China Room

The author of the multi-prize-winning The Year of the Runaways returns with a novel of forbidden love that echoes across the generations''China Room is the kind of novel that reminds you why you fell in love with reading'' Open Book, BBC Radio 4Shortlisted for the Rathbones Folio Prize 2022Longlisted for the Booker Prize 2021Longlisted for the Walter Scott Prize for Historical Fiction 2022Longlist for the Ondaatje Prize 2022A Daily Telegraph , Guardian and The Times Book of the Year Mehar, a young bride in rural 1929 Punjab, is trying to discover the identity of her new husband. She and her sisters-in-law, married to three brothers in a single ceremony, spend their days at work in the family''s ''china room'', sequestered from contact with the men. When Mehar develops a theory as to which of them is hers, a passion is ignited that will put more than one life at risk. Spiralling around Mehar''s story is that of a young man who in 1999 travels from England to the now-deserted farm, its ''china room'' locked and barred. In enforced flight from the traumas of his adolescence - his experiences of addiction, racism, and estrangement from the culture of his birth - he spends a summer in contemplation and recovery, finally gathering the strength to return home.Readers love CHINA ROOM:***** Amazing... I could not put it down!***** The characters jump off the pages... Beautiful***** Powerful and heart-wrenching***** Wonderful... I read it in one sitting***** Gripping storytelling... An easy five stars