Ten Seconds from the Sun
Russell Celyn Jones
Ray Greenland is an exemplary family man and Thames River pilot who can navigate people safely in the here and now, while his wife Lily, in her capacity as a director of a dating agency, arranges their happy futures. But what none of those around him know, including Lily and their children, is that Ray's life is not his own; he is mortgaged to a past that might, at any time, come to claim him back.
When Ray was twelve he did something so wrong he must live under a false identity for the rest of his life. He tries to atone by loving his family, while protecting them against the pernicious truth; telling stories from other people's happier lives and claiming them as his own. The only safe place for him is on the lower reaches of the Thames. But it's on land where Ray's past resurfaces and a lifetime of caution may not be enough to save him.
TEN SECONDS FROM THE SUN has the pace and hallmark of a classic tragedy, reaching back into the mythology of childhood and revealing it as an avenging nemesis.
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About Russell Celyn Jones
Reviews for Ten Seconds from the Sun
Sophie Lewis, SUNDAY TELEGRAPH
The imaginative command is masterly, the tension unbearable. It grips from first to last
Geoff Dyer
This is, on one level, a brilliant psychological thriller, so tightly plotted that it's hard to put down. But Celyn Jones achieves more than this. Beautifully and allusively written, the novel is a twenty-first century GREAT EXPECTATIONS that touches on the idea of ruptured childhood innocence and the alarming fact that we may never really know the people we love. Noirishly gripping ... one of the most readable novels of the year
DAILY MAIL
It's hard to resist the novel's hypnotic pull.
SUNDAY TIMES