Biography

Rachel Cusk was born in Canada in 1967 and spent much of her childhood in Los Angeles before finishing her education at St Mary's Convent in Cambridge. She read English at New College, Oxford

New College, Oxford

New College is one of the constituent colleges of the University of Oxford in the United Kingdom.- Overview :The College's official name, College of St Mary, is the same as that of the older Oriel College; hence, it has been referred to as the "New College of St Mary", and is now almost always...

, and has travelled extensively in Spain and Central America. She is the author of six novels. The first, Saving Agnes (1993) won the Whitbread First Novel Award. A Life's Work: On Becoming a Mother (2001) is a personal exploration of motherhood. In The Lucky Ones (2003) she uses a series of five narratives, loosely linked by the experience of parenthood, to write of life's transformations, of what separates us from those we love and what binds us to those we no longer understand.

In 2003 Rachel Cusk was nominated by Granta

Granta

Granta is a literary magazine and publisher in the United Kingdom whose mission centers on its "belief in the power and urgency of the story, both in fiction and non-fiction, and the story’s supreme ability to describe, illuminate and make real." In 2007, The Observer stated, "In its blend of...

magazine as one of 20 'Best of Young British Novelists'. Her latest novel is The Bradshaw Variations (2009).

Selected bibliography

• Saving Agnes (1993)
• The Temporary (1995)
• The Country Life (1997)
• A Life's Work: On Becoming a Mother (2001)
• The Lucky Ones (2003)
• In the Fold (2005)
• Arlington Park (2006)
• The Last Supper: A Summer in Italy (2009)
• The Bradshaw Variations (2009)

Awards and Prizes

• 1993 Whitbread First Novel Award
  1993 Whitbread Awards
  -References:*...
  
    Saving Agnes
• 1997 Somerset Maugham Award
  Somerset Maugham Award
  The Somerset Maugham Award is a British literary prize given each May by the Society of Authors. It is awarded to whom they judge to be the best writer or writers under the age of thirty-five of a book published in the past year. The prize was instituted in 1947 by William Somerset Maugham and thus...
  
    The Country Life
• 2003 Whitbread Novel Award
  2003 Whitbread Awards
  -Children's Book:Winner:*David Almond, The Fire-EatersShortlist:*Catherine Fisher, The Oracle*Michael Morpurgo, Private Peaceful*Jeanne Willis, Naked Without a Hat-First Novel:Winner:*DBC Pierre, Vernon God LittleShortlist:...
  
    (shortlist) The Lucky Ones
• 2007 Orange Prize for Fiction
  Orange Prize for Fiction
  The Orange Prize for Fiction is one of the United Kingdom's most prestigious literary prizes, annually awarded to a female author of any nationality for the best original full-length novel written in English, and published in the United Kingdom in the preceding year...
  
  (shortlist) Arlington Park

Further reading

"Suburban Worlds: Rachel Cusk and Jon McGregor." In B. Schoene. The Cosmopolitan Novel. Edinburgh University Press, 2009.