In this novel, which spent a year on the Australian bestseller lists, it is 1907 and the Blue Mountains are filled with the grand dreams of elsewhere. Eureka Jones, a young pharmacist’s assistant with historical eyes, falls in love with Harry Kitchings, a man who takes pictures of clouds and succumbs to the “madness of photography”. Their love turns the mountains sapphire blue.
Set in a vast landscape haunted by sadness and the stories which drift across it, The Service of Clouds explores passion, illness, and the secret desires we bring to places.
Shortlisted, 1998
- Miles Franklin Literary Award
- Victorian Premier’s Literary Awards
- Australian Publishers’ Book of the Year
- The Age Book of the Year
- Dobbie and Kibble Awards
Praise
“In a novel whose intellectual acuity is never overwhelming, and whose language is a delight, Delia Falconer uses the stories of two love affairs to explore how an imagination formed by European models tries to make sense of an alien and perturbing Australian reality.”
J. M. Coetzee
“The introduction of photography into the Australian Blue Mountains is an unlikely subject for a debut novel. Reading it is like watching a picture slowly emerge in a developing tank. But what a picture, and what a writer.“
Economist Review
“…this stunning tale of unrequited loves, sacred and profane alike, is a work of impressive originality, concentration, and force.“
Kirkus Reviews
“The introduction of photography into the Australian Blue Mountains is an unlikely subject for a debut novel. Reading it is like watching a picture slowly emerge in a developing tank. But what a picture, and what a writer.“
Economist Review
“…an exuberant meditation on the “history of the air,” the art of seeing and the end of romance as the pre-moderns knew it.”
New York Times Book Review
“…It is such a joy to read a novelist who writes with all the precision and exuberance of a poet.“
Sydney Morning Herald
Other editions
Published in the USA by Farrar, Straus and Giroux
Published in Germany by S. Fischer Verlag as Die Liebe zu den Wolken.
Published in Argentina by UNSAM Edita as Al Servico de las Nubes
Published in the USA by Farrar, Straus and Giroux