The Dynamite Room

by Jason Hewitt

Overview

Accomplished, resonant and surprising (Guardian) -- a debut for fans of Summer of My German Soldier.

In July 1940, eleven-year-old Lydia escapes life as a child evacuee in Wales. She arrives home to her English village, gas mask in tow, only to find it abandoned. Her family's house is shuttered and empty. Lydia settles in though, determined to wait out the war.

Later that night he arrives: a wounded soldier, gun-wielding, heralding a full-blown German invasion. He says he won't hurt Lydia, but she cannot leave the house.

The unlikely pair coexists in their claustrophobic confines, becoming dependent on each other for survival. Lydia soon realizes that the soldier knows more than he should about her family -- and that he's plotting something for them both.

Eerie, gripping, and incredibly moving, The Dynamite Room brings an original and contemporary resonance to the great tradition of war classics.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9780316327633
Publisher:	Little, Brown and Company
Publication date:	03/17/2015
Sold by:	Hachette Digital, Inc.
Format:	eBook
File size:	3 MB

About the Author

Jason Hewitt is a novelist, playwright and actor. He was born in Oxford, and lives in London. His debut novel, The Dynamite Room, was long-listed for the Desmond Elliott Prize and the Authors' Club First Novel Award.

Editorial Reviews

Eleven-year-old Lydia had been evacuated safely to Wales early in the war, but something compels her to escape back to her home in Suffolk. The tiny village to which she returns is strangely empty and the 1940 world she is entering is one unlike any that she or any reader have ever encountered. Through the eyes of Lydia and a German soldier, Jason Hewett's debut novel unfolds with the uncertainty of those catastrophic times, gripping us with its contrapuntal prose. Editor's recommendation.

Longlisted for the Desmond Elliott Prize

A Barnes and Noble's Discover Great New Writers pick of 2015

PRAISE FOR THE DYNAMITE ROOM:

"Wow. Wonderful."—Chris Cleave, author of Little Bee and Gold

"Suspenseful and powerful. A novel of great humanity that exposes the absurd contradictions of war."—Samantha Harvey, author of The Wilderness, short-listed for the Orange Prize and long-listed for the Man Booker Prize

"Superb. Absorbing, suspenseful and with a beautifully poetic touch."—Nathan Filer, author of the Costa Award-winning The Shock of the Fall

"Clever and unsettling, this most unconventional of war stories had me totally gripped."—Shelley Harris, author of Jubilee

"An effective psychological drama between two extraordinary characters. Claustrophobic, touching, character-driven, and told in lovely prose...Readers who loved The Boy in the Striped Pajamas will have a strong affinity with The Dynamite Room."—Katie Ward, author of Girl Reading

"The Dynamite Room grabs you from the outset and refuses to let you go. Whilst building strong psychological tension between the two characters, it still skillfully achieves empathy, ultimately, for both. A compelling, powerful and humane book."—Judith Allnatt, author of The Moon Field

"With its unshowy, confident prose, this novel is accomplished, resonant and surprising, and poses some delicately handled questions about whether redemption is possible, and at what point a good heart becomes forever besmirched."—Jill Dawson, Guardian

"Ambitious and often gripping...Hewitt has a strong sense of narrative pace and brings a strange poetry to his depiction of an exhausted and empty world...A very promising first novel."—Observer (UK)

"As powerfully visualized as a screenplay... Hewitt handles this complicated narrative with assurance, juggling the reader's sympathies while adding crumbs of information, all the while pitting Heiden's tarnished ideals against Lydia's vulnerability. A sense of theatricality pervades the contemporary scenes—small cast, stifling domestic setting—but these are usefully crafted in the closing pages to deliver a jolting finale. An unusual, intricate drama delivered with accomplishment."—Kirkus Reviews


"[A] strong debut...well-crafted and engrossing. In the confines of a house that can feel at once claustrophobic and expansive, he artfully explores family and identity, and how war changes the lives of both soldiers and civilians."
—Publishers Weekly (starred review)

"In this fine balance of taut suspense and tragedy, Hewitt has created an emotionally charged character study in which he explores the loneliness, fear, hope, and shame that war visits on ordinary people. Mystery and general-fiction book groups will enjoy dissecting these characters and their nuanced story; highly recommended to fans of Karin Fossum as well as to readers of character-driven historical fiction."—Booklist (starred review)

"The Dynamite Room explores what can happen to a good person swept up in a bad cause, and how the maelstrom of war sears its youngest victims. The themes of the novel run closely to those of another recent work, All the Light we Cannot See, by Anthony Doerr. In the hands of writers less skilled than Hewitt and Doerr, these novels might have been horror stories of rape and murder. Hewitt, however, poses some profound questions: What if the wolf who comes to the door has the soul of a musician? What if he is self-aware enough to have retained his sense of right and wrong?"
—Washington Independent Review of Books

From the Publisher