The Book of the Most Precious Substance

A sensational occult thriller. Gran's writing is palpably seductive - like Lily Albrecht, readers have little choice but to follow the book to its sinister conclusion.

Extravagant, sexy and compelling, I loved it.

A mesmerizing biblio-mystery [and] a profound and magical reckoning with loss and the possibility of going on. She has outdone herself.

This is an astonishingly good literary thriller, subversive, sexy and written with huge heart. I loved it to bits.

There’s two types of magic at play, here. There’s what these characters are trying to do, mixing books and sex and spells, and then there’s the magic Sara Gran is doing to us, as we compulsively read this literary thriller. And there’s a third magic we only wish we could do: pay in blood to go back, read this book again for the first time.

The Book Of The Most Precious Substance is a mix of book buying mystery, erotica, and a pinch of Clive Barkerian obsessive existential horror, but it’s all Gran. And it’s all brilliant.