The Big Music tells the story of John Sutherland of'The Grey House', who is dying and creating in the last days of his life a musical composition that will define it. Yet he has little idea of how his tune will echo or play out into the world - and as the book moves inevitably through its themes of death and birth, change and stasis, the sound of his solitary story comes to merge and connect with those around him.In this remarkable work of fiction, Kirsty Gunn has created something as real as music or as magical as a dream. One emerges at the end of it altered and changed. Not so much a novel as a place the reader comes to inhabit and know, The Big Music is a literary work of undeniable originality and power.

Kirsty Gunn is the author of three novels, Rain, The Keepsake, Feathersone, and a collection of short stories, This place you return to is home. In 2004, she was awarded the Scottish Arts Council Bursary for Literature. She is also married and the mother of two young daughters. She lives in London and Edinburgh.