Beautifully written, both poetic and powerful. Set in the Yorkshire countryside it it describes a family who do not fit in to the norm and a father who is doing his best to protect them. Highly recommend. Thank you to Net Galley for an ARC.

Worthy of the accolades. A beautiful and rare book! Normally my tastes are more commercial but I really loved this book and I think it will stay with me for a long time.

Daniel is on the road, following the railway tracks north, looking for his sister. For a while they lived an idyllic sort of life - him, Daddy, and older sister Cathy - in a house Daddy built himself in a small patch of unwanted isolated woodland. They lived almost completely 'off grid', hunting and foraging for food, having little to do with folk in the nearby village. At home their life was one of peace and simplicity but away from it, Daddy's life was one of violence, clandestine prize-fights and acting as a 'fixer' when debts weren't paid. When these two worlds collide, someone's bound to get hurt ...


Daddy's 'occupation' allows him to live on the fringe of society, but the 'real' world can't be ignored forever, and the woodland idyll is threatened by folk who care about law, property ownership, and their rights. Piece by piece, Mozley raises the tension, building a great sense of brooding violence in which you feel almost anything could happen, and Daddy is backed into a corner with only one way to respond.

It's a story rather reminiscent of a Martin McDonagh script - folk going about their day to day lives getting caught up in violence outside their control - or one in which a retired hitman is called on to do one last job, with devastating consequences to his family, mashed up with a Robin Hood style tale of the 'little man' trying to overcome those with land and the backing of law.
The peaceful existence in the wood jars harshly with the outside world, and Mozley seems equally at home bringing both to life on the page - a delight when the reader's experiencing the woodland through Daniel's eyes, a horror when violence erupts.
Things start a bit slowly, with lots of back story and I wondered where the plot was going, and how long it might take. To be honest, there were times when I nearly gave up ... but then the beautifully descriptive writing caught me, and the sharks started to circle Daniel's little bit of heaven, waiting for the first opportunity to oust his family, and I found it a book I couldn't put down.
4.5 stars

A family living on the fringe of society. A single parent, the father, looking after his daughter and son who are about 13 and 9 respectively. They both look up to their Dad, though he has earnt his living fighting in nonprofessional fights, with heavy betting. His wife walked out on the children and Dad leaving with no explanation, since when the Dad has tried to build a home for the children on a plot of land that once belonged to the mother/family before the mother sold it off under questionable circumstances. The Dad tried to survive without fighting, trading his skills/produce instead. However, the landowner pulls the father back into the underworld of fighting by saying he would give the land to the son if the father fought and won. The landlords son is murdered and suspicion is cast onto the Dad.
An unusual slant on life, with violence graphically described ! The book comes to a sudden ending, which came as a surprise to me and the ending left me wanting.

This was chosen as our book club pick for this month, so was thrilled to be accepted to read it on Netgalley. A story set in fairly modern day Yorkshire, although written as if in the deep south of America 50 or more years ago. The style suited the story, although I kept forgetting where it was. The first half of the story was rather slow and I could have stopped reading at any point. Hoped for big things of the end but all seemed quite melodramatic. Some lovely descriptions but felt like Something was lacking. I'm interested to see what other members of the group thought.

Very much a book of two halves, Elmet initially presents an oddly idyllic family life, which rejects much of the modern world and the money economy. When needed, cash derives from the widowed father's occasional bare knuckle fights.

But a devil appears in paradise and leads to a second half of raw violence which does at times feel like being kicked somewhere between the belly and the mind.

The teenage son tells the story with an imperfect understanding, leaving room for the imagination to come into play. A teenage daughter is central but mysterious.

Absolutely recommend

This story is narrated by Daniel, who lives in a copse in woods somewhere in rural Yorkshire with his sister and their 'Daddy'. Daddy is a fearsome mountain of a man and earns a living by bare knuckle fighting, occasional labouring and a bit of debt collecting. He built the family home in the woods with his own hands. It is not an unhappy life, despite the isolation and Daddy's questionable career choices, and the little family live fairly untroubled. But nothing good lasts forever.

A large part of the story isn't pretty, in fact for the most part it is downright dirty and brutal. But it is beautifully written and although the book is set in recent times it has a somewhat older feel.

I enjoyed this book but for such a short novel I felt that a lot of pages were taken up with minute details and descriptions, particularly early on, making the actual story slow to get going, but it does then pick up a lot in the second half. Despite my slight reservations this is still an extremely atmospheric and richly detailed tale about family life and growing up, and revenge.

This was okay, but I feel like a lot of the more important parts that made others rate it higher was lost on me. I think the writing was interesting, but I'm unsure if I'll read anything else this author does.

I have been wanting to read this for some time and when I heard it had been longlisted for the Womens Prize for fiction I was desperate to start it. It was a dark but addictive read with fascinating characters and intricate plots. Really enjoyed

Thank you to NetGalley for my copy of Elmet

This novel is so beautifully written. I totally got lost in the prose and descriptions. I thought it was a really original idea for a story. Mainly a family saga with elements of fairy tale, coming of age and a really brutal unexpected ending. This is a novel that will stay with me for a long time.

What a wonderful, beautifully written book! Loved it so much, gave me goosebumps.
it contradicts the established canon of British nature writing as a nostalgic retreat into a rural fairyland. Nature as fond mother cradling and redeeming the sinners (sorry, Amy Liptrot) or close observation of natural phenomenon as if to document its universal appeal (Melissa Harrison, whose work I enjoy a lot). Mozley writes sensitively about the tranquility and beauty of the countryside, but this is a landscape under siege from the brutality of developers, large-scale farmers, supermarkets and progress more generally.

3.5 stars

Elmet is a book I have been meaning to read for a while, and I am that I eventually got to it thanks to Netgalley sending me a free ebook proof.

I greatly enjoyed many aspects of Elmet. The writing is beautiful and really cement the setting in your mind. In contrast I did find some of the secondary characters, such as Price, a little flat but as the story is told from the point of view of a 14/15 year old boy I can forgive that to an extent and assume Daniel doesn’t know much about Price beyond what he has been told or seen for himself.

I love wild settings and I think that many of us long to shuck of the bounds of modern live and retreat to simple lives in the woods. Elmet is described beautifully, a place half way between the modern (1980s) world and something more ancient. Mozley focuses in on small details about the trees, animals and everyday tasks. Layering up her story. Her characters are made solid through simple descriptions. The story winds and moves back and forth between now and the past as Daniel goes over why they moved to the woods, life before, life now. Some things are left unexplained because it was never explained to him, such as his mother remaining a mystery throughout.

My main issues with Elmet were that because this is all Daniel’s perspective the language sometimes jarred. Daniel has very little education, and yet he comes out with intelligent, beautiful and insightful observations. The narrative sometimes slipped away from being Daniel’s and became the author’s, if that was what they wanted then perhaps first person wasn’t the best choice? I also occasionally had to check how old Daniel was, especially towards the very end. This happens with other characters too and would cause me to pause and go back to check who was speaking because it jarred.

There are some awful events within the novel and due to the ambiguous nature of the ending I was frustrated that no one really addressed these issues? Characters are sexually assaulted, physically assaulted and murdered. The main character is a child. The novel is open ended and ambiguous. I was left feeling a little dissatisfied and uncomfortable. I wanted someone to condemn what was happening, but no one really does.

http://www.goodreads.com/review/show/2398151404‬

Daniel and Cathy live with their father in Elmet, a fictitious location in Yorkshire. Their mother is not present in the tale but is referred to as having been unable to cope with family life and her absence is often felt as the trio cope with the prejudice that comes their way as a result of their off-grid life. This book was deservedly shortlisted for the Man Booker prize in 2017 and is one of the most beautifully written stories I have read in some time. I reread many of the passages as they so lyrically evoked the landscape and relationships. Apart from the occasional mention of modern day inventions (TV, car etc.) this book could have been set at any time and that is perhaps intentional to demonstrate the ways in which humans can be cruel to other humans in any time and place. As I read it I was reminded of Wuthering Heights, such is the evocation of Yorkshire created by the author. The tale is told in two time frames, starting with Daniel moving north, searching for something and moving back and forward in time between this search and his earlier teenage years with Cathy and his father. The reader knows that something bad has happened and the tension builds gradually to reveal what these events have been. This is a story of family love and loyalty against the odds. I have recommended highly to others and will re-read for the pleasure of the prose.
I received a complimentary copy of this book from the publisher via Net Galley in return for an honest review and went on to purchase a hardback copy to take pride of place on my bookshelves.

Gripping from the start and well told. Creates a compelling world. I read it in two sittings. Recommend.

I can without a doubt see why Elmet by Fiona Mozley was nominated for an award. The way in which this story was written had the power and presence of an orchestra. Sweet, sweet music, ambling along at perfect pace, flowing and describing and setting the scene. The characters were the boom from the cymbals, the mighty beat of drums, and in contrast, the delicate poignancy of a triangle.

As you can probably tell, this story totally GOT ME. Such simplicity, and yet, it was INCREDIBLE.

Elmet is contemporary fiction at its best. This story has a heart, and it made mine beat in unison with it.

Where it takes me is old world, english folk traditions and traveller codes. Globalisation, social media and Wetherspoons makes it easy to forget the lawless and isolated nature of the UK's rural communities. I don't particularly celebrate this way of life but I have never seen it portrayed in fiction before- children having to fend for themselves and an anti hero father figure is not original but together with this backdrop of violence and ideas around land rights I loved it.

It was ok i guess. It took me absolutely ages to trawl through it because i constantly lost interest and found something better to do.

Elmet was quite stressful-taunt and tense plot with a sheltered narrator and as the reader you knew it was all going to implode amidst this prose that held gems of expression.

"‘Means nothing to me.’

‘I can help,’ I said tentatively.

He shook his head. ‘No, lad, it’s not that. I can read well enough to understand what it says. It’s idea a person can write summat on a bit of paper about a piece of land that lives and breathes, and changes and quakes and floods and dries, and that that person can use it as he will, or not at all, and that he can keep others off it, all because of a piece of paper. That’s part which means nowt to me.’"

Amongst a list of hotly tipped books, big-hitters, former shortlistees and award winners, Elmet, the debut novel of Fiona Mozley, was the surprise inclusion on the 2017 Man Booker longlist. Indeed the only Goodreads review of the book at the announcement date was from an advanced reader credited in the author’s afterword.

Elmet isn’t a striped elephant from a children’s book but rather, per a quote from Ted Hughes Remains of Elmet, which serves as this novel’s epigraph:

"Elmet was the last independent Celtic kingdom in England and originally stretched out over the vale of York … But even into the seventeenth century this narrow cleft and its side-gunnels, under the glaciated moors, were still a ‘badlands’, a sanctuary for refugees from the law"

Nowadays the Elmet name is primarily known (at least to those of us interested in UK politics) for the Elmet and Rothwell constituency, one swinging increasingly to the Conservative party as working class communities are displaced by commuters into Leeds.

So was Elmet worthy of its place amongst such illustrious company on the Booker list....

It is certainly an original and intriguing read.

Mozley’s novel is set in or near the present time – the text is oddly timeless but the references to the Bosnian and Iraq conflicts and Pendelino trains provide some clues.

Daniel (almost 14) and Cathy (15), having lived for years with their maternal grandmother, move with their father to a house he is constructing deep in a copse:

"Now pocked with clutches of trees, once the whole county had been woodland and the ghosts of the ancient forest could be marked when the wind blew. The soil was alive with ruptured stories that cascaded and rotted then found form once more and pushed up through the undergrowth and back into our lives. Tales of green men peering from thickets with foliate faces and legs of gnarled timber. The calls of half-starved hounds rushing and panting as they snatched at charging quarry. Robyn Hode and his pack of scrawny vagrants, whistling and wrestling and feasting as freely as the birds whose plumes they stole. An ancient forest ran in a grand strip from north to south. Boars and bears and wolves. Does, harts, stags. Miles of underground fungi. Snowdrops, bluebells, primroses. The trees had long since given way to crops and pasture and roads and houses and railway tracks and little copses, like ours, were all that was left. Daddy and Cathy and I lived in a small house that Daddy built with materials from the land here about. He chose for us a small ash copse two fields from the east coast main line, far enough not to be seen, close enough to know the trains well."

Their father is a giant of a man, the most feared bareknuckle fighter in all of England, taking on all comers in illegal prize fights the length and breadth of the land.

"The slap of shoes against the mud. Men stamping and rubbing their hands. Daddy and the Bear, their fists in guard. Barking dogs. Spitting men. A sticky wind. Ancient oaks arching their backs to cover the scene. The scent of diesel. Diesel, dirt, sweat, blood, burning meat, the sugars dripping from fried onions. A ring of men standing above rings of mushrooms, connected and hidden beneath the earth, and then rings of limestone."

The first half of the novel sets the scene for their unconventional life. They aren’t travellers, but neither are they conventional members of society, largely wanting to be just left alone. Even when living with their grandmother they didn’t really fit in at school, bullied by the other children, and Daniel’s mind often turns back to a time when his sister fought back against some boys tormenting them.

"I wondered if she thought about it too. Or if the boys did. Or if any of the other small people at the far reaches of my recollection spent the time that I had thinking about the bits in which they played a part. It seems to me that so much of everything came from this, and that if anyone thought about moments like this enough, the future would be done before it had even started, and I mean that in a good way."

Although Daniel and Cathy were the victims. and the bullies got what they deserved, when the boys complain to their parents, the headmistress takes the boys side. Summoned with Daniel and Cathy to her office, Daniel is disappointed that his father accepts the headmistress’s guilty verdict against Cathy, despite knowing her to be wholly justified in their actions:

"Mrs Randell’s assessment was simply the way people saw things, he told us. It was the way the world was and we just had to find methods of our own to work against it and to strengthen ourselves however we could".

Cathy responds:

"They were so nasty to me, Daddy. Not the pain, Daddy, I dindt mind that, but the way they made me feel inside. No matter what I do, I can never win.

‘You did though. You fought them and beat them. You protected your little brother. What more could you do?’ Daddy ran his hands through his hair and then his beard as if searching for an answer there.

‘I mean it doendt matter, does it? I mean that things will always be as they are now. I mean that there will always be more fights and it will just get harder and harder. I feel like I’ll never just be left alone.’"

And as they live in their woodland home, their father brings them up to regard themselves as alone and needing to strengthen themselves rather than rely on others, an approach that Cathy wholly embraces:

"Cathy took Daddy deadly seriously in his attempts to train us against the world. She found a kind of solace in his tasks. She wanted to be every inch of him but believed what he said about how different she was, about how she had to be good at different things, how she had to find a different way of surviving.
[...]
Everything he did now was to toughen us up against something unseen. He wanted to strengthen us against the dark things in the world. The more we knew of it, the better we would be prepared. And yet there was nothing of the world in our lives, only stories of it. We had been taken out of our school and our hometown to live with Daddy in a small copse. We had no friends and hardly any neighbours. We obtained a form of education from a woman who dropped books lazily into our laps from a library she had developed to suit only her tastes and her own way of thinking."

This woman is Vivien, an old acquaintance of their father’s but very different, living a much more conventional lifestyle. When they are first taken into account, Daniel’s sees her living room: the detailed recollection that he sets out (of which this is only part) is typical of his narration in the novel, perhaps relating to the aforementioned desire to remember things in detail, although the words don’t always ring true in the character’s mouth (and at times feel a little like padding):

"There was a deep sofa covered by worn blue velvet, with two large sitting cushions. They dipped to meet each other in the middle but were still quite plump at their outer edges. There was a blanket on one of the arms with a scene stitched together with red and white wool but obscured by the folds. There was a carpet atop a carpet, one grey and fitted to the size and shape of the room, and one a set rectangle with tassels on the two shorter edges and a pattern of lines and angles that I would have sat down on and traced my fingers over were I younger or alone."

Daniel seems to be tempted towards the different lifestyle that he glimpses in his visits to their house, whereas Cathy can’t settle down to study:

"I came to prefer the inside to the outside, the armchair, the blankets and cushions, the tea and the teacakes, the curtains and the polished brass, and Vivien’s books, and the comfort of it all. And while I sat and read and drank tea, Cathy walked or ran through the fields and woods and, in her own way, she read the world too."

The differences between Cathy and Daniel, and Cathy’s greater affinity to their father, extend to a theme of gender confusion. Daniel is the homemaker, which causes his father some amusement:

"‘Why am I funny?’ I asked.
‘Don’t know. You like making house nice and that.’"

And Daniel himself remarks that he never really thought about gender:

"You have to appreciate that I never thought of myself as a man. I did not even think of myself as a boy. Of course, if you had asked me I would certainly have replied that that was what I was. It is not as if I had ever actively rejected that designation. I just never thought about it. I had no reason to think about it. I lived with my sister and my father and they were my whole world. I did not think of Cathy as a girl nor as a woman, I thought of her as Cathy. I did not think of Daddy as a man, though I knew that he was."

Various people remark that Daniel more resembles his absent mother, both in looks but even fashion sense, which they sometimes mean as a compliment and others an insult, depending on their view of his father. Daniel admits:

"I have to admit, I wore my clothes in this manner because I had seen my mother wearing her clothes in this manner. I wore those little T-shirts and those too-tight jeans and I left my midriff bare because I had seen my mother do this. And nobody corrected me. Or nobody noticed. Or it did not matter. Or I do not know what."

The second half of the book takes a more political turn and one that mirrors the author’s own interests and concerns about property ownership.

They are visited by Mr Price, a rich local landowner. He turns out to own the land on which Daniel’s father had built his house, although the land had been formally owned by Daniel’s mother who first inherited it but then sold it to Price when she had financial problems. Price also turns out to have had a fancy for Daniel’s mother before she eloped with Daniel’s father, who at the time worked for Price as both a prize-fighter and also a hired enforcer.

Price is not treated sympathetically in Daniel’s account:

"Mr Price was the sort of man who accelerated his car when pedestrians crossed the road.
[... He] had a few cars but drove his blue Peugeot saloon when visiting tenants. The ones who paid in cash. The rest did informal work for him on his land or elsewhere. They paid their rents through this work. He preferred it that way. That way he did not have to organise wages and they were his to run like dogs. For the most part he had inherited the land he owned.
[...]
Daddy said that Mr Price just hated to feel the weight of helplessness. To interfere with the lives of others was to carve for himself a presence in the world. Mr Price detested that which he could not control. We lived here on his doorstep yet he had no access to our lives. We did not pay him rent, we did not work for him, we did not owe him any favours. And so he feared us."

The family start to become involved in the local community, seeking information on the exploitation of both local tenants and also the casual workers by the local landowners, led by Price:

"There was little to be had around here. The jobs had gone twenty years ago or more. There was just a couple of warehouses where you could get work shifting boxes into vans. At Christmas-time there were more boxes and more vans but still not enough. There were jobs here and there for women: hairdressing jobs, nannying jobs, shop-assistant jobs, cleaning jobs, teaching-assistant jobs if you had an education. But if you were a man and you wanted odd jobs or seasonal farm work this was where you met."

The workers tell them how they labour for illegally low wages, while claiming benefits. Indeed the only good thing said about Price is that he will at least give you time off to report to the job centre, except:

"‘He’ll go and dob you in if you cause a fuss. He’ll go and tell job centre you’ve been working for him and he’ll rustle up some bits of paper he says he’s been giving you all along. Payslips and legal stuff. Stuff you’ve never seen before in your life but then it’s suddenly there and it’s your own fault for claiming benefits and for not paying tax or summat, all in one go. Happened to Johnno.’
‘Happened to Tony.’
‘Happened to Chris, and all.’
‘Bastard.’ "

Similarly the locals complain that their landlords collect the rent but, unlike the council for their tenants, provide no services such as repairs to the property:

"It’s land. Only land. I’m paying to live on a piece of land that we, all of us, used to own together. And I’m working as hard as I ruddy can to get enough money to pay for that land that we, all of us, used to own together. And I can’t see reason for any of it, any more.’"

They, together with a local called Ewart, start to lead an orchestrated fightback, by collectively withdrawing their labour and withholding their rent, appealing to the times when the workers had strength and power through withdrawing their rent. Although Vivien slightly punctures their pomposity:

"I saw that Vivien had been standing with us. She looked at Ewart uncertainly. I was not sure if they knew each other but before I made to introduce them, she spoke. ‘It wasn’t all that wonderful, all the time. Those men who would come together so naturally to support one another would go home drunk and beat their wives.’ Ewart was caught for a moment.

Vivien continued, ‘There are dreams, Ewart, and there are memories. And there are memories of dreams.’"

But following initial success, Price and his men fightback, literally, and the struggle ends in a violent and bloody (and to be frank, rather over the top) conclusion, causing Daniel to flee his house and then desperately try to find his sister, walking along the train line to Edinburgh. This story of his search is told not at the end, but rather in brief interspersed chapters.

Elmet is certainly a very strong debut novel and the Booker jury are to be credited with having bought in to our attention – it’s certainly much stronger and more distinctive that many of the surprise inclusion in previous year’s lists.

However it is not without a number of flaws. Daniel is not a completely convincing creation: the lyrical prose of his narration doesn’t sit well with his blunt verbal speech and his character is rather exaggeratedly naïve (one remark "We had driven all the way to Leeds for them". rather called up Harry Enfield’s blunt-Yorkshire-bloke in my mind (‘Don’t talk to me about sophistication – I’ve been to Leeds’). And the Vivien Daniel relationship felt underexplored.

The political aspects of the novel also felt rather unbalanced. Mozley addresses some legitimate concerns, but does so by creating a rather cartoonish protagonist in Price – buy-to-let landlords aren’t all that evil (honest!).

3.5 stars – rounded down to 3 . But certainly recommended and a worthy addition to the Booker list.

Set in Yorkshire based round the old feudal area of Elmet but telling a very dark tale. It is set in contemporary times with Cathy, Danny, the narrator and Daddy their father, living in a house built on an area of ground they have claimed as theirs from the local landowner, Mr Price. This gentleman it transpires is no stranger to the family. The little family live on the edge of society both physically and morally. Daddy is a huge fellow who has been a bare knuckle fighter but has a softer side for the children. Daddy hunts and forages for food sometimes also leaving the children alone while he disappears so the children have also become resourceful;in particular Cathy. The local populace are beholding to the local landowners, farmers and businessmen for their homes and wages. They set up a mini revolution for fairer wages. One such landowner is Mr Zprice who also has two nasty sons. It is he and his who will become the nemesis for Daddy, Cathy and Danny.
The book is full of excellent des riptide passages but is no faint hearted read. There is fighting, torture, kidnapping and violent death all wrapped up in this tale.