Grove Press nets Verghese’s ‘humbling’ novel

Grove Press has netted a new novel from Abraham Verghese, set in south India, named The Covenant of Water. 

Peter Blackstock, publisher, acquired UK and Commonwealth rights, excluding Canada, from Mary Evans at Mary Evans Inc. The novel will be published on 18th May 2023. 

Spanning 77 years, from 1900 to 1977, The Covenant of Water follows a family in south India that suffers from a “peculiar affliction”: in every generation, at least one person dies by drowning. The publisher continued: “The story opens with a 12-year-old girl, grieving the death of her father, who is sent by boat to meet her 40-year-old husband for the first time at their wedding. From this poignant beginning a gripping and unexpected family story unfolds, an exploration of love and marriage, struggle through hardship, and a hymn to progress in medicine and human understanding.” 

Verghese’s novel blends his “deep knowledge of and enthusiasm for the medical world with his writing genius, resulting in a bold, sweeping story that reads like a classic Russian novel”. 

Blackstock commented: “The Covenant of Water is epic but with a page-turning momentum, and it conjures a whole world which feels absolutely alive. Abraham tells much of the story of India’s path to modernity through a single family living in Kerala from 1900 to the 1970s, moving through joy, tragedy, love and marriage as the country around them shifts and turns. It’s a beautiful, humbling book about family lineage and connection, and also about the unexpected ways mankind makes progress. Ultimately, it’s a book about human persistence in difficult times – and although it’s historical in its scope it feels so pertinent to all we’re going through today.”

Verghese added: “I’m thrilled that Grove Press UK will publish The Covenant of Water for readers in the UK and in Commonwealth countries, especially because much of the story takes place in the UK as well as in south India, in places where I spent my formative years as a child and did my medical training. As a reader and writer, the eventful decades between 1900 to 1970 have always fascinated me and I hope this tale set in that period resonates for readers.”