Let Me Be Like Water

A beautifully poignant and poetic debut about love, loss, friendship, and ultimately, starting over.

Twenty-something Holly has moved to Brighton to escape. But now she’s here, sitting on a bench, listening to the sea sway… How is she supposed to fill the void her boyfriend left when he died, leaving her behind?

She had thought she’d want to be on her own, but when she meets Frank, a retired magician who has experienced his own loss, the tide begins to shift. A moving and powerful debut, Let Me Be Like Water is a book about the humdrum and extraordinariness of everyday life; of lost and new connections; of loneliness and friendship.

S. K. PERRY was longlisted for London’s Young Poet Laureate in 2013 and is the author of the poetry collection Curious Hands: 24 Hours in Soho. She lives in London and Let Me Be Like Water is her first novel.

“[A] moving debut… By the book’s satisfying conclusion, readers will feel they have grown alongside loving and resilient Holly.” —Publishers Weekly

“A beautiful and gut-wrenching exploration of a woman defining herself after a monumental loss.” —Kirkus

“For fans of Mitch Albom, Anne Tyler, and Rachel Khong … read it for a sense of comfort, and for a reading experience as soothing and cathartic as ocean waves lapping at your toes.” —BookPage

“Raw, visceral and confident… this is an affecting debut.” —The Daily Mail

“Beautifully portrays the experience of living with grief… Perry’s novel is emotionally honest and heartfelt, a tender and refreshing take on loss, love, friendship, and moving on.” —Booklist

“A beautiful reflection on love, grief and friendship. Witty and profound.” —Fiona Mozley, author of Elmet

“Let Me Be Like Water is a beautiful, honest and engaging study of how we are healed through the grace of others. It is a novel about the people and places we love, and how, when these are lost, we learn, often in the most surprising ways, how to begin again.” —John Burnside, author of A Summer of Drowning

“Intimate, ruthless, tender: this book is like medicine for the soul.” —Nina George, author of The Little Paris Bookshop

“Radiant and brave.  A beautifully crafted study of loss and the redemptive nature of friendship; and a powerful reminder of the tendernesses of love, in all its forms.” —Kate Howard, author of The Ornatrix

“This beautiful novel about mourning is actually a celebration of life and the regenerative power of friendship. Let Me Be Like Water transcends pain and comforts; it dances in the sky like a kite.” —Denis Thériault, author of The Peculiar Life of a Lonely Postman

“A deeply felt, deeply romantic novel of fragmentary, raw emotion, that flickers and flares like a nerve exposed.” —Barney Norris, author of Five Rivers Met on a Wooded Plain

“Let Me Be Like Water holds you in the familiar place of loss, longing, and survival. Devastating and beautiful.” —Chimene Suleyman, author of Outside Looking On

“A work of both harrowing beauty and exquisite gentleness, which several times moved me to tears; a profound, tenderly-crafted meditation on grief and the everyday heroism of those who somehow help us heal.” —Musa Okwonga, award-winning poet

“Perry’s sure-handed debut is an extraordinary atlas of heartbreak, hopelessness, and the herculean strength required to power through despair to survival into recovery. Hard to put down; impossible to forget.” – *STARRED* Library Journal 

 

Close
MobyLives