Matrix
Lauren Groff
(Author)
Description
AN INSTANT NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER WINNER OF THE 2022 JOYCE CAROL OATES PRIZE FINALIST FOR THE 2021 NATIONAL BOOK AWARD FOR FICTION One of Barack Obama's Favorite Books of 2021 Named a Best Book of the Year by The New York Times, The Washington Post, TIME, NPR, The Financial Times, Good Housekeeping, Esquire, Vulture, Marie Claire, Vox, The Los Angeles Times, USA Today and more!"A relentless exhibition of Groff's freakish talent. In just over 250 pages, she gives us a character study to rival Hilary Mantel's Thomas Cromwell ." - USA Today "An electric reimagining . . . feminist, sensual . . . unforgettable." - O, The Oprah Magazine "Thrilling and heartbreaking." -Time Magazine "[A] page-by-page pleasure as we soar with her." -New York Times
One of our best American writers, Lauren Groff returns with her exhilarating first new novel since the groundbreaking Fates and Furies.
Cast out of the royal court by Eleanor of Aquitaine, deemed too coarse and rough-hewn for marriage or courtly life, seventeen-year-old Marie de France is sent to England to be the new prioress of an impoverished abbey, its nuns on the brink of starvation and beset by disease. At first taken aback by the severity of her new life, Marie finds focus and love in collective life with her singular and mercurial sisters. In this crucible, Marie steadily supplants her desire for family, for her homeland, for the passions of her youth with something new to her: devotion to her sisters, and a conviction in her own divine visions. Marie, born the last in a long line of women warriors and crusaders, is determined to chart a bold new course for the women she now leads and protects. But in a world that is shifting and corroding in frightening ways, one that can never reconcile itself with her existence, will the sheer force of Marie's vision be bulwark enough? Equally alive to the sacred and the profane, Matrix gathers currents of violence, sensuality, and religious ecstasy in a mesmerizing portrait of consuming passion, aberrant faith, and a woman that history moves both through and around. Lauren Groff's new novel, her first since Fates and Furies, is a defiant and timely exploration of the raw power of female creativity in a corrupted world.
Product Details
Price
$28.00
$26.04
Publisher
Riverhead Books
Publish Date
September 07, 2021
Pages
272
Dimensions
6.37 X 9.34 X 0.97 inches | 0.97 pounds
Language
English
Type
Hardcover
EAN/UPC
9781594634499
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About the Author
Lauren Groff is a three-time National Book Award finalist and the New York Times bestselling author of the novels The Monsters of Templeton, Arcadia, Fates and Furies and Matrix, and the short story collections Delicate Edible Birds and Florida. She has won the Story Prize and has been a finalist for the National Book Critics Circle Award. Groff's work regularly appears in The New Yorker, The Atlantic, and elsewhere, and she was named one of Granta's 2017 Best Young American Novelists.
Reviews
Praise for Matrix [T]hrilling and heartbreaking. Groff. . . crafts an electric work of historical fiction. -TIME "[A] page-by-page pleasure as we soar with her. " - New York Times Book Review
Incandescent. . .Woven from Groff's trademark ecstatic sentences and brimming with spiritual fervor, Matrix is a radiant work of imagination and accomplishment. -Esquire "In Lauren Groff's hands, the tale of a medieval nunnery is must-read fiction. -The Washington Post
The medieval nun drama you didn't know you needed. . . . The femme energy in this book is strong, with hardly a man to be found in 272 pages . . . Fans. . . . will appreciate [Groff's] gift for conjuring isolated communities, places where people are forced together by faith and circumstance -- and the intimacies and frustrations that result. -Vulture
"A bold new direction for the accomplished writer."- Vogue
"A mesmerizing study of faith, passion and violence."- Harper's Bazaar
"Sumptuous, sublime . . engrossing."- Atlanta Journal-Constitution "Expansive . . . . passionately feminist, funny and even a bit profane."- Good Housekeeping "This transportive and meditative tale that will swallow you up from the very start." - Newsweek "A premier stylist, [Groff] continues to grow....The voice she finds for Marie de France...will hold readers fast." - Los Angeles Times
"Stunning . . .grand, mythic . . .feels both ancient and urgent, as holy as it is deeply human."- Entertainment Weekly "Both epic and intimate, this sweeping novel explores questions of female ambition, creativity and passion with electrifying prose and sparkling wit. A propulsive, captivating read."-Brit Bennett, #1 New York Times bestselling author of The Vanishing Half "An audacious piece of storytelling, full of passion, wisdom and magic." -Sarah Waters, New York Times bestselling author of The Paying Guests "A thrillingly vivid, adventurous story about women and power that will blow readers' minds. Left me gasping." -Emma Donoghue, author of Room "Luminous, divine, her masterpiece."-Daisy Johnson, author of Sisters "Matrix is alive with lust and glory. In the incandescent Marie de France - visionary, cantankerous and uncowed by the constraints of her sex - Groff paints a portrait of sisterhood that shines out of the past and into the lives of women today."-C Pam Zhang, author of How Much of These Hills is Gold
"Groff has created a labyrinth of jewel-like moments . . . and transformed it into a novel that is perfect for right now."-BookPage, STARRED review "Splendid with rich description and period vocabulary, this courageous and spine-tingling novel shows an incredible range for Groff (Florida, 2018), and will envelop readers fully in Marie's world, interior and exterior, all senses lit up. It is both a complete departure and an easy-to-envision tale of faith, power, and temptation." - Booklist, STARRED review Set in early medieval Europe, this book paints a rousing portrait of an abbess seizing and holding power. . .Groff's trademarkworthy sentences bring vivid buoyancy to a magisterial story. - Kirkus, STARRED review "Transcendent prose and vividly described settings bring to life historic events, from the Crusades to the papal interdict of 1208. Groff has outdone herself with an accomplishment as radiant as Marie's visions." - Publishers Weekly, STARRED review
Incandescent. . .Woven from Groff's trademark ecstatic sentences and brimming with spiritual fervor, Matrix is a radiant work of imagination and accomplishment. -Esquire "In Lauren Groff's hands, the tale of a medieval nunnery is must-read fiction. -The Washington Post
The medieval nun drama you didn't know you needed. . . . The femme energy in this book is strong, with hardly a man to be found in 272 pages . . . Fans. . . . will appreciate [Groff's] gift for conjuring isolated communities, places where people are forced together by faith and circumstance -- and the intimacies and frustrations that result. -Vulture
"A bold new direction for the accomplished writer."- Vogue
"A mesmerizing study of faith, passion and violence."- Harper's Bazaar
"Sumptuous, sublime . . engrossing."- Atlanta Journal-Constitution "Expansive . . . . passionately feminist, funny and even a bit profane."- Good Housekeeping "This transportive and meditative tale that will swallow you up from the very start." - Newsweek "A premier stylist, [Groff] continues to grow....The voice she finds for Marie de France...will hold readers fast." - Los Angeles Times
"Stunning . . .grand, mythic . . .feels both ancient and urgent, as holy as it is deeply human."- Entertainment Weekly "Both epic and intimate, this sweeping novel explores questions of female ambition, creativity and passion with electrifying prose and sparkling wit. A propulsive, captivating read."-Brit Bennett, #1 New York Times bestselling author of The Vanishing Half "An audacious piece of storytelling, full of passion, wisdom and magic." -Sarah Waters, New York Times bestselling author of The Paying Guests "A thrillingly vivid, adventurous story about women and power that will blow readers' minds. Left me gasping." -Emma Donoghue, author of Room "Luminous, divine, her masterpiece."-Daisy Johnson, author of Sisters "Matrix is alive with lust and glory. In the incandescent Marie de France - visionary, cantankerous and uncowed by the constraints of her sex - Groff paints a portrait of sisterhood that shines out of the past and into the lives of women today."-C Pam Zhang, author of How Much of These Hills is Gold
"Groff has created a labyrinth of jewel-like moments . . . and transformed it into a novel that is perfect for right now."-BookPage, STARRED review "Splendid with rich description and period vocabulary, this courageous and spine-tingling novel shows an incredible range for Groff (Florida, 2018), and will envelop readers fully in Marie's world, interior and exterior, all senses lit up. It is both a complete departure and an easy-to-envision tale of faith, power, and temptation." - Booklist, STARRED review Set in early medieval Europe, this book paints a rousing portrait of an abbess seizing and holding power. . .Groff's trademarkworthy sentences bring vivid buoyancy to a magisterial story. - Kirkus, STARRED review "Transcendent prose and vividly described settings bring to life historic events, from the Crusades to the papal interdict of 1208. Groff has outdone herself with an accomplishment as radiant as Marie's visions." - Publishers Weekly, STARRED review
