Saville

Set in and around the Second World War, David Storey’s tale about a boy from a mining town who grows away from his roots won the Booker Prize in 1976.

"Mesmerically readable, 'Saville' is a revelation. It is alive with light and air and a kind of perpetual motion."  -  Michael Ratcliffe, The Times

Saville is set in South Yorkshire in the fictional mining village of Saxton. This is the story of Colin Saville’s struggle to come to terms with his family - his mercurial, ambitious father, his deep-feeling, long-suffering mother - and to escape the stifling heritage of the raw mining community into which he was born.

"Reading this magnificent book is like drinking pure spring water from cupped hands. It has no false notes, no heaviness of emphasis, no editorial manipulations of plot to prove a point. One becomes so totally involved in the lives of these people that their every word and action becomes charged with meaning... Reminiscent of a nineteenth-century classic."   -  Jeremy Brooks, Sunday Times

David Storey studied at the Slade School of Art, before a writing career that yielded 15 plays and 11 novels. His novels include This Sporting Life, which was made into an acclaimed film starring Richard Harris. Storey’s work won many prizes, including the Macmillan Fiction Award, the Somerset Maugham Award, the Faber Memorial Prize and, in 1976, the Booker Prize, for Saville.