Unless (Paperback)

"A fitting farewell from an author revered for her graceful, insightful writing...sparkles with wry humor and elegant irony." (Hartford Courant )

"All novelists worth their fictional salt can create fine characters; Carol Shields creates lives. " (New York Times Book Review )

"A fine book, poignant, witty, rich in character, vivid in its sense of place...surprisingly suspenseful." (St. Louis Post-Dispatch )

"The best of her novels...fearless, smart, funny, beautifully written." (New Orleans Times-Picayune )

"Remarkably subtle and unsettling...one of those books that make you regret that reading is a solitary pleasure." (Christian Science Monitor )

"Shields's novels and short stories are intensely imagined, humanely generous, beautifully sustained and impeccably detailed." (Publishers Weekly )

"Truly, a miracle of language and perception." (The Oregonian (Portland) )

"Nothing short of astonishing." (The New Yorker )

"Relentlessly fine...imagined with style and vigor, melancholoy and wisdom." (San Diego Union-Tribune )

"All the trademark Shields delights are robustly present: idiosyncratic plotting; limber prose...deep compassion...tart commentary and irreverent wit." (Orlando Sentinel )

"Unless succeeds beautifully...Shields [is] an expert at illuminating the complicated dynamics of off-kilter families." (Atlanta Journal-Constitution )

"Closely observed moments create the kind of subtle textures and elegant prose that won Ms. Shields the Pulitzer Prize." (Richmond Times-Dispatch )

"Her wisdom and generosity of spirit are visible at every turn." (London Times (Sunday) )

"All novelists worth their fictional salt can create fine characters; Carol Shields creates lives. " (New York Times Book Review )

"When Shields is good she is very good. There are nuggets of pure gold in Unless." (Newark Star Ledger )

"A novel of...assured intelligence and defiant vivacity." (San Francisco Chronicle )

"A superb new novel...a graceful coda, an arabesque performed over an abyss." (Time Magazine )

"A luminous novel ...Shields writes with clarity, intelligence and generosity, finding meaning in most mundane details of home life." (Milwaukee Journal Sentinel )

"A raw, subtle, inspiring novel about feminism, femininity, virtue, oppression and motherhood...I was inexpressibly moved by it." (Rachel Cusk, Daily Telegraph (London) )

"Marvelously idiosyncratic, passionate and wise, Shields' tenth novel rollicks from beginning to end with sauciness and wit." (Book Magazine )

"Finely detailed, thoughtful and sometimes even humorous, this book is highly recommended for all fiction collections." (Library Journal )

"A superb new novel...a graceful coda, an arabesque performed over an abyss." (Time magazine )

"Often quietly heartbreaking...often, bitingly humorous." (Kirkus (starred review) )

"A landmark book...yet another noteworthy addition to Shields's impressive body of work." (Publishers Weekly (starred review) )

"Nothing short of astonishing." (The New Yorker )

"A brave, profound, and quirky novel with an undercurrent of the deeply amusing." (Anita Shreve, author of Sea Glass )

"Luminous ... Shields is a consummate master of tone and acute psychological insight." (Pittsburgh Post-Gazette )

"Entirely satisfying. Shields' voice, tender and moderated at all times, remains wise and very readable." (Houston Chronicle )

"With a poet's precision, Shields dissects grief and makes coping with bad luck feel like domestic heroism." (People )

"Some hefty perceptions, fortunately shared with us in this fine novel." (Washington Post Book World )

"A wonderful, powerful book, written in a style which combines simplicity and elegance. I found it deeply moving." (Joanne Harris, author of Chocolat )

"A thing of beauty-lucidly written, artfully ordered, riddled with riddles and undergirded with dark layers of philosophical meditations." (Los Angeles Times )

"An engaging, memorable novel." (Cleveland Plain Dealer )

Forty-four-year-old Reta Winters, wife, mother, writer, and translator, is living a happy life until one of her three daughters drops out of university to sit on a downtown street corner silent and cross-legged with a begging bowl in her lap and a placard round her neck that says "Goodness."

The final book from Pulitzer Prize-winner Carol Shields, Unless is a candid and deeply moving novel from one of the twentieth century's most accomplished and beloved authors.