Born and raised in Canada, Sarah Leipciger lives in London with her three children. She is Associate Lecture in Creative Writing at Birkbeck University and also teaches at City Lit London. Her short fiction has been shortlisted for the Asham Award, the Fish Prize and the Bridport Prize. She is the author of the critically acclaimed THE MOUNTAIN CAN WAIT (2015) and COMING UP FOR AIR (2020). MOON ROAD is her third novel.
Moon Road reads like a darker, gruffer blue-collar version of Elizabeth Strout’s novel, Oh, William! ... a slow-burn story about people who are learning to live with the unthinkable and the unknowable. Leipciger has written an intelligent, nuanced book that doesn’t let off fireworks or rely on catchy concepts. Instead, she places her faith in quiet observations about the contradictory elements that make up our relationship with ourselves and those we love. It is, refreshingly, a novel for grown-ups. * THE TIMES * Set against the monumental grandeur of the mountains, this is a deliberate slow burn, sensitive but unsentimental, with the central mystery secondary to the novel’s humane, memory-lingering exploration of life and hope in the shadow of loss * DAILY MAIL * A road trip with heart…a truly divine book, I loved both its simplicity and depth * PRIMA Book of the Month * Kathleen is a wonderful character – spikey and obstinate, but also vulnerable and big-hearted * GOOD HOUSEKEEPING * A beautifully imagined portrait…a melancholy, meditative and simply gorgeous written story about two people, and enduring love * WOMAN AND HOME * A deeply humane story by one of my favourite writers. Tough, tender, wonderful * JOANNA QUINN, author of THE WHALEBONE THEATRE * A whip-smart take on the classic road trip, with a compulsive bread-crumb plot, Moon Road is at once a candid portrait of ageing, an astute primer on parenting, and a masterful novel of love, loss, and navigating life's darkest moments * C.S. RICHARDSON, author of ALL THE COLOUR IN THE WORLD * A road trip into the human heart, wise and tough and generously alive, tracing through Kathleen and Yannick’s journey the slow alchemy by which loss tears people apart, and then sometimes brings them back together again * FRANCIS SPUFFORD * Read this! A love story, a tragedy, a road trip. Some of the best writing you'll read. Definitely one of my contenders for Books of the Year * CLAIRE FULLER * A brilliant, compassionate novel that unflinchingly lays bare what we can’t know about those we love and what we can’t forget. Moon Road is self-assured, keenly-observant, heart-wrenching storytelling. Every page is a delight, leading to an ending that left me absolutely breathless. Beautiful, clever, captivating. * SHELLEY READ, author of GO AS A RIVER *