How long is it?
352 pages in the Knopf 2014 hardcover edition.
Fiction · Novel · Literary Fiction · Historical Fiction
The Narrow Road to the Deep North
Highly regardedBooker Prize, 2014Reading facts
✓ Checked- Reading effort
- 64 / 100High
- Length
- 352 pagesKnopf · 2014
- Reading time
- 7 hat 50 pages an hour ·
- Pace
- Measured
- Emotional intensity
- 5 / 5
About 7 h · at 30 minutes a day, about 15 days
Estimated from the page count of this edition. Dense books can take longer than the estimate.
About the book
In August 1943, Australian surgeon Dorrigo Evans struggles to keep his fellow prisoners alive on the Thai–Burma railway, treating starvation, disease and injuries from beatings with scarcely any medicine. He remembers his affair with Amy, his uncle’s young wife, before his capture. His story extends from childhood in Tasmania to old age, when public recognition as a war hero sits uneasily with his private life.
Reader notes
The narration jumps across decades and among prisoners and guards, so the war unfolds through several perspectives. Lyrical passages alternate with graphic descriptions of camp brutality and damaged bodies; the love story includes explicit sex. It is a literary war novel.
How it reads
- Writing style
- Dense · Descriptive · Lyrical
- Tone
- Bleak · Intimate · Melancholic · Reflective
- Structure
- Multiple timelines · Nonlinear
- Driven by
- Atmosphere · Character · Relationships
- Point of view
- Multiple viewpoints
- Setting
- Burma Death Railway · Java · Tasmania, Australia
Reading complexity
- Writing
- 4 / 5
- Ideas
- 4 / 5
- Structure
- 4 / 5
- Background knowledge
- 2 / 5
About this profile
Collected’s assessment, not reader ratings. Complexity runs from 1 (least demanding) to 5 (most demanding).
- Writing
- How much attention the sentences and language require.
- Ideas
- How much interpretation or abstract reasoning the book asks of you.
- Structure
- How much you need to keep track of speakers, timelines and connections.
- Background knowledge
- Prior knowledge needed to follow the book, beyond what it explains.
- Emotional intensity
- Emotional pressure, from gentle (1) to intense (5). Separate from difficulty.
Themes
- Guilt
- Love
- Memory
- Mortality
- Trauma
- War
Content notes
- Violence
- Strong
- Sexual content
- Strong
- Swearing
- Strong
- Substance use
- Mild
- Abuse
- Strong
- Self-harm or suicide
- Mild
Standing and awards
Highly regarded
- Booker Prize, 2014
- International Dublin Literary Award shortlist, 2015
- Miles Franklin Award shortlist, 2014
- Andrew Carnegie Medals for Excellence in Fiction and Nonfiction longlist, 2015
Questions readers ask
Which edition is shown here?
Knopf · 2014 · Hardcover. ISBN 9780385352857.
How long does it take to read The Narrow Road to the Deep North?
About 7 hours at 50 pages an hour, based on the 352-page Knopf edition. Dense books can take longer.
About the author
Richard Flanagan
Richard Flanagan is an Australian novelist, essayist, screenwriter, and film director. Before turning to fiction, he wrote four nonfiction books that he regarded as his apprenticeship, including Codename Iago, the autobiography of con man John Friedrich, which he ghostwrote in six weeks to finance his first novel. That experience later informed First Person. His essays and journalism range across literature, politics, art, and the environment, while his novels often test the boundary between personal memory and recorded history. The Narrow Road to the Deep North moves between Tasmania, a forbidden affair, wartime captivity, and its aftermath. Gould’s Book of Fish uses the unstable journal of a convict artist to examine colonial punishment, racial violence, and the authority to preserve or alter the past.
If you liked this
Edition and details
- Publisher
- Knopf
- Publication year
- 2014
- Format
- Hardcover
- Pages
- 352
- ISBN
- 9780385352857
- Edition language
- English
- Original language
- English
- First published
- 2013
- Genres and form
- Fiction · Novel · Literary Fiction · Historical Fiction · Literary fiction · Psychological fiction · War fiction
- Editions
- 15
- Languages
- 4 (English, Spanish, Hebrew, Unspecified)
The catalog does not yet include a matching edition. Details may differ between editions.