num_pages: 160
description: In J. L. Carr's deeply charged poetic novel, Tom Birkin, a veteran of the Great War and a broken marriage, arrives in the remote Yorkshire village of Oxgodby where he is to restore a recently discovered medieval mural in the local church. Living in the bell tower, surrounded by the resplendent countryside of high summer, and laboring each day to uncover an anonymous painter's depiction of the apocalypse, Birkin finds that he himself has been restored to a new, and hopeful, attachment to life. But summer ends, and with the work done, Birkin must leave. Now, long after, as he reflects on the passage of time and the power of art, he finds in his memories some consolation for all that has been lost.
language: English
title: A Month in the Country
titlecomplete: A Month in the Country
characters: Mr. Dowthwaite, Edgar Ellerbeck, Colonel Hebron, Alice Keach, Mossop, Lucy Sykes, Rev. J.G. Keach, Kathy Ellerbeck, Tom Birkin, Emily Clough, Mr. Ellerbeck, Charles Moon
genres: 20th Century, Art, Historical Fiction, Novella, Historical, Literary Fiction, Novels, Classics, British Literature, Fiction
ratings_count: 13989
places: Yorkshire, England, England
awards: awardedAt: 315561600000
name: Booker Prize, awardedAt: 315561600000
name: Guardian Fiction Award
publisher: NYRB Classics