House Of Ashes (Finalist Of Costa Fiction Award)

WINNER OF THE 2020 COSTA PRIZE "Author of The Mermaid of Black Conch, Rathbone Folio Prize nominated, winner of the Costa Best Novel Award and Winner of the Costa Book of the Year. The City of Silk is restless. During the post-independence era, a new beginning was denied to the people of the small island of Sans Amen. Corruption set in and has been endemic for too long. Then, one hot July evening the Leader, the self-appointed head of a fringe spiritual group, gathers his followers and tells them: ‘Today, we will be making history. For ourselves, and our fellow countrymen of Sans Amen'. And so a brotherhood of half-trained men and boys take up arms and storm two of the most important buildings in the city: the House of Power and the television station. Together, they will take back what is rightfully theirs. Caught up in the mayhem is Ashes. A quiet, scholarly, family man, like the others, he has been swept up by the Leader’s charisma and rhetoric.