The Perfect Golden Circle is a thrilling introduction to a British literary star and a moving meditation on history, trauma and the urge to create. Set in 1989, the novel takes place almost exclusively in the fields of rural England, where protagonists Calvert and Redbone use boards and rope to create massive, complex crop circles. Benjamin Myers (The Offing) maintains a tight focus on his two principal characters, societal outcasts with an intense, almost theological devotion to their craft. Perhaps his most impressive achievement is how, in chapters dedicated to the construction of a particular crop circle, Myers manages to stretch his focus far beyond the confines of the field, to encompass the social and political conflicts roiling the rest of the country.
Calvert and Redbone are The Perfect Golden Circle's only consistent characters, with very few others making unwelcome intrusions on the world they have created for themselves. Calvert is a veteran of the Falklands War with scars both physical and mental, while Redbone is a relic of a counterculture era that seems increasingly out of place in Thatcherite Britain. Their mission in creating the crop circles is both simple and difficult to define precisely, embodied by Redbone's repeated motto: "Fuel the myth and strive for beauty." Working in the fields in the dead of night, Calvert and Redbone begin to see themselves as belonging to artistic and spiritual traditions as ancient as Stonehenge, establishing a continuity with their ancestors. Their ambitions grow as their creations receive more press attention, inspiring talk of alien visitations and ley lines, until the two fixate on their most ambitious crop circle yet: the Honeycomb Double Helix.
The Perfect Golden Circle concerns itself with what modern Britain is choosing to leave behind, which includes those damaged by a pointless war, like Calvert, and unclassifiable creative sorts, like Redbone, who simply don't fit in. The land is also in the process of being left behind, both in terms of reckless ecological destruction and in the average person's ties to ancient practices of farming or spiritual communion. In the fields at night with Calvert and Redbone, Myers's evocative prose captures the unlikely friendship growing between the two characters as well as the ways their work helps them heal and find purpose. The Perfect Golden Circle is closely bound to its characters, but its reflective mood takes readers on enthralling excursions into England's vast history. --Hank Stephenson, the Sun magazine, manuscript reader
Shelf Talker: This thrilling reflection on land and country follows Calvert and Redbone as they attempt to heal and make meaning by constructing crop circles in 1989 England.