The Legacy of Elizabeth Pringle: a story of love and belonging

Kirsty Wark's first novel gleams with beauty... Part romance, part family history, mother-and-daughter fable and meditation on memory, The Legacy of Elizabeth Pringle has qualities of heart... something of great worth and beauty gleams through the narrative and haunts the reader with its imaginative truth... Wark's presentation of a unique love unalloyed by sexuality is original and enthralling. The Legacy of Elizabeth Pringle is a hymn to the stark beauty of the island of Arran. (Guardian)

Curl up for this big-hearted romantic debut by the Newsnight presenter... A pulse of secrets drives the story along... affecting and tender. (The Times)

Set on the Scottish island of Arran, Kirsty Wark's brilliantly vivid descriptions bring alive a story that reaches across the generations. (Daily Mail)

The narrative switches between Elizabeth and Martha...The structure works well, demonstrating the similarities and differences between the two women. Both are well-rounded characters and their stories are engaging... Martha's relationship with Anna is beautifully and touchingly written, a daughter helplessly watching her beloved, vibrant mother fade away... This is an appealing debut that sustains interest to the very last page... Elizabeth Pringle is a quietly heroic character and, like Arran, she never fails to charm. (Independent on Sunday)

The story is set in the beautiful Scottish island of Arran, a place Wark very obviously knows and loves... Wark's story telling is direct, compelling and rewarding for the reader. She is a real writer who happens to do television. (Daily Mail)

The book is fresh and beguiling... Wark deftly and delicately plaits the intricate tales of three women... The narrative is packed with incidents but, for the most part, does not rush; it breathes, sighs, ponders. Wark has an exceptionally vivid sense of place. Windswept Arran and Holy Island become starkly beautiful lodestones which keep its old inhabitants and draw new ones. The landscapes, soil and vegetation have the power to heal broken humans, deliver love and hope after calamities. George Eliot paid homage to those "who lived faithfully a hidden life, and rest in unvisited tombs." In this novel some of those hidden stories are told and graves visited with real tenderness. (Independent)

a lyrical, truthful, contemplative book. [it] grows, imperceptibly, like bindweed round the reader, captivating them and then practically throttling them in with a denouement so shocking that I could barely speak afterwards. (Daily Telegraph)

The BBC presenter's debut novel is an enjoyable mother-and-daughter fable and meditation on memory (Observer)

Wark depicts the weather, the landscape and the inhabitants of the island so vividly that all I wanted was a ferry ticket. (Woman & Home)

An excellent, page-turning debut from the Newsnight presenter. (Viv Groskop Red Magazine)