The Confession

Review

Dazzlingly good. The Confession is that rare thing: an utterly engrossing novel which asks big questions without ever once losing sight of the storyteller's need to entertain and move. I turned the final pages in tears and I know already I shall return to it again and again. Without doubt one of the best novels of recent years Author: Elizabeth Day, author of The Party and How to Fail

I haven’t enjoyed a book so much in a long time . . . I lost myself in the story, not wanting to come up for air. A bold, intelligent, wonderful novel Author: Sarah Winman, author of Tin Man

Burton is asking important questions in The Confession – questions about motherhood, art and creativity, love, friendship – and in doing this, she has created three utterly fascinating characters. Connie, Elise, and Rose are complicated; complex in ways that women are so rarely allowed to be in literature, demanding that their stories be heard. This is a beautiful novel and one that will stay with me for a very long time Author: Louise O’Neill, author of Only Ever Yours

Jessie Burton always writes perceptively about female identity and creativity, but here she also explores motherhood in all its guises and nuances to stunning effect Source: Red

Her best yet, I’m dazzled by it . . . it’s ambitious and courageous in its scope and I was thrilled and emboldened. The Confession is clever, assured and compelling and I am deeply jealous of every reader who has it all ahead of them Author: Daisy Buchanan, author of The Sisterhood

Successful writer Constance 'Connie' Holden and Elise Morceau meet by chance on Hampstead Heath in 1980. Elise follows Connie to the glamorous world of LA, but it's not long before she makes a decision that changes everything, and a compelling mystery begins to unfold. An absorbing tale of self-discovery Source: Woman & Home

An irresistible tale of families, deception and the consequences of our choices. With Connie, Rose and Elise, Jessie pours light into the closed-off parts of our minds, and explores how we can be both masters of and servants to our own fate. She unpicks you stitch by stitch, then puts you back together again Author: Stacey Halls, author of The Familiars

A masterpiece about the autonomy of women and their roles in society, navigating Hollywood stardom, motherhood and fragmented identity Source: Irish Tatler

The story of the intoxicating relationship between two women, and its fallout Source: Sunday Times Culture

In The Confession, Jessie Burton hasn’t just captured a myriad of women’s experiences but also the intrinsic ambivalence of living in a female body: the advantages, the oppressions. She’s built a world of women that is so vivid and absorbing that at one point I paused in my reading to google Connie – and only then remembered that she was a fictional character Author: Jean Hannah Edelstein, author of This Really Isn’t About You

About the Author

Jessie Burton is the author of the Sunday Times number one and New York Times bestsellers The Miniaturist and The Muse, and the children’s book The Restless Girls. In its year of publication The Miniaturist sold over a million copies, and in 2017 it was adapted into a major TV series for BBC One. Her novels have been translated into thirty-eight languages, and she is a regular essay writer for newspapers and magazines. She lives in London.