“You don’t so much read an Emily Maguire novel as get sucked up and spat out at the end, with all your moral certitudes shaken…” Radio Adelaide
Summer, Sydney, and holed up in a tiny flat off Broadway are idealistic American Adam, weary activist Graeme, and wild, misunderstood Katie.
Each is searching for answers to life’s biggest questions – why are we here? what is love? what constitutes betrayal? – and thrust together, over an intense two-week period, they begin to form answers. In doing so, they must first confront their darkest demons, both within and without…
Provocative, honest, brimming with sexual tension and crackling with intelligence, Emily Maguire’s sensational novel cements her place as one of Australia’s hottest talents.
‘The understatement of its writing and its tenderness and unsentimentally give Smoke in the Room a compelling and convincing energy that holds the reader absorbed, then gently lets her go.’ Australian Book Review
‘At breakneck speed and in an unadorned style, Maguire examines problems that most of us would like to ignore ... Her power is that she can dress these ideas up as a thrill of a read while slyly forcing us to ask the big questions about how to live, how we help and who we hurt.’ The Weekend Australian