Love and Other Thought Experiments

Longlisted for the Booker Prize 2020Longlisted for the Desmond Eliot Prize 2020Longlisted for the Polari Prize 2021Featuring on BBC 2's Between the Covers'Sophie Ward is a dazzling talent who writes like a modern-day F Scott Fitzgerald' Elizabeth Day, author of How To Fail'An act of such breath-taking imagination, daring and detail that the journey we are on is believable and the debate in the mind non-stop. There are elements of Doris Lessing in the writing - a huge emerging talent here' Fiona Shaw'A towering literary achievement' Ruth Hogan, author of The Keeper of Lost ThingsRachel and Eliza are planning their future together. One night in bed Rachel wakes up terrified and tells Eliza that an ant has crawled into her eye and is stuck there. Rachel is certain; Eliza, a scientist, is sceptical. Suddenly their entire relationship is called into question. What follows is a uniquely imaginitive sequence of interlinked stories ranging across time, place and perspective to form a sparkling philosophical tale of love, lost and found across the universe.

Sophie Ward is a dazzling talent who writes like a modern-day F Scott Fitzgerald, a genuinely affective family narrative that is emotionally compelling as well as intellectually stimulating. Surely not since Jostein Gaarder's 1991 novel Sophie's World, has an author produced such an imaginative and original synthesis of fiction and philosophy, In Love and Other Thought Experiments, Ward proposes to alter the colour of her readers' minds . . . But the success of Ward's venture inevitably depends on the quality of the writing. This is often moving, exuberant and sensitive. We care about her characters and share their hopes and fears. Ward's investigation and practice of empathy is easily the best thing in the book., Brimming with close observation . . . the sheer literary ambition on show is impressive, with Ward producing a highly original first novel that echoes European experimentalists such as Kundera and Krasznahorkai, Ward has achieved something quite extraordinary: a super-smart metaphysical romp that's also warm, wistful and heartfelt. A book that declares, winningly, that just because it's all in your head, it doesn't mean it's not real.

Sophie Ward is an actor and writer. Her debut novel, Love and Other Thought Experiments, was longlisted for the Booker Prize in 2020.