The Innocent

A New York Times Notable Book of the Year “A topical and brutal tour de force that somehow ascends from horror to a promise of goodness and grace.” —Michael Ondaatje“So exhaustively suspenseful that it should be devoured at one sitting. . . . McEwan fuses a spy-novel plot with themes as venerable as the myth of Adam and Eve.” —Newsweek “Never less than wholly entertaining.” —The Wall Street Journal “Powerful and disturbing . . . a tour de force.” —The New York Times “Pure literary pleasure . . . . it's McEwan's fascination with the inner sources of cruelty and conquest that gives The Innocent its frightening vitality.” —LA Weekly “Has the spooky, crooked-angled, danger-aroundevery-corner feeling of a Carol Reid film. It remindedme often of The Third Man and that is no mean feat.”—Jonathan Carroll, The Washington Post Book World “Impeccably constructed. . . . Though its plot rivals any thriller in narrative tension, this novel is also a character study—of a young man coming of age in bizarre circumstances.” —Publishers Weekly“Unfolds with psychological acuity. It’s the sort of book Hitchcock might have snapped up for production.” —USA Today“The plot crackles like thin ice with dread andsuspense.” —The Sunday Times“The sheer cleverness of the book is dazzling, and only fully to be appreciated as you turn the last page.” ―London Review of Books