and voices so absorbing that when the timeline jumps forward you are reluctant to leave them, only for the next protagonist to become the centre of your world until it is time to move on again. A phenomenal achievement, Cuddy is by some distance my novel of 2023

NEW EUROPEAN

A visionary epic which covers a millennium of English history and employs poetry and prose, playscript and pastiche to trace the story of St Cuthbert, the building of Durham Cathedral and the contemporary northern landscape

GUARDIAN, Best books of the year

This bold, experimental novel, which uses poetry as much as prose, won this year's Goldsmiths prize

THE TIMES, Books of the Year

A polyphonic hymn to a very specific landscape and its people. At the same time, it deepens his standing as an arresting chronicler of a broader, more mysterious seam of ancient folklore that unites the history of these isles as it's rarely taught

OBSERVER

A visionary epic which covers a millennium of English history and employs poetry and prose, playscript and pastiche to trace the story of St Cuthbert, the building of Durham Cathedral and the contemporary northern landscape.

GUARDIAN, Books of the Year 2023