I Refuse - Softcover

"An extraordinarily humane work...I Refuse will lodge in the heart and remain there" (Eileen Battersby Irish Times)

"An exquisite story of a friendship formed and lost in a twist of fate" (Scotsman)

"A poignant novel about the bonds forged and broken between friends and family members" (Independent)

"A poignant, melancholic novel about the bonds forged and broken between friends and family members" (Lucy Scholes Independent)

"Relentless, often shocking, but always satisfying" (Financial Times)

Two men meet by accident on a bridge early one morning. Once they were best friends – but Tommy and Jim haven’t seen each other for 35 years. Back then, Tommy and his sister were abandoned by their mother and later by their abusive father, and Jim, who lived alone with his religious mother, went to high school and became a socialist. Then one winter, Jim started to doubt whether he was deserving of the friendship. Now Jim is standing on the bridge, fishing, when Tommy drives by in his expensive new Mercedes. I Refuse follows both men during the course of the fateful day that follows.

Per Petterson’s outstanding new novel is broader in scope than many of his previous novels, but as powerful and moving as anything he has ever written.