Season

George Harrison

‘A beautiful novel about the beautiful game’ Jonathan Pearce

SHORTLISTED: East Anglian Book Awards

For ten months of the year, two men are drawn to adjacent seats in a stadium, carrying the burdens of life and pouring all their hopes into their beloved but ailing team.

Fatherless and fretful, the Young Man is trying to nurture a precarious new relationship and to find his place in the world. The Old Man, an increasingly isolated carer for his fading wife, knows he has little left to look forward to. Neither fan is a comfortable talker. However, in a slow-motion play of nods, silences and guarded chats, they strike up a tentative friendship across the generational gap.

Told through thirty-eight chapters – one for each game of the Premier League campaign – Season is a lyrical, hypnotic and gently uplifting study of loneliness and modern masculinity. About much more than football, it celebrates the healing, unifying and maddening role of ritualised sport in the lives of ordinary people.

‘Pushes beyond the clichés to get to something emotionally true. A heartfelt and sensitive portrait of male bonding in the stands’ Daily Telegraph

‘In this clever, heartfelt debut, two lonely season-ticket holders glimpse one another’s lives between the lines of tight-lipped small talk’ Mail on Sunday, the best new fiction

‘A highly accomplished novel written with gut-wrenching, net-busting depth. A winner of a story in every way’ Ashley Hickson-Lovence

‘This heartfelt, platonic love story [is] an intelligent exploration of masculinity in the 21st century’ The Observer

‘[Harrison] writes about the game really beautifully. You don’t need to know much about football to find [Season] compelling’ Nick Ahad, Front Row, BBC Radio 4

‘Harrison’s passion for the game is evident but it’s how he draws out the personalities of these two taciturn characters that impresses most. Season hits the back of the net’ John Boyne, Irish Times

‘Harrison does an excellent job... Season captures the universal experience of fandom but its real concern is male loneliness’ TLS

‘Well observed, neatly handled and full of good things’ D.J. Taylor

Hardback: 288pp

Published: Lightning (January 2025)

ISBN: 9781785634147