I began reading Burncoat without a good sense of whether or not I would enjoy it. I’ve read short stories by Sarah Hall previously and found her writing to be beautiful, but as the pandemic drags on, the idea of a pandemic-themed novel held less appeal.

Still, I’m very glad I chanced it. Although the second person narration and the timeline are at times a little confusing, I was immediately captivated by this novel.

Other reviewers have commented on the frequency and graphic nature of the sex scenes and descriptions of sickness. Personally, I wish we saw more sex scenes in mainstream fiction and can’t understand why they seem to cause controversy in a way that graphic descriptions of violence don’t. The sex here is graphic, yes, but it is also masterfully written - this is not the cringeworthy sex we often see in literary works. The sickness descriptions are also potentially confronting but they too just made the book more compelling.

If you’ve read and enjoyed Sarah Hall’s work previously, or you want to start the year with something slim but immaculately written, I would highly recommend Burncoat.

In Sarah Hall's fiercely realistic sixth novel, Burntcoat, a sculptor comes to terms with her mortality as she relives experiences of love and caregiving.

Edith Harkness, 59, knows she won't live to see her latest burnt-wood sculpture installed; she's still suffering the aftereffects of the deadly novavirus. Her studio, Burntcoat, was a refuge for her and her lover, Turkish restaurateur Halit, during the pandemic and lockdown, but became a prison as her illness persisted.

Marked by vivid detail and matter-of-fact prose, Edith's reminiscences skip around in time. Gradually, flashes of memory fill in a turbulent past: her beloved stepmother Naomi's recovery from a stroke, their life in a remote English cottage, an abusive relationship during art school, learning woodcraft in Japan and finding early critical success.

It is difficult to avoid reading this as a compact Covid-19 parable. Nova seems worse than Covid, both medically and societally--it's led to looting, violence and breadlines. Through Edith's chronic form, Hall (Madame Zero) imagines the long-lasting effects Covid may have on our societies.

While Hall's picture of human vulnerability--including the rigors and indignities of caregiving for the sick--is bleak, the laser focus on the physical is an opportunity for her to posit sex and creativity as means of coping with trauma and isolation and for building resilience. Death cannot obliterate art for, as the novel's defiant first line declares, "Those who tell stories survive." Unapologetically sensual and intellectual in the vein of Rachel Cusk and Siri Hustvedt, Burntcoat is a story for our times.

As with previous Sarah Hall novels Burncoat is beautifully written.
We are in the grips of a pandemic that is indiscriminately infecting and killing people around the world which sounds familiar but is in some ways worse than what we are currently living through. The current situation helps us understand how nobody expects to live through such a crises and as the country falls apart trust in the government wanes. Those spared question why they have survived whilst loved ones died.
The novel centres around renowned sculptor Edith Harkness and looks back on her life. We learn of her childhood with her brilliant but damaged mother Naomi and during locking, how she cared for her lover Halit in her bedroom above her studios at Burncoat.
An intense and beautiful novel.

I have very much enjoyed Sarah Hall's previous novels, so I was excited to receive an advance copy of Burntcoat.

This is a beautifully written novel in which an international virus is infecting and killing indiscriminately (sound familiar?) and leading renowned sculptor Edith Harkness to lock down with the lover she barely knows. In sharing their histories with each other, we learn of Edith's childhood with her brilliant but damaged mother, Naomi, and of her career as an artist, as well as Edith's compulsion to purchase Burntcoat, the strange warehouse loft cum workshop where she lives.

In terms of plot, this one isn't a thrill-ride - for the most part, it's quiet, reflective, internal. I liked that a lot of the story mirrored the recent pandemic, and felt a definite empathy with the characters, but for me the shining star in this novel was the prose itself. Sarah Hall writes like a poet, and her use of language is exquisite - it's what keeps me coming back and back again to her novels.

A simmering jewel of a novel, this one.

Thank you to NetGalley, and to the publisher, who granted me a free ARC copy of this novel in exchange for an honest review.

I was sent a copy of Burntcoat by Sarah Hall to read and review by NetGalley. I found this book to be rather confusing, especially at the beginning, and I can’t say that I liked the style of writing. It was very intense in places, especially the passages concerning sex and also those describing the suffering with illness. The speech within the book had no real definition, as seems to be quite popular in novels recently, so I wasn’t altogether sure who was saying what a good deal of the time. The main theme of the novel was undoubtedly making reference to the current pandemic, though the virus itself was not specified as such. I can’t say that I enjoyed this book and was quite relieved to find that it was reasonably short - I am however in no doubt that I will be in the minority in expressing this.

An intense and beautiful novel, you will definitely feel the burns! Having read Hall's previous works, this feels like a natural development.

In this novel sculptor Edith Harkness considers her closest relationships when she is nearing death. She has had a non-traditional relationship with her mother Naomi, herself an artist who has suffered a stroke. In the most harrowing section of the novel, she recounts the impact of a Novavirus on her partner, Halit. Within the confines of Burntcoat, the studio and home she has converted, the reader shares the cocoon they have developed and the strong physical and psychological bond. Outside, the disintegration, violence and alienation moves closer and closer. Sarah Hall can capture so much in the slightest phrase and has created a quiet personal story of love, creativity and growth within the extremest of situations, that have become all too real for many since 2020.

Thanks to Faber and Faber and Netgalley.

This is truly beautifully written, intense, feverish, and huge in scale. It could feel claustrophobic but it doesn't - it's wide ranging and open hearted. I desperately want to see the works of art that the narrator creates, and see the results of the techniques she learns as a voracious student.

That said, there's no denying that this is a depressing tale. Death is predatory, ubiquitous and shockingly graphic; love is doomed, but it is told in the most extraordinary way!

This is an intense read particularly in the latter half or so of the book when the narrator, Edith meets and falls in love with Halit. Then there’s a global pandemic. It’s written in a nonlinear and in some places dreamlike way, to start with I found it confusing but it gets into a style that was suited to a woman looking back, remembering her childhood (also a difficult time as her mother suffered brain damage after a haemorrhage), her early adult years and now post pandemic facing probable death from the virus recurring. Love, family, coping with illness and disability, humanity particularly in the face of calamity and disruption, art, memory and loss are some of the many themes here.

Burntcoat is one of the first pandemic novels, apparently Sarah Hall started writing it on the first day of lockdown in the UK. Edith Harkness, a world renowned artist, is 59 years old and dying from AG12, a norovirus which spread through the world 20 years previously. This virus always kills, either soon after infection or, as in Edith’s case, years later reemerging from dormancy. Edith has done better than most to get to 20 years post infection and as she approaches what may be her final work, a commission to commemorate the lives lost to the pandemic, she sits in Burntcoat, her art studio and home, and reflects on her life before and during the pandemic.

Edith’s mother is a famous writer but then suffers a life changing stroke. Her mother can barely take care of herself or Edith let alone write. After her father departs it is just Edith and her mother in a remote cottage. Edith describes how her mother is no longer who she remembers. The young Edith becomes a carer instead as “children adapt, fill the gaps”.

A damaging relationship in her 20s with an abusive man named Ali leaves Edith pushing away love and focusing instead on her art until she meets Halit. Edith and Halit begin a highly charged sexual relationship and decide to quarantine together in Burntcoat as the pandemic breaks. Their relationship grows just as outside society decays. Hall writes so vividly of their sexual love and the pleasure they find in each other but within the space of six months that vivid imagery of physical exploration moves from the sexual to the witnessing of that same body succumbing to decay and death.

It is an intimacy of young passionate love and then the equally intense intimacy of watching and caring as the same body weakens and then dies, except for most people this takes a lifetime, but for Edith it happens in the space of six months. Edith remarks that she can no longer recognise Halit once the disease has him, as she couldn't recognise her mother after her stroke. Edith believes that sickness and disease will take away who you are, which is only ever temporary and fleeting but the art you produce at that point in time will be the only thing that can remain permanent. Sarah Hall’s writing about sex, death and art is so beautiful, truthful and has such a feverish dreamlike quality, I was swept away by it.

Thank you to netgalley and faber and faber for an early ebook in exchange for an honest review.

Sarah Hall's 'Burntcoat' is (sorry - cliched) a novel for our times. This fairly slim story is set in a pandemic, in many ways similar to what we have all been living through over the last 18 months, but in many ways, so much worse - hopefully, not a sign of things to come.

This is beautifully-written and convincing. 'Burntcoat refers to where a large part of the novel takes place - a disused warehouse-type building. The artist who lives there has to deal with her partner's illness, and subsequent death, and it's this which makes the story particularly scary and relevant to our times.

I hope that 'Burntcoat' is as thought-provoking for you as it was for me.

One of the most beautiful books I've ever read, despite its subject matter.

Set in the aftermath of a pandemic, not entirely dissimilar to C19, the book charts both the final days of a famous artist, the first days of a great love affair from her past, his death and this is interwoven with memories of her childhood, her relationship with her mother in particular.

It is about death and sex, but is also about love, relationships, art and - really interestingly- fame. It reads like a lucid dream and I loved it.

Thanks to the publisher and the author for the opportunity to read this wonderful work.

This is a slim but arresting novel and the first proper piece of ‘lockdown art’ I’ve read. It’s beautifully written with a deceptively simple structure actually telling multiple stories across time and place. It’s an odd one to read whilst still in the middle of the pandemic and I’d urge caution if you’ve been affected or bereaved - this is an honest and raw account that will hit pretty close to home. For others, highly recommended - thanks to NetGalley and the publisher for the ARC.

Right. I started this book expecting a dystopian, perhaps slightly political book, with a beautiful writing style. I was not familiar with the author at all, but the blurb and first few lines intrigued me.

I am glad it was short, because it was really depressing. The main character, Edith, is a famous sculptor. There were lenghty passages about her artistic journey, which may appeal to fans of sculpture or Japanese art, but I personally struggled to picture the pieces described.

I also was not really sure what the point of the story was. Whilst I enjoyed some passages about Edith's childhood, especially her relationship with her mum, other passages were frankly disturbing and unnecessary. I am by no means a prude, but some sexual scenes were just graphic in an ugly way. They did not add to the relationship of Edith with her Turkish love interest.

The virus was also much worse than Covid, and whilst there were some brief interesting reflexions on its consequences on society (resurgence of individualism, rationing, paranoia) it was inconsistent, and all portrayed through the eyes of Edith, so the bigger picture was not explored.

Finally, I am glad I read it on my Kindle, as there were too many words I had never seen before. I usually love literary fiction, but was the use of so many archaic/obscure words deliberate? Either way, it detracted from the story.

I would not recommend this book, but I am grateful to NetGalley and Faber and Faber for the ARC in exchange for an honest review.

2.5 stars rounded down.

I was blown away by Sarah Hall’s short story collection ‘Sudden traveller’ when I read it last year. Her writing is bold, rich, poetic, full of striking imagery and emotional wisdom, and the stories and her prose left a lasting impression on me. So I was keen to see what she would achieve in her new novel.

'Burntcoat' is a pandemic tale, set in the midst of a deadly virus whose symptoms may differ from Covid-19, but the social effects are relatable - isolation, fear, hardship, and protracted miserable death. It’s short, but an intense and brutal read. The text is laden with physical and emotional horror, and awash with every bodily fluid imaginable. The narrator’s mother suffers a stroke early on, changing her into another woman altogether. A traumatic childhood living with her brain-damaged mother, after her father is unable to cope and abandons them, is followed by an abusive relationship at university and a disastrous pregnancy, all rendered in viscerally appalling detail. It’s a novel about survival, about care, about how we cope with physical, emotional and social extremes, and the meaning of art and creation within that.

Salvation comes in the form of a successful artistic career and the love of a Turkish hunk, also damaged physically and mentally from military service. These two lost survivors find themselves locked in together when the pandemic strikes, and quarantine becomes a loving cocoon of learning about each other and themselves. (There’s a lot of shagging - skimmed, sorry but hetero sex yawn.) The art backdrop really held my interest in this section. Edith, the narrator, specialises in huge sculptures, landmarks, working with wood and metal and a technique learned in Japan of carefully burning wood so that only its structural essence remains, which is then polished to a finish that shows all its detail. The metaphor is apt for the purging emotional fires she’s been through, The peace and order of her time in Japan also contrast with the chaos and violence of pandemic England, while on a societal level the virus clears away the superficial and unnecessary to reveal and capture what is essential to survival.

'Burntcoat' is a tale of damaged bodies and minds, creativity, survival, gendered roles, love, and death. It succeeds and excels on all those issues. According to the author, she started writing this novel on the first day of UK lockdown, with no knowledge of how things would pan out, and only a ‘What if’ story in mind. The horror that permeates the story so urgently needed to be captured, because we’re already in danger of forgetting.

Fascinating, intriguing, thought provoking. A book I will very likely read again. I loved the idea of a sculptor being the main protagonist in this lockdown book especially as Grayson's Art Club helped me through.. Recommended it to others

Rating: 5/5 stars

“I’m the wood in the fire. I’ve experienced, altered in nature. I am burnt, damaged, more resilient. A life is a bead of water on the black surface, so frail, so strong, its world incredibly held.”

Burntcoat is next in the long line of COVID/pandemic-inspired novels to come out over the past 1,5 years. As I’ve had mixed feelings towards the majority of them, I went in a little apprehensive. I can tell you right now, that this is beyond a doubt my favourite lockdown-novel I’ve read.

Told in dual timelines, 59-year old Edith Harkness reflects on her life and imminent death, both of which have been marked by the pandemic she survived in her twenties. In a 2020-timeline, much like our own, a novel respiratory illness named AG3-novavirus sends the world into lockdown. Edith and her new boyfriend Halit find their young relationship challenged by an extended quarantine period together in the apartment above Edith’s wood-sculpting studio (aptly named Burntcoat).
In a secondary timeline, that could be much like our own in 30 years, Edith returns to Burntcoat, suffering from the symptoms of what’s essentially a severe-form of long-AG3: a relapse of the disease encountered decades earlier, that it universally fatal. Surrounded by her burnt-wood sculptures for which she’s since gathered much acclaim, Edith reflects on the memories lived here, and the permanent stains they’ve burned onto her own life.

I struggle when reviewers throw this word around too often, but it feels wholly justified in this case to do so: Burntcoat is a masterpiece. It’s the definitive “lockdown-novel”; we can stop writing them now. It’s also so much more than that. It’s a deeply intense, claustrophobic and at times almost physical exploration of body, art, and the intensity in which we connect to others under pressure.

Body is a central theme throughout this novel, the way we experience it, carry it, and occasionally surrender it, whether that be to desire, sickness or the care of another human. It’s present in Edith’s memories of taking care of her disabled mother; in the thin line where loss of control and preservation of dignity touch. It’s present in the progression of relationship between Edith and Halit: one initially based off frantic, physical desire, and pressurised into something more.
As difficult a theme as this can be to explore, Sarah Hall manages it in an insightful and confident way, all in under 300 pages. Chapeau.
Befitting of such a difficult theme, I was at times uncomfortable reading this novel. For example, during the parts where the narrative becomes a little more fragmented, mirroring Edith’s fragmentary state-of-mind during her illness. It’s not easy to read, yet fits perfectly into the story. The same could be said for some of the more graphic sex-scenes that some readers seem to have fallen over. In my opinion, they were completely fitting within the aforementioned exploration of body, and therefore I didn’t mind them.

Overall, Burntcoat might well be one of my favourite pieces of literature of 2021. A perfectly crafted, intense story that burned its way into my marrow and will haunt me for a long time to come…

Many thanks to Faber&Faber for providing me with an ARC in exchange for an honest review. Burntcoat is out on October 7th 2021.

Brilliant in many ways , this story about Sculptor Edith Harkness & she undergoes huge transformations vis the changes in her life from the age of eight until who knows when , but all these changes are brought about by changes in events along her time line & also those in humanity itself all across the Globe !
It resonates with what we have going on now with what we all have affecting our daily lives all around the Globe & maybe some people will find it too raw. He mother near the start of the book says ``Do Stories make sense of a Disordered World '' & do they or are they the places we escape too in order to stay sane & then make sense of all that's going on around us !
This is a very moving story at times I felt tears of deep emotion towards the characters rolling silently down my cheeks .
The reason I've only given it four stars is because it actually left me in limbo , & I cannot divulge why without spoiling things for other readers .#GoodReads, #NetGalley, #FB, #Instargam, #Amazon.co.uk, #<img src="https://www.netgalley.com/badge/c566f42be23a0e25d120e78a3454e2d427c4beee" width="80" height="80" alt="50 Book Reviews" title="50 Book Reviews"/>, #<img src="https://www.netgalley.com/badge/ef856e6ce35e6d2d729539aa1808a5fb4326a415" width="80" height="80" alt="Reviews Published" title="Reviews Published"/>, <img src="https://www.netgalley.com/badge/aa60c7e77cc330186f26ea1f647542df8af8326a" width="80" height="80" alt="Professional Reader" title="Professional Reader"/>.

Haunting and poetic. It is quite an intense read, but it was so fabulous. The perfect book to lose yourself in on a blustery autumn day.

Beautiful, sensitive, and evocative writing bring the situations depicted close to home. The characters, how they deal with their relationships, and their determination offer us all hope.
Thanks for the opportunity to read this book.