The Water Cure: A Novel

Sophie Mackintosh

Jan 2019 · Penguin Random House Audio · Kuchazwe ngu-Hannah Murray, Gemma Whelan, ne-Morfydd Clark

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“A gripping, sinister fable!” —Margaret Atwood, via Twitter

ONE OF THE BEST BOOKS OF THE YEAR:
NPR • GLAMOUR • GOOD HOUSEKEEPING • LIT HUB • THRILLIST

King has tenderly staked out a territory for his wife and three daughters, Grace, Lia, and Sky. Here on his island, women are protected from the chaos and violence of men on the mainland. The cult-like rituals and therapies they endure fortify them from the spreading toxicity of a degrading world.

But when King disappears and two men and a boy wash ashore, the sisters’ safe world begins to unravel. Over the span of one blistering hot week, a psychological cat-and-mouse game plays out. Sexual tensions and sibling rivalries flare as the sisters are forced to confront the amorphous threat the strangers represent.

A haunting, riveting debut, The Water Cure is a fiercely poetic feminist revenge fantasy that’s a startling reflection of our time.

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SOPHIE MACKINTOSH won the 2016 White Review Short-Story Prize and the 2016 Virago/Stylist Short-Story competition, and has been published in Granta magazine and Tank magazine, among others. The Water Cure is her first novel.