Permanence

I loved this sensuous, moving, and quietly devastating novel. Sophie Mackintosh’s portrait of a couple in desperate thrall to doomed romance—and her revelations about the dangers and delights of intimacy, of vulnerability’s risks and rewards—will stay with me for a long time – Monica Heisey, author of ‘Really Good, Actually’A haunting and seductive novel which pulses with the possibility, or impossibility, of love. The unmet needs and violent hungers of Sophie Mackintosh’s characters do not remain within their bodies but instead fester in the crumbling monuments and shifting landscapes they inhabit. As her readers, we too are pulled into those glimmering psychic fissures – Avni Doshi, author of ‘Burnt Sugar’With Permanence, Sophie Mackintosh turns the novel of adultery inside out. This is the perfect imperfect love story: haunting, unsettling, uncanny – Lauren Elkin, author of ‘Scaffolding’I adore Sophie Mackintosh’s eerie, ethereal fictions – gorgeous, psychologically fraught fever dreams that linger in the mind for days after reading * LitHub *Astonishing and unforgettable. Reading Permanence is like dreaming – sensual and atmospheric, vivid and hazy at once. The novel shimmers like a vision or a memory; I loved spending time there – Francesca Reece, author of ‘Voyeur’A brilliant parable about desire, infidelity and devotion. With Sophie Mackintosh’s work, the thrill is in the slow, disquieting unfurling of the world. A dark gem that asks us to consider the cost of intimacy – I tore through it – Erin Somers, author of ‘The Ten-Year Affair’A devastating twist on the love story; Permanence asks us to examine whether desire can survive in the absence of longing, whether passion can only ever truly grow in the shadows. It is Mackintosh’s best novel yet – Keiran Goddard, author of ‘Hourglass’A truly beautiful book… Sophie Mackintosh offers a nuanced, confronting and original perspective on love and desire. But she also probes fundamental questions about agency and freedom with wry, refreshing intelligence. This book made me think a lot and I also found it very moving. I loved it – Rachel Connolly, author of ‘Lazy City’A dreamlike, speculative fable about the suspended reality of love affairs, rendered with Mackintosh’s trademark precision and intensity… In charged, sensuous prose, Mackintosh probes the price of illicit romance and the tensions imposed by secrecy * Bookseller, ‘April Recommendations’ *Wonderfully immersive [and] dreamlike * Stylist, ‘37 things that will be huge in 2026’ *

Sophie Mackintosh is the author of four novels, including The Water Cure and Cursed Bread. She has been longlisted for the Man Booker Prize and the Women’s Prize, has won a Betty Trask Award, and has been selected as one of Granta’s Best of Young British Novelists. She has been published in Granta, The White Review, and TANK magazine, among others. Her new novel, Permanence, will be published in April 2026.