Generous, cultured, well-travelled and brilliantly forthright, she instantly disabuses her guest of his inherited and unexamined prejudices “‘Don’t hate the Germans; many of them are just like you and me’”and sets about opening his eyes to the wider world, and especially to the joys of literature, “that secret universe”. As a journalist he has written about the arts and nature for publications including New Statesman, The Guardian, The Spectator, NME, Mojo, Time Out, New Scientist, Caught By The River, The Morning Star, Vice, The Quietus, Melody Maker and numerous others. The natural world of the island, especially the garden, the river she is forbidden to swim in, and the sea, are also described in visionary and elemental terms that are both beautiful in their simplicity and sensuously poetic: Nature, with its flora and fauna, provides Robert with a respite from his impoverished reality. The landscapes around him fills him with a renewed sense of hope. As he observes the trees and flowers around him, and glimpses the wildlife roaming free, his mind drifts away from his worries and from the repercussions of war. Staying with Dulcie, Robert’s life opens into one of rich food, sea-swimming, sunburn and poetry. The two come from different worlds, yet as the summer months pass, they form an unlikely friendship that will profoundly alter their futures.

He is an award-winning author and journalist whose recent novel Cuddy (2023) won the Goldsmiths Prize. Members found both the two main characters intriguing and likeable, and found their friendship and enjoyment of each other’s company believable, despite the difference in their ages. Indeed several members said they would like to end up being Dulcie-like! –perhaps not so surprising given that most of us already live in fairly remote rural locations, and so could easily imagine living in Dulcie’s house on the coast. Although Dulcie seems at first quite hard and secretive, we enjoyed the way we get to see her softer edges as the novel progresses and we learn more of her life story. Offene See von Benjamin Myers, übersetzt von Klaus Timmermann und Ulrike Wasel, ist ein sehr langsamer und atmosphärischer Roman, der mir einige wunderschöne Lesestunden am Strand beschert hat. Wir Lesenden begleiten Robert auf seinen Wanderungen - sowohl der Wanderung durch die kleinen Dörfchen Englands hin zum Meer, als auch der Wanderung zu sich selbst, die er bei Dulcie in ihrem alten Cottage und dem Atelier unternimmt. Beide waren sehr interessant zu lesen und vor allem Dulcie habe ich wirklich ins Herz geschlossen. When it comes, the release Madeline gains, is perhaps not the one she thought she was seeking, but the one she needed nonetheless.

The Sydney Morning Herald

The writing is quite poetic and atmospheric when Myers describes nature and the surroundings, sometimes it's a little much, but overall these parts were enjoyable. The writing became more shaky the second Dulcie, the old wise and cursing woman, turns up. The dialogue is forced and reminded me of self-help books, Dulcie as far away from a real person as possible. The relationship between the characters didn't really develop, it was simply there. Now, until then, the book was still okay, however once the poetry-sub plot came about it really went down the drain. You have to be a certain writer to put poems into your novel and describe them as the best poems ever, the collection of which of course sell more copies than poetry ever does. The ending was abrupt and silly, and yes, amateurish. This is a wonderful novel. The only real niggle is that Myers is required to write some poetry written by Romy Landau who was supposedly a poet of genius. Now Myers is a good poet, a very good poet even; but a poet of genius? But that’s a minor point. But what makes this a coming of age work for Myers is his characterisation now matches blow for blow the descriptions of the natural world, which until now have had the upper hand to varying degrees. In some of his early brutal works like Beastings on occasion the characters have been supporting players to the forests and dales, but here the character’s words and interactions feel authentic. You started your career as a music journalist for Melody Maker. Your first novel was about Richey Edwards of the Manic Street Preachers. How much did this influence your subsequent work?

Since then he’s produced a series of award-winning novels across different genres developing a distinctive voice before arriving at this fully realised coming of age tale set in an England just about recovered from the Second World War.

The Offing

Benjamin Myers’s eighth novel, The Offing, is the tale of Robert, a young man who, in the aftermath of the second world war, sets out across Yorkshire to Robin Hood’s Bay, where he forges an unlikely friendship with an eccentric and artistic older woman, Dulcie. Myers’s novels have always been challenging, intelligent and linguistically adventurous, and he built up a loyal underground following with books such as Beastings, Pig Iron, and The Gallows Pole. This latter was his breakthrough success, winning the Walter Scott prize. He lives in Hebden Bridge with his wife, the novelist Adele Stripe. One reader was “disappointed”, describing the novel as “weak”; though it had a great deal of potential, the prose wasn’t good enough to really enjoy and didn’t move the plot on sufficiently. In the course of this pivotal summer Robert’s mind and body develop. Dulcie encourages him not to limit himself, not to view his future as preordained. I wanted very much to enjoy this book, to really sink into it. It seemed like a good moment to read a heartwarming tale of a golden summer and life lessons learned between an older woman and a teenage boy. I have been craving depictions of the natural world, and I spent most of my childhood holidays just a few miles from where this book it set. I’ve heard great things about the writer, and I appreciated that it was a northern writer. One of the most interesting, restless writers of his generation ... Unfurling at the unhurried pace of a fern, it's an evocatively lyrical paean to the countryside - deeply felt and closely observed * DAILY MAIL *