When God Was a Rabbit

A Novel

By Sarah Winman

Lorrie Moore meets John Irving in this exciting debut from an extraordinary new literary voice-already sold in eleven countries around the world.

This is a book about a brother and a sister. It's a book about secrets and starting over, friendship and family, triumph and tragedy, and everything in between. More than anything, it's a book about love in all its forms.

In a remarkably honest and confident voice, Sarah Winman has written the story of a memorable young heroine, Elly, and her loss of innocence-a magical portrait of growing up and the pull and power of family ties. From Essex and Cornwall to the streets of New York, from 1968 to the events of 9/11, When God Was a Rabbit follows the evolving bond of love and secrets between Elly and her brother Joe, and her increasing concern for an unusual best friend, Jenny Penny, who has secrets of her own. With its wit and humor, engaging characters whose eccentricities are adroitly and sometimes darkly drawn, and its themes of memory and identity, When God Was a Rabbit is a love letter to true friendship and fraternal love.

Funny, utterly compelling, fully of sparkle, and poignant, too, When God Was a Rabbit heralds the start of a remarkable new literary career.

Advance Praise for When God Was a Rabbit:

“Sarah Winman has written this book in the exact way events in a childhood—and a life—accrue, and I’ve never seen anyone able to do that so well. Brilliant, funny, and moving, WHEN GOD WAS A RABBIT is a captivating novel!”—Robb Forman Dew, author of Being Polite to Hitler

Reviews for When God Was a Rabbit:

“Wonderful, darkly comic…Remarkably, WHEN GOD WAS A RABBIT never feels melodramatic or unkind to its characters. Much of this has to do with Winman’s mastery of tone: the narration is dry-eyed but glinting. While her plot traffics heavily in grim incident, she maintains a winning proportion of whimsy throughout. At the very least, she’s created the most amusing and emotionally satisfying work of rabbit deism to come down the pike in a long time.”—New York Times Book Review

“[WHEN GOD WAS A RABBIT] succeeds in being both charming and heartbreaking. This is mostly because of the piercingly real and believable voice Winman crafts for Elly, through whose eyes we see it all unfold.”— Boston Globe. Read full review.

“[A] striking debut…Winman's most durable tool is her lucid, devastating voice, and she wields it both to sculpt and shatter, often in the same passage. [Her] precise and detailed portrait of an inner life growing not out of itself, but into itself — illuminating the continuum between the child's mind and the grown-up's — will cross generations.”—Denver Post. Read full review.

“[An] eccentric coming-of-age story…Winman’s prose is elegantly restrained as she sketches Ell’s family life, touching lightly upon both good and bad moments. It’s these little moments—some small, one monumental—that are the most affecting the poignant. B+”—Entertainment Weekly

"Winman debuts with a heartbreaking story of the secrets and hopes of a sister and brother who share an unshakable bond. Elly and her older brother, Joe, appear to be just like all the other kids in mid-1970s Essex, U.K., but, as is often the case, shocking secrets lurk below the surface for the siblings and Elly's best friend, Jenny Penny--one has been sexually abused, another has an alcoholic and promiscuous mother, another is homosexual--and the weight of bearing each other's traumas erupts in hard to watch ways. As the years go on, each moves forward; for Elly and Joe, this is more easily accomplished, as their family moves away from Essex and Joe's secret is brought to light, relief Elly doesn't receive until much later. As the story winds through time and across the Atlantic, the trio and their families are rocked by 9/11, leading to a final twist that strains belief before settling into acceptable inevitability. Winman shows impressive range and vision in breaking out of the muted coming-of-age mold, and the narrative's intensity will appeal to readers who like a little gloom." (May)—Publishers Weekly

"Over a 30-year time span, Elly and her older brother, Joe, experience everything the late 20th century has to throw at them, from child molestation to marital upheaval, cancer, and, finally, the terror of 9/11. Joe goes down the rabbit hole of depression when he loses the early love of his life, Charlie, who is abducted and tortured after his father gets a contract to work in the Middle East. When Elly also suffers the loss of a neighborhood friend, Joe comforts her with the gift of a pet Belgian hare whom they decide to call “God.” Their father’s big win in the football pools transforms the family from middle-class suburbanites to wealthy eccentrics as they leave their familiar Essex surroundings and move to a wooded estate in Cornwall. VERDICT Despite the gravity of events, Winman pulls a good number of rabbits from her hat in a picaresque coming-of-age tale where characters disappear then shockingly reappear. This affecting and original debut is recommended for most public libraries." [See Prepub Alert, 11/22/10.]—Barbara Love, Kingston Frontenac P.L., Ont.—Library Journal

“Winman’s debut boasts one of the more endearingly unconventional families in a while. A freshly rendered tale of growing up and living in the world by a late-starting author with a bright future.”—Kirkus Reviews

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When God Was a Rabbit

A Novel