On the hottest day of the summer of 1935, thirteen-year-old Briony Tallis sees her sister Cecilia strip off her clothes and plunge into the fountain in the garden of their country house. Watching her too is Robbie Turner who, like Cecilia, has recently come down from Cambridge. By the end of that day, the lives of all three will have been changed for ever, as Briony commits a crime for which she will spend the rest of her life trying to atone.

Ian McEwan is the critically acclaimed author of seventeen books. His first published work, a collection of short stories,First Love, Last Rites, won the Somerset Maugham Award. His novels includeThe Child in Time, which won the 1987 Whitbread Novel of the Year Award;The Cement Garden;Enduring Love;Amsterdam, which won the 1998 Booker Prize;Atonement;Saturday;On Chesil Beach;Solar;Sweet Tooth;The Children Act; andNutshell, which was a Number One bestseller.AtonementandEnduring Lovehave both been turned into award-winning films,The Children ActandOn Chesil Beachare in production and set for release this year, and filming is currently underway for a BBC TV adaptation ofThe Child in Time.

The magnificent book behind the acclaimed film starring Keira Knightley and James McAvoy.