Delphi

In the novel Delphi, a woman in 2020 is writing a book about prophecy in the ancient world while navigating lockdown, a marriage in crisis, and a ten-year-old son who seems unreachable. She becomes fixated on divination and prediction, but fails to notice the future creeping into her own home. The book is a snapshot and a time capsule, capturing our pasts, presents, and how we keep on going in a world that is uncertain and absurd. It is both truthful and enjoyable to read, and has been praised for its bold, brave, and uncompromising approach.

Format: Hardback
Length: 208 pages
Publication date: 28 July 2022
Publisher: Penguin Books Ltd

Inviting, stylish, and candid ... Pollard's future, as a novelist, is very bright indeed.




The i newspaper's Sarah Moss hailed it as "clever, warm, and funny." The Guardian described it as "this isn't the first - and most certainly won't be the last - pandemic novel, but it might be the most brilliant."




In a time more turbulent than any of us could have ever imagined, a woman is attempting to write a book about prophecy in the ancient world. Navigating the tightening grip of lockdown, a marriage in crisis, and a ten-year-old son who seems increasingly unreachable, she becomes fixated on our many forms of divination and prediction: on oracles, tarot cards, and tea leaves, and the questions we have always asked as we scroll and click and rage against our fates.




But in doing so, she fails to notice the future creeping into the heart of her own home. For despite our best intentions - our sacrifices and our bargains with the gods - time, certainty, and, sometimes, those we love, can still slip away.




Heartbreakingly relatable and achingly funny, Delphi is both a snapshot and a time capsule, deftly capturing our pasts, our presents, and how we keep on going in a world that is ever more uncertain and absurd.




Delphi is a compact miracle of a book. Evie Wyld, author of The Bass Rock, praised it as "bold, brave, and uncompromising," stating that Pollard has found a way to write about the last couple of years that is both truthful and enjoyable to read, which she didn't think was possible.




Cathy Rentzenbrink, author of Everyone is Still Alive, described it as "dark and dangerous, disturbed and disturbing in equal measure - I loved it." Anna Hope, author of Expectation, said, "Dark and dangerous, disturbed and disturbing in equal measure - I loved it."

Weight: 282g
Dimension: 137 x 206 x 22 (mm)
ISBN-13: 9780241558539