Benjamin Wood was born in 1981 and grew up in northwest England. A former Commonwealth Scholar (receiving his MFA from the University of British Columbia), he is now a Senior Lecturer in Creative Writing at Birkbeck, University of London. His debut novel, The Bellwether Revivals, was shortlisted for the Costa First Novel Award 2012 and the Commonwealth Book Prize 2013, and won one of France’s foremost literary awards, Le Prix du Roman Fnac, in 2014.

A STATION ON THE PATH TO SOMEWHERE BETTER

For twenty years, Daniel Hardesty has borne the emotional scars of a childhood trauma which he is powerless to undo, which leaves him no peace. One August morning in 1995, the young Daniel and his estranged father Francis – a character of ‘two weathers’, of irresistible charm and roiling self-pity – set out on a road trip to the North that seems to represent a chance to salvage their relationship.

​They have one shared interest, The Artifex, a children’s TV drama for which Fran works on set, and Daniel has been promised special access to the studio. But with every passing mile, the layers of Fran’s mendacity and desperation are exposed, pushing him to acts of violence that will define the rest of his son’s life. The acclaimed author of The Ecliptic writes a novel of exceptional force and beauty about the bond between fathers and sons, about the invention and reconciliation of self – weaving a haunting story of violence and love.​