The Giant Dark

an award-winning novel about love and fame

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Pub Date 8 Jul 2021 | Archive Date 31 Mar 2022

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Description

'Heartbreaking, beautiful, epic. I loved it.'
KIRAN MILLWOOD HARGRAVE, author of The Mercies

What does it mean to be adored?

Aida is the defining rock star of her age; her every move observed, examined and owned by a devoted, cultish fanbase. When she disappears without a trace into a complicated love affair, her fans are determined to find her, uncover her truths and own her once more.

Away from the spotlight, Aida and Ehsan reconnect after a decade apart, hoping to recapture the innocent, lost love of their youth. But before long, their connection is strained by secrets and jealousies. The past begins to blur with their present as they follow in the footsteps of tragic, mythic lovers before them.

Inaugural winner of the Mo Siewcharran prize and shortlisted for the Encore Award, The Giant Dark is a stunning and heartbreaking literary novel about love and fame.

'A beautiful and imaginative reinterpretation that had me spellbound.'
JENNIFER SAINT, author of Ariadne

'Blindingly brilliant... I cannot wait to read everything she writes.'
DAISY JOHNSON, author of Everything Under

'Wholly original.'
GUARDIAN

'Heartbreaking, beautiful, epic. I loved it.'
KIRAN MILLWOOD HARGRAVE, author of The Mercies

What does it mean to be adored?

Aida is the defining rock star of her age; her every move observed, examined...


Available Editions

EDITION Other Format
ISBN 9780349701745
PRICE £16.99 (GBP)
PAGES 368

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Average rating from 60 members


Featured Reviews

When Aida and Ehsan reconnect after their relationship ended a decade earlier, Aida is a well-loved rock star and Ehsan has just quit his job. As their romance is rekindled, secrets of the past threaten their relationship.

Once I read that The Giant Dark was a loose retelling of Orpheus and Eurydice, I was sold but Aida and Ehsan's story swept me away. I was so invested in them as a couple and in their lives. The narrative splits between the two lovers but also brings in a group narrative of Aida's fans who have been following the changes to her personal life that are having an effect on their idol's music career.

Beautifully written and so engaging, The Giant Dark is a novel different to anything I've read before. Full of hope and love but also a dark story with many layers.

It's difficult to go into greater detail without giving anything away so all I will say is, read this book!

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The Giant Dark is a novel about love, fame, and art, as a rock star reconnects with a past boyfriend and things start to spiral out of control. Aida is a household name, the kind of rock star with a cult-like fan base and whose songs you might hear everywhere, and has just released a song on the soundtrack of a new vampire film, based off one of her favourite books. When she runs into her ex, Ehsan, at a dinner party hosted by a friend, they are drawn back together, but finding your muse again isn't as simple as it sounds, and Aida and Ehsan are tormented by the past and present.

This book combines some fantastic elements, like the look at a female rock star and the nature of fans (the obsessive fan viewpoint comes from a second person narrative as they act like a chorus), and playing with the idea of a muse and what you take from them. The story is loosely based upon Orpheus and Eurydice, and though I had read this in the blurb, I completely forgot whilst reading, as it's quite subtle, rather than being the sort of myth-inspired book that shoehorns references in. In general I liked the narrative, though in the second half it does get a bit fragmented and confused, combining past and present time periods in a way that works in some ways but does make the pace a bit slow.

Aida and Ehsan are interesting characters, with Aida being torn between how fans see her and how she is when not performing, and Ehsan finding it hard to find purpose when everyone else he knows seems more successful than him. Especially by the end of the novel, you know a lot of Ehsan and less about Aida (it at least felt to me like less was told to the reader about Aida), which builds even more of a sense that you might actually know more about the muse than the artist.

I like looking at cults of celebrity around rock stars, and this was an intriguing exploration of how being a famous musician is so entwined with the rest of your life, even though we mostly see Aida in the narrative out of sight of an audience. The second person chorus of hardcore fans was possibly my favourite element, telling a tragic story of how opinion can change just through disappointment. However, I found the book dragged a bit, especially later on, so I found the ending less effective than the earlier parts and at times confusing.

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A beautifully written book switching from the perspective of Aida's fans (expertly capturing the obsessive nature of fandom) and the private life of Aida and her boyfriend Ehsan. Even though both worlds collide, they are also very separate. Only on a few occasions does Ehsan comment on Aida's stage life. Definitely worth a read.

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The Giant Dark is brilliant and heartbreaking.

I particularly liked how Aida and Ehsan's story was told from both perspectives as well as from the view point of Aida's fan base. Its a beautiful but tragic love story that will stay with me long after I have finished it.

I would not hesitate to recommend this book as a must read and have gone ahead and ordered myself a beautiful signed hardback copy from an indie store.

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Intelligent gorgeous prose. I highlighted so many sentences to read over again. This is a beautiful tale of obsessive love and of how it can both nurture, dissapoint and destroy us.

The three points of view from the star, the lover and the fans made the narrative fascinating to read.

A stunning novel which will no doubt become a classic in the literary world.

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A beautiful modern take on a classic myth. I read this in about a day, the characters are so skillfully drawn and their love story flows beautifully throughout the book

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Wow. It' appropriate that this book is written in two parts. In fact, it's almost like two books anyway. This book appealed to me because I find the Greek myths fascinating and this is a loose retelling of the story of Orpheus and Eurydice. I imagined it would be similar to the retellings of authors like Jennifer Saint, Pat Barker and Madeline Miller. It really isn't, it's so much more. Aida d'Souza is a bit of a Daisy Jones (Taylor Jenkins Reid) character and I had echoes of Rooney's Normal People. I loved the layout of the chapters, with the super fans acting as a kind of chorus through out the novel. The book is heartbreakingly sad at times and totally hypnotic.

Thank you @netgalley and Little Brown Book Group for the ARC. The Giant Dark is out on July 8th 2021.

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The Giant Dark is an intense novel about fame, music, poetry, living internationally and loving another person in the spotlight. Apparently it’s intended to be a loose retelling of the myth of Orpheus and Eurydice, but I wouldn’t have noticed the link without being told. Aida’s fans act as a kind of Greek chorus though, so perhaps that’s an intentional nod to the myth?

A recommended read.

Thanks to the author, publisher and NetGalley for providing a review copy in exchange for honest feedback.

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A genderbent take on Orpheus and Eurydice, the intoxicating story of Aida, a global superstar musician and her greatest love, Ershan, is one of the best things I have read this year. Like a blend of Circe with Daisy and the Six, this blend of myth retelling and the sweaty heady sheen of rock star lifestyle, this story of their whirlwind relationship has a mystical element as I was questioning whether this almost obsessive relationship is toxic but feeling that it is fate they are destined to be together. It swops between three perspectives, including powerfully to me was the third person perspective of her infatuated fan base, which sounds almost Greek Chorus but really captures the relentless hysteria of a fandom and a meteoric rise to fame beautifully. It can feel like reading multiple books in one go, keeping it interesting, and also this drops nuggets of information throughout that would be the crux of a different story. There is a shock gasp moment at 50%, which causes Aida to go to the edge, teetering on the precipice of mental illness, so could be hard for others to read. I sped through this in just over a day, as I was enraptured by this read, in particular the enrapturing character of Aida.  

Trigger warnings for suicide, psychosis, grief, self-harm.

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This is such a lovely book. Such a beautiful cover. The romance in this is really interesting as they are both Asian. One is English, the other is American. You then have the love affair between Ada and her adoring fans.

I absolutely love the Greek story of Orpheus and Eurydice and this is a lose retelling of that tale. I think that Ada being the famous singer and Ehsan being the muse is really interesting. It's interesting how this is a story of them both rediscovering their love for each other and rekindling their romance after meeting each other 10 years later at a mutual friend's party. Something which I found interesting was how Ada had become successful, whereas Ehsan had given up on his dream to become a poet. He left his job and if anything Ehsan is possibly the Eurydice in this story. That being said, I like seeing the woman in the relationship being the successful one and then the male having to work with that dynamic. Hopefully, more books will include this and make it seem more natural.

I found the insights into Ada's relationship with her Mum and the way she felt growing up in a strict Indian household really interesting. We learn that due to her mum working so hard, she didn't/couldn't stay out late and boys are a distraction. I totally related to Ada doing mini rebellious acts like smoking outside and then covering it up. I loved the hidden Easter eggs of the similarities between Orpheus and Ehsan (O plays the lyre, E works for Lyre Books publishers) and how both of them are poets.

However, the writing style does take a bit of getting used too as it flits between 2nd POV and 3rd POV, which initially can be a little confusing. The POV of her adoring fans though offers an interesting insight.

Final thoughts- If you are reading this for the retelling aspect, then just think that the themes, and some details are similar. But this is a more contemporary take. It is more about sad nostalgia, loneliness, fame and love. It will definitely make an impression on you.

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I really enjoyed the first two thirds of this book, then I lost my way, Despite this I did enjoy it and thought the writing was really great. The narrative partly coming from a collective group rather than one person I thought was really interesting and in my experience unique, the writing really captures the obsessive culture of a fandom. A beautiful retelling of a myth, definitely worth a read!

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The Giant Dark is not a straight retelling of a Greek myth in the style of, for example, The Silence of the Girls; rather, it uses the story of a musician and lover fatally entwined more as a jumping-off point for a decidedly modern story of what life in the spotlight can be like. It doesn’t hang around: the pace sucked me in so that a few pages before bedtime quickly turned into two chapters. I could definitely see this working on screen.
Because it is so much about the lives of Aida and Ehsan, about their relationship, I was drawn in to their world, the only punctuation being the short chapters from the perspective of Aida’s devout fans. Sarvat Hasin’s writing is direct and unfussy and really works. And she writes really well about sex, not titillating but true to life: awkwardness and bliss alongside each other. Despite the reality of the relationship, there is an otherworldly dimension too. In the second half of the book – after a huge bombshell of a plot point (or does that show my ignorance of the source material? My note was simply ‘bloody hell!’) – a new figure is present.
I really enjoyed The Giant Dark and look forward to reading more of Hasin’s work. I wasn’t wholly convinced by the ending; maybe I need to go back and have another read. Perhaps it’s best not to judge a book by its cover – I would never have guessed the tone of this from the image used (one of Johnson’s paintings?). It matters not; The Giant Dark is excellent whichever way you look at it.

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