The Homecoming

“This latest novel from the bestselling Dutch author is a long, lyrical meditation on mourning and identity…Like an 18th-century still life, this luminous novel captures in heartbreaking detail both the vibrancy of life and the poignancy of decay and loss.” —Historical Novel Society

“[Anna Enquist’s] best, most comprehensive, and most touching novel.” —NRC Handelsblad (The Netherlands)

“A surprising and touching novel about the loss of children; about a ruined union between a man and a woman; and, above all, about the inadequacy of facts in helping to understand people.” —Haarlems Dagblad (The Netherlands)

“Elizabeth is drawn so that she’s completely understandable even though the problems she faces are not of our time. She is more than a seaman’s wife left behind to care for the family. Sitting at home, she’s almost as much of an explorer as her husband, and on one point she outdoes him: as a survivor, as a fighter against death. In the end, she knew more than James Cook about the nakedness of existence.” —Max Pam, HP/De Tijd (The Netherlands)

“Elizabeth, the wife of the seafaring explorer James Cook, had six children, and each one of them died. Three of the five boys succumbed to illness; the other two were lost at sea; and Elly, the only girl, was run over by a coach. Anna Enquist uses the difficult life of this captain’s wife, who herself would live to ninety-four, as the premise for her novel The Homecoming. It is a heart-wrenching novel, written with much empathy and psychological ingenuity. Enquist has taken the known biographical facts and made a new story from them using her own vision and denouement. Elizabeth spends most of her long life waiting. Waiting for her husband, who will not return from his third and final journey. Waiting for her sons, too, who will meet with just as disastrous an end while following in his footsteps. Enquist paints a penetrating picture of the inner life of her heroine, who must cope with one blow on top of another and still not throw in the towel. As an eighteenth-century wife, Elizabeth had little input into the decisions of her husband, the Admiralty, and the king of England—this much is as clear as day in the novel. Although there are plenty of opportunities for melodrama, The Homecoming steers away from this. There is room for heavy feelings: angst, hope, loss, and anger at all the premature deaths. Apart from describing emotional pain, Enquist also writes about scurvy and exotic cultures and lives. The revelations about the way in which Cook met his end on the Polynesian island of Tahiti are gruesome.” —OPZIJ (The Netherlands)