The Seed Collectors

Three generations. Two secrets. One family tree. Aunt Oleander is dead. In the Garden of England her extended family gather to remember her, to tell stories and to rekindle old memories. To each of her nearest and dearest Oleander has left a precious seed pod. But along with it comes a family secret that could open the hardest of hearts but also break the closest ties…A complex and fiercely contemporary tale of inheritance, enlightenment, life, death, desire and family trees, The Seed Collectors is the most important novel yet from one of the world’s most daring and brilliant writers. As Henry James said of George Eliot’s Middlemarch, The Seed Collectors is a ‘treasure house of detail’ revealing all that it means to be connected, to be part of a society, to be part of the universe and to be human.

Reviews of The Seed Collectors

* Ingenious and original … A cracking good yarn, fizzing with intelligence — PHILIP PULLMAN on The End of Mr Y * Thomas can discuss quantum physics and philosophy while making you think you're reading a sparkling romantic comedy The Times, on Our Tragic Universe * Thomas has the mesmerising power of a great storyteller Financial Times * So addictive, you can't help but fall deeper and deeper under Scarlett Thomas's spell — DOUGLAS COUPLAND on Our Tragic Universe * Thomas pulls off this intellectual rollercoaster of a novel with dry humour and panache, the ideas sparkle and the protagonist is wryly appealing Sunday Times, on The End of Mr Y