An Observer Best Debut Novel 2024
An urgent debut set in multicultural London which takes the reader on a frightening journey into online radicalisation
SHORTLISTED FOR THE 2024 BETTY TRASK PRIZENOMINATED FOR THE 2025 GORDON BURN PRIZE'A politically engaged, urgently plotted coming-of-age thriller with a wicked satirical streak' OBSERVER'A brilliant dissection of race, identity, masculinity and extremism' MONICA ALI'Riveting . A blistering and prescient novel' FERDIA LENNON, author of Glorious ExploitsIn an East London borough, two second-generation immigrants search for a sense of identity and belonging amid a wave of online radicalisation and extremism. College student David survives through music and multiplayer video games. Attacked by his classmates for the controversial on-stage comments of his musical idol Karl Williams, he retreats into an online world of far-right ideologies and toxic masculinity. Hassan, too, is alienated from his friends, who drink, smoke weed and mock his volunteer work at the local mosque. As the young men struggle to find a path through a hostile-seeming world, their fates become tragically, catastrophically intertwined.