Ian McEwan 07年的新书On Chesil Beach，使他再度入围英国布克奖。这本只有二百页的小书，就规模而言，更似novella（中篇小说），McEwan 把语言的细腻玩出了一种喜剧的幽默，别具谐趣。 英国诗人Philip Larkin’s Annus Mirabilis开头第一段这么写道： Sexual intercourse began In nineteen sixty-three (which was rather late for me) - Between the end of the Chatterley ban And the Beatles’ first LP. On Chesil Beach的故事便是发生在性解禁的前一年1962年的七月，两个二十二岁的年轻人，天资不凡的小提琴手Florence与踌躇满志的历史系学生Edward，小说开门见山第一句话描写他们，“青春、受过良好的教育、都还是处子之身”，新婚之夜，两人在Chesil海滨酒店的蜜月套房，发生了一场不可思议的性战。Edward对初夜的兴奋期待，紧张的害怕自己表现不好，来得太快，相反，同样紧张不安的Florence，明知这样一种身体关系是夫妻间不可避免的正常之事，却仍无法克服对此的厌恶与排斥，灵与肉的交战，纠缠着Florence挣扎的内心，也像一块不祥的乌云，笼罩着她与Edward甜蜜浪漫的爱情。 Florence与Edward的爱情，将如何化为精神与肉体的（被迫）结合，McEwan如一位希区柯克式的悬念大师，吊足读者的胃口。小说前四分之三的笔墨集中在新婚初夜的几个小时里，对Florence和Edwarn说不出口的心理交战、及所表现出的身体悸动，描画细致得好像电影的慢动作镜头，不厌其烦中越见张力，而在最后不到四分之一的结尾，却以几年、十年的大跨度，流水般的概述Edward此后的一生，这般两极化的剪辑速度，读完全书，有一种预感，这个小说其实很适合改编成电影。

本书是一部技巧高度纯熟的小长篇，“恐怖伊恩”时期的代表作，着力探索人性欲望的无限可能，讲述了一个关于美的追求者为了满足自己的欲望如何将美的对象摧残致死的故事。一对如胶似漆却又貌合神离的情人正在度假。从踏进这座繁华却又怪诞的旅游城市的第一天起，他们就一直被跟踪、偷拍。暗处的这双眼睛如影随形，诱惑着这对情人找寻新鲜刺激、寻求所谓陌生人的慰藉，并最终使他们一心一意地投身于一个处心积虑为其设下的情欲与死亡的陷阱中。小说蕴含着无数隐喻，与众多经典文本高度互文，充满了对托马斯·曼《死于威尼斯》、E·M·福斯特《看得见风景的房间》等意味深长的正引或戏仿，被誉为麦克尤恩的两部“小型杰作”之一。

On a chilly February day, two old friends meet in the throng outside a London crematorium to pay their last respects to Molly Lane. Both Clive Linley and Vernon Halliday had been Molly's lovers in the days before they reached their current eminence: Clive is Britain's most successful modern composer, and Vernon is editor of the newspaper The Judge. Gorgeous, feisty Molly had other lovers, too, notably Julian Garmony, Foreign Secretary, a notorious right-winger tipped to be the next prime minister. In the days that follow Molly's funeral, Clive and Vernon will make a pact with consequences that neither could have foreseen. Each will make a disastrous moral decision, their friendship will be tested to its limits, and Julian Garmony will be fighting for his political life. A sharp contemporary morality tale, cleverly disguised as a comic novel, Amsterdam is "as sheerly enjoyable a book as one is likely to pick up this year" (The Washington Post Book World).

Ian McEwan's symphonic novel of love and war, childhood and class, guilt and forgiveness combines all the satisfaction of a superb narrative with the provocation we have come to expect from this master of English prose. On a summer day in 1935, thirteen-year-old Briony Tallis witnesses the firtation between her older sister, Cecilia, and Robbie Turner, the son of a servant. But Briony's incomplete grasp of adult motives and her precocious imagination bring about a crime that will change all their lives, a crime whose repercussions Atonement follows through the chaos and carnage of World War II and into the close of the twentieth century.