You heard us correctly, the patron saint of horny Irish novels, Sally Rooney, has been working on another book entitled Beautiful World, Where Are You, and word is that it will be as 10/10 steamy as her last works.
Considering the way things have very much stayed the exact same since the clock struck midnight into 2021, the news that we will be able to sink our teeth into another dramatic, twenty-something love story this year is a welcome reprieve from the rest of the news cycle. To top it off, the cover for the upcoming book has now been unveiled by Faber with the cover artwork designed by Jon Gray, and illustrations by Manshen Lo. The cover follows along the same, recognizable vein of Normal People and Conversations With Friends, which feels like a delightful return to Rooney's complex and intricate worlds.
📢 Cover reveal 📢
Finally, the Beautiful World, Where Are You cover is unveiled!#BWWAY https://t.co/RUt72I6JSJ pic.twitter.com/T0zna2pESx
— Faber Books (@FaberBooks) April 13, 2021
In 2018, the Normal People author almost had us believing she might not put the proverbial pen to paper ever again when she told the Irish Independent, “I have no idea if I’ll write another book. Maybe I am one of those people who writes two novels in their 20s then never writes anything else again.” A quote that set our bar of excitement into the underworld, clinging to what she had already bestowed us with.
Thankfully, Rooney did not stick to her rather unsure word, and on September 7, 2021, Faber publishing will release the book to the frenzy of devoted Rooney fans.
The plot - as described by Faber on its spanking new dedicated website - follows a young novelist named Alice who meets Felix, a warehouse worker, and invites him to travel to Rome with her. Back in Dublin (where else?), Alice's best friend Eileen is recovering from a break-up and "slips back into flirting with Simon, a man she has known since childhood."
"Alice, Felix, Eileen and Simon are still young – but life is catching up with them. They desire each other, they delude each other, they get together, they break apart. They have sex, they worry about sex, they worry about their friendships and the world they live in. Are they standing in the last lighted room before the darkness, bearing witness to something? Will they find a way to believe in a beautiful world?" The website reads.
“This book is a brilliant exploration of the intertwined lives of four characters,” Jon Gray adds, telling Entertainment Weekly about the newly-revealed design. “I wanted it to feel like you were catching glimpses of them through clouds like melted holes in the cover revealing the characters inside.”
“Manshen Lo’s work has exactly the right tone. It’s cool and distant, but also has enough personality and detail in it to make it feel somehow very human and domestic.”
Essentially, it sounds like the young, confused romance that we're craving at the moment, and the setting of Europe makes it all the more inviting in classic Sally Rooney fashion. For those who are devoted to getting their hands on a copy stat, you can preorder Beautiful World, Where Are You from the dedicated website, now.
Back in April, when Jon Gray’s illustrated cover for the book was released, they caused a stir across social media feeds, which were then filled with pics of advance reader copies by the lucky few that received them the following month. This week, those ARCs have been spotted for sale on sites like eBay and Depop, with sellers listing them for hundreds of dollars despite the publisher’s ban on reselling. Seems like people are really thirsting for that Rooney content!
Image: @faberbooks
