SHORTLISTED FOR THE RATHBONES FOLIO PRIZE'This short novel will live on in your imagination long after you read the last page' Claire MessudWhen Cy Bellman, American settler and widowed father of ten-year-old Bess, reads in the newspaper that huge ancient bones have been discovered in a Kentucky swamp, he leaves his small Pennsylvania farm and daughter to find out if the rumours are true: that the giant monsters are still alive, and roam the uncharted wilderness beyond the Mississippi River. West is the extraordinary story of a quest for a myth, of Bellman's journey into the unknown and of Bess, waiting at home for her father to return, facing monsters of her own. It is an eerie and timeless epic-in-miniature. 'One of the best books I've read this year... It's a book you can read in a day and that will resonate all year long in your head' Sunday Times 'Carys Davies is a deft, audacious visionary... Twisting the heart as few others can...' Téa Obreht, author of The Tiger's Wife