Deafening

Advance reading copy. 8vo. 380 pp. Pictorial wrappers in an acetate dustjacket.

Author's debut novel. Shortlisted for the 2005 International Dublin IMPAC Prize as well as the William Saroyan International Literary Prize. Winner of the 2004 Commonwealth Writers' Prize for Best Book (Caribbean & Canada region). Left profoundly deaf from scarlet fever, Grania O'Neill grows up in a silent world, but her life changes when she falls in love with Jim Lloyd, a hearing man, on the eve of the Great War.

Written as a tribute to Itani's grandmother who lost her hearing after contracting the disease at the age of eighteen months old. "Some books just demand the adjective 'wonderful.' This is one of them." –The Times (London)