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Biography | Interview | Prizes | Reviews Praise for Clare Allan |
| ‘Poppy Shakespeare has that rare quality: the feel of a book that needed to be written … It is bitterly, brutally funny and extraordinarily moving’ Telegraph ‘Catch-22 meets One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest … an electrifying debut … surreal, raucous, infuriating and very funny’ Guardian ‘The characters, in all their bravado, pathos and absurdity, feel utterly true to life. It is a brave and original piece of work’ Patrick McGrath ‘Funny, lyrical and deeply affecting … Seize this passionate, unsettling, accomplished debut with both hands’ Spectator 'A single mother trapped in a London loony bin tries to prove she's sane....' Claudia Deane; The Washington Post; Jul 2, 2006 What's most startling about Allan's gift as a novelist is her ability to give us both the story N wants to tell and the one just beyond her comprehension. Tom Barbash (New York Times Books Review) “Allan casually yet boldly manages to bring the reader into N’s chaotic and feudal world. . . . Poppy Shakespeare is not only the careful telling of an unbelievable tale, but also a provoking examination of our health systems and the ethos of psychiatric facilities. . . . For anyone looking for a dynamic summer read with a troubling twist, Poppy Shakespeare is a worthy debut.” Winnipeg Free Press A “stunning debut novel . . . so alive it practically sparks off the page. Oh, and then there’s the riotous humour. This is a laugh-out-loud kind of book. . . . In a long literary tradition of novels that chronicle “the Mental Patient,” Poppy Shakespeare stands out because its author has brought the madwoman down from the attic, or out of the shadows, and placed her at the centre of her own tale. . . . A rip-roaring good story.” Globe & Mail “The superlatives are all shabby with overuse. Brilliant and incisive. Stunningly original. Heartbreaking. Something new will have to be minted for Poppy Shakespeare and her author, Clare Allan. . . . [It is] funny and ironic, but it is also a skewering portrait of the mental health system, and not just in Britain. . . . This is a debut novel, but already Allan is a literary force to contend with, one of those rare, oh-too-rare, writers who can make your mind and heart and guts flip in simultaneous somersaults. Don't give this a miss. It's the real thing.” Merilyn Simonds in The Gazette (Montreal) “Allan’s world isn’t quite right in the head, but is as real as a slap in the face. Her prose has an irresistible dark gumption reminiscent of Ali Smith. . . . As Allan . . . reminds us, you don’t have to be sane to see the funny side.” The Times (UK) “Poppy Shakespeare is a distinctive and powerful debut, full of brave experiments that generate unexpectedly fierce emotional heat. In a literary scene whose established stars milk tragedies such as the Holocaust or 9/11 for precious little reason beyond their own artistic vanity, Allan has given us something indigestibly, potently true.” Michel Faber, author of The Crimson Petal and the White, in the Guardian (UK)
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