Life Cycle of a Moth

Unforgettable . . . Wonderfully linguistically playful . . . A book that expertly balances light and dark, childish play and the most adult of terrors * * Observer * *
A beautiful debut. It's rare that a novel feels so much like a little world to escape into, albeit at times a very bleak one, but everything here was so thoroughly and tenderly well-realised, the sense of ceremony and indoctrination, the details of nature. An allegory about the fragile times we live in and the terrible challenges of protecting our way of life and the creatures we love -- SARA BAUME
Muscular, moving and muddy, Life Cycle of a Moth is an unflinching woodland fable you cannot miss. It's astonishing and stirring; a debut novel tenderly cadenced and alchemical, and I'm still reeling from turning its final pages. Rowe Irvin is a born storyteller -- LUCY ROSE, author of THE LAMB
This exhilarating and thoughtful novel takes us deep into a forest, deeper still into the scrambled knots of love that bind a mother and daughter fiercely to themselves and away from the rest of the perilous world. Wonderful -- LULU ALLISON
A novel of creative fecundity, where the earth is as real as Daughter and Myma. Irvin's prose is at once razor-sharp and profound. I will remember Life Cycle of a Moth for a long time to come -- AMY TWIGG
As gentle and tender as it is dark and unsettling, Life Cycle of a Moth depicts a complex mother daughter relationship in a strange yet familiar setting. The prose is biting and rich, echoing the rankness and brittle beauty of the natural world. The mysteries at the novel's heart kept me riveted -- MOLLY AITKEN
Life Cycle of a Moth is a novel of rare power - a moving meditation on care and harm, a love letter to the natural world, and a playful inquiry into language and form. Irvin is a writer of astonishing talent who has achieved something truly special with this strange, beautiful and entirely singular novel -- GABRIELLE GRIFFITHS
Epic and intimate, brimming with fierce love and jagged wonder, Life Cycle of a Moth is the kind of book whose pages you can't stop turning even as you don't want them to end. There are echoes here of visionary wordsmiths like Eimear McBride, Ursula K. Le Guin and Marlen Haushofer, but the accomplishment - as singular as it is striking - is all Irvin's own -- LAIRD HUNT, National Book Award finalist for ZORRIE
I was immediately enthralled by the sheer force of Rowe's writing. She captures so beautifully the feral innocence of a young woman brought up away from everything, fluent only in finding food, physical pleasure and pain, the changing seasons. It is a complete immersion in Daughter's wild, twisted worldview . . . I have not been able to stop thinking about Life Cycle of a Moth since I finished it; my thoughts keep returning to the cottage in the compound; this intensely haunted and haunting space and its vital and troubled inhabitants. Lyrical, unrestrained, transgressive, moving - with moments of pure poetry. Absolutely gorgeously written, it left me at once hopeful and bereft -- EMMA VAN STRAATEN
Hauntingly beautiful, and hopeful in its moments of bleakness, Life Cycle of a Moth is an astounding novel that will live within you long after you've read the last page. Irwin plays with language in a masterful way -- JODIE MATTHEWS, author of MEET ME AT THE SURFACE