The Catastrophist

Ronan Bennett

Moves with the pace and shock of a thriller while refusing to compromise on lush and sensual description. This is a love story between a man and a woman with opposing philosophies set in a country striving to throw off the yoke of colonial oppression. Will appeal to readers who like books which deliver on a cinematic scale – rich and vivid in landscape and people.

Extract

She is gone and I feel suddenly very alone. I drink what whisky I can find. I want to shake her and tell her to hurry up and grow up and get disillusioned like the rest of us; and I want her not to change, ever, for I need her to be like this: I have been stimulated, I have found things I otherwise would not have found. I live in the tension of our disparities. But where is this going, this strange affair?

Parallels