Time Song

A poetic and fascinating exploration of life on Doggerland... This is one of the only books I've ever read that has made me feel better about climate change.

Olivia Laing, Guardian *Book of the Week*

[Time Song] is time travel... wonderful.

Rachel Cooke, Observer

A magical, mesmerising book - a book which makes you feel giddy at the thought of the deep gulf of history hidden just beneath your feet.

Roger Cox, Scotsman

Breathtaking... [a] splendidly rich book... I admire the intelligence, the appetite for discovery and the shining imagination that have gone into [Time Song].

Gillian Tindall, Literary Review

There is something quite magical about this book. It is full of surprises, of twists and turns, changes of tone and focus. Blackburn casually compresses vast sweeps of geological time into a paragraph… She has a deceptively simple way of writing, almost childlike, never embellished, but behind it lies an artfulness that once sensed, is beautiful beyond words… absolutely delightful.

Sue Brooks, Caught by the River *Book of the Month*

Rarely have I read a book in which there is such an entrancingly liquid and easy drift between the metaphorical and the actual… This is not science or history (there are enough books like that) but understanding – so that in [Blackburn’s] hands the ancient Doggerland landscape of distant summers becomes filled again… This book is a wonder.

Adam Nicolson, Spectator

[Julia Blackburn] has an inimitable approach to non-fiction… down-to-earth – though always thought provoking… begging to be set to music.

Peter Carty, iNews

Time Song is fiendishly clever… Archaeologists have long known how past and present co-exist. None, however, has been able to express it so convincingly.

Mike Pitts, British Archaeology

There are many beauties to be found in Blackburn’s writing, particularly when she turns an observant eye on landscapes and the evidence they provide of the prehistoric peoples who inhabited them.

Nick Rennison, The Times

Time Song is not a straightforward book about Doggerland. It is much more interesting than that… Time Song is richly peopled, Blackburn’s unflagging curiosity and sharp eye bringing a diverse cast of characters vividly to life. She sifts their stories not just for information, but for meaning; she’s conjuring for us not merely the facts of Doggerland, but the weight of its omission from our history books, our collective memory and our imaginations.

Melissa Harrison, Financial Times

One of my favourite writers in the whole world is Julia Blackburn and she has produced yet another uncategorisable masterpiece which is Time Song... [Blackburn] is one of our great original writers... [Time Song] is a beautiful, beautiful book.

John Mitchinson, Backlisted Podcast

It is in her descriptions of the sea and her imaginings of the land it submerged that Ms Blackburn's book is most arresting… the combination of wry observations and personal reflections makes Time Song gripping.

Economist

Julia Blackburn is an impossible-to-categorise writer, curious in every sense… and she has a genius for the imaginative leap, for thinking her way into the past.

Kate Hubbard, Oldie

An engaging and informative link to deep history.

New Statesman

A deeply consoling book.

Stephanie Cross, The Lady, *Book of the Week*

Dreamy, poetic, meditative, wildly discursive and intensely personal… [Blackburn] has a witchy way of ascribing human personality to other species, and even inanimate objects… Provocative and poetic.

Lewis Jones, Daily Telegraph

Majestic… The genius of Time Song is that the diverse form of the book subtly suggests that narratives may not be continuous… [this] book on the past is above all a response to the urgent problems of the present.

Nancy Campbell, Times Literary Supplement

Julia Blackburn’s marvellous Time Song...is startling, funny and often very moving.

Simon Winder, New Statesman, Books of the Year

Julia Blackburn's marvellous Time Song: Searching for Doggerland...is startling, funny and often very moving.

Simon Winder, New Statesman, *Books of the Year*