Reviews

Cal - main page

read an extract

Cal - the screenplay

To fashion a short, telling novel out of the hideous complexities of Northern Ireland takes narrative skill of a high order. In CAL Bernard MacLaverty has managed to do it superbly.
Nina Bawden in The Daily Telegraph (13.1.83)

A formidable fictional triumph.
Valentine Cunningham in The Observer (16.1.83)

Very close to literary perfection...
Eileen Battersby in U Magazine (Sept 1984)

A bittersweet fable of our time.
Jim Miller in Newsweek (5.9.83)

Miraculously vivid precision... he is a born novelist.
Francis King in The Spectator (12.2.83)

It is a work in the classical tradition of the novel; and it has all the beauty and moral seriousness of the form at its best.
Allan Massie in The Scotsman (15.1.83)

This is a short novel but it is that rarest of all experiences, one that leaves us a little different, and a little wiser, for having had it. CAL is a hard, dark gemstone of a book.
Alan Ryan in Cleveland Plain Dealer (21.8.83)

... a tiny marvel of technical perfection... CAL is a most moving novel whose emotional impact is grounded in a complete avoidance of sentimentality... CAL will become the PASSAGE TO INDIA of the Troubles.
Michael Gorra in The New York Times Book Review (21.8.83)

CAL is a love story as affecting and tragic as you could want... as finely crafted as a short story.
Robert Wilson in USA TODAY (29.7.83)

The reader is drawn into an emotional affinity rarely achieved by serious writing in our time...
Julia O'Faolain in The New York Times Book Review (2nd November 1980)

... the work of a contemporary master.
Alan Bold in The Sunday Standard (2.5.82)