Book
What we can know / Ian McEwan.
One hundred years in the future, much of the western world has been submerged by rising seas following a nuclear accident. Thomas Metcalfe, a scholar and researcher, longs for the early 21st century as he chases the ghost of a poem written in 2014. When he stumbles across a clue that may lead to the poem's discovery, a story is revealed of entangled loves and a brutal crime that destroy his assumptions about people he thought he knew intimately well.
Record details
- ISBN: 9781039058200 (hardcover)
- Physical Description: 301 pages ; 25 cm
- Publisher: Toronto, ON : Alfred A. Knopf Canada, 2025.
Search for related items by subject
| Subject: | End of the world > Fiction. Future, The > Fiction. Scholars > Fiction. Sea level > Fiction. |
| Genre: | Science fiction. Apocalyptic fiction. Novels. |
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Show Only Available Copies
| Location | Call Number / Copy Notes | Barcode | Shelving Location | Status | Due Date |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Lakeshore Branch | NEW FIC McEwa | 31681010435162 | FICTION | Checked out | 11/11/2025 |
- Random House, Inc.
"A philosophically charged tour de force by one of the best living novelists in English." âKirkus Reviews (starred review)
â[What We Can Know] gave me so much pleasure I sometimes felt like laughing. . . . Itâs the best thing McEwan has written in ages. Itâs a sophisticated entertainment of a high order.â âDwight Garner, The New York Times
â[What We Can Know is] brilliantly, and surprisingly, plotted. . . . [McEwan] demonstrates with shocking intensity how little we can ever really grasp about the strange evasions of the heart.â âThe Washington Post
NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER ⢠From the Booker prizeâwinning, bestselling author of Atonement and Saturday, a genre-bending new novel full of secrets and surprises; an immersive exploration, across time and history, of what can ever be truly known.
2014: At a dinner for close friends and colleagues, renowned poet Francis Blundy honors his wifeâs birthday by reading aloud a new poem dedicated to her, âA Corona for Vivienâ. Much wine is drunk as the guests listen, and a delicious meal consumed. Little does anyone gathered around the candlelit table know that for generations to come people will speculate about the message of this poem, a copy of which has never been found, and which remains an enduring mystery.
2119: Just over one hundred years in the future, much of the western world has been submerged by rising seas following a catastrophic nuclear accident. Those who survive are haunted by the richness of the world that has been lost. In the water-logged south of what used to be England, Thomas Metcalfe, a lonely scholar and researcher, longs for the early twenty-first century as he chases the ghost of one poem, âA Corona for Vivianâ. How wild and full of risk their lives were, thinks Thomas, as he pores over the archives of that distant era, captivated by the freedoms and possibilities of human life at its zenith. When he stumbles across a clue that may lead to the elusive poemâs discovery, a story is revealed of entangled loves and a brutal crime that destroy his assumptions about people he thought he knew intimately well.
What We Can Know is a masterpiece, a fictional tour de force, a love story about both people and the words they leave behind, a literary detective story which reclaims the present from our sense of looming catastrophe and imagines a future world where all is not quite lost.
