This is an important new book and the rewards increase tenfold the further into the story one gets

Radio Times, Book at Bedtime

A surge of language, beautiful and enchanting, a novel that weaves a love of literature into its own moving tale

Guardian

Extremely moving, poignantly capturing Ruth's doomed childhood relationship with her twin brother. By the final chapter I was weeping

Sunday Times

The Anne Enright award for the Irish novel most guaranteed to make you cry … Niall Williams wins this year's award on the strength of his title alone … Suffused with warmth and humour

Independent on Sunday

Deeply allusive, infectiously hopeful … Somewhere between bildungsroman, epic and family saga, History of the Rain is an unashamedly unfashionable, lyrical paean to the pleasure of reading and to serendipity … A fresh and powerful reminder that: “We tell stories to heal the pain of living

Daily Telegraph

A beautiful, poetic tale … One to read slowly and savour

irish Independent