Farrar, Straus & Giroux, USA; Virago/Little Brown, UK

The Great Fire is the story of two World War II veterans and friends, an English war hero and the Australian colleague whose life he saved, and their struggle to make sense of post-war existence and their divergent lives. Aldred Leith, military hero and son of a famous novelist, has come to East Asia to observe firsthand the subject matter of a book he intends to write. There he meets Helen, the teenaged daughter of his old friend, and becomes captivated by her ability to live vicariously through literature. Despite their age difference, the two gradually are drawn to one another. But both must heal from the recent global horrors before regaining the capacity to love.

The Great Fire is Shirley Hazzard’s first published novel in more than 20 years. Born in Australia, she traveled the world during her early years, a result of her parents’ diplomatic postings. In 1947, at the age of 16, she was engaged by British intelligence to monitor the civil war in China. The Great Fire received the 2003 National Book Award for Fiction. Hazzard is the author of five other works of fiction including National Book Critics Circle Award winner The Transit of Venus and three books of nonfiction. She lives in New York.