by Sarah Moss (Author)
A team of six archaeologists from the United States, England, and Scotland assembles at the beginning of the Arctic summer to unearth traces of the lost Viking settlements in Greenland. But as they sink into uneasy domesticity, there is news of an epidemic back home, and their communications with the outside world fall away. Facing a Greenland winter for which they are hopelessly ill-equipped, Nina, Ruth, Catriona, Jim, Ben, and Yianni, knowing that their missives may never reach their loved ones, write final letters home. These letters make up the narrative of Cold Earth, with each section of the book composed of one character's first-person perspective in letter form.
In this exceptional and haunting debut novel, Moss weaves a rich tapestry of personal narrative, history, love, grief, and naked survival. Cold Earth is both a heart-pounding thriller and a highly sophisticated novel of ideas.
Author Biography
Sarah Moss is a novelist, travel writer and academic. She teaches Creative Writing in the English Department at University College Dublin and is a Fellow of the Royal Society of Literature. Moss has written seven novels, Ghost Wall, The Tidal Zone, Signs for Lost Children, Bodies of Light, Night Waking, and Cold Earth. Ghost Wall was shortlisted for the RSL Ondaatje Prize and the Polari Prize, and longlisted for the Women's Prize, and The Tidal Zone, Signs for Lost Children, and Bodies of Light were shortlisted for the Wellcome Book Prize, in 2017, 2016 and 2015 respectively.