The Land in Winter

SHORTLISTED FOR THE 2025 BOOKER PRIZE NEW YORK TIMES EDITORS’ CHOICE NPR BEST BOOK OF 2025 NEW YORKER BEST BOOK OF 2025 SHELF AWARENESS BEST BOOK OF 2025 WINNER 2025 Walter Scott Prize for Historical Fiction 2025 Winston Graham Historical Prize for Fiction “Tender, elegant, soulful and perfect...Superb.”—Samantha Harvey, Booker Prize-winning author of Orbital December 1962: In a village deep in the English countryside, two neighboring couples begin the day. Local doctor Eric Parry commences his rounds in the village while his pregnant wife, Irene, wanders the rooms of their old house, mulling over the space that has grown between the two of them. On the farm nearby lives Irene’s mirror image: witty but troubled Rita Simmons is also expecting. She spends her days trying on the idea of being a farmer’s wife, but her head still swims with images of a raucous past that her husband, Bill, prefers to forget. When Rita and Irene meet across the bare field between their houses, a clock starts. There is still affection in both their homes; neither marriage has yet to be abandoned. But when the ordinary cold of December gives way—ushering in violent blizzards of the harshest winter in living memory—so do the secret resentments harbored in all four lives. An exquisite, page-turning examination of relationships, The Land in Winter is a masterclass in storytelling—proof yet again that Andrew Miller is one of the most dazzling chroniclers of the human heart. “Andrew Miller’s writing is a source of wonder and delight.”—Hilary Mantel “This book is really special.”—Sarah Jessica Parker, 2025 Booker Prize Judge View Less