The Boy Next Door
On sale
15th April 2010
Price: £9.99
*Winner of the Orange Award for New Writers*
‘Entertaining, ambitious and packed with news from elsewhere, leavened by the precious optimism of youth. Don’t miss it.’ Independent
A powerful love story set in post-independence Zimbabwe as it slides towards chaos.
‘Two days after I turned fourteen the son of our neighbour set his stepmother alight.’
Or so Lindiwe Bishop believes, though eighteen months later the charges against Ian McKenzie are dropped and he returns home, full of charm and swagger. Intrigued, Lindiwe strikes up a covert friendship with the mysterious white boy next door. As a bond grows between them, they cannot foresee how severely it will be tested in the years ahead.
Vividly evoking Zimbabwe’s slide from independence into chaos, THE BOY NEXT DOOR tells an engrossing tale about what it means to witness, change, love and remain whole when all around you is falling apart.
‘An exuberant, tender and often humorous love story … Irene Sabatini is a born writer, and she has told a completely engrossing story’ Daily Mail
‘Entertaining, ambitious and packed with news from elsewhere, leavened by the precious optimism of youth. Don’t miss it.’ Independent
A powerful love story set in post-independence Zimbabwe as it slides towards chaos.
‘Two days after I turned fourteen the son of our neighbour set his stepmother alight.’
Or so Lindiwe Bishop believes, though eighteen months later the charges against Ian McKenzie are dropped and he returns home, full of charm and swagger. Intrigued, Lindiwe strikes up a covert friendship with the mysterious white boy next door. As a bond grows between them, they cannot foresee how severely it will be tested in the years ahead.
Vividly evoking Zimbabwe’s slide from independence into chaos, THE BOY NEXT DOOR tells an engrossing tale about what it means to witness, change, love and remain whole when all around you is falling apart.
‘An exuberant, tender and often humorous love story … Irene Sabatini is a born writer, and she has told a completely engrossing story’ Daily Mail
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Reviews
Irene Sabatini's captivating first novel, THE BOY NEXT DOOR, offers readers a rare and often painfully honest glimpse into life in post-independent Zimbabwe. And yet there is much light and hope and yes, love - genuine and hard-earned - in this book as well. A true pleasure.
One of the most engaging novels about inter-racial love to be published this century . . . entertaining, ambitious and packed with news from elsewhere, leavened by the precious optimism of youth. Don't miss it.
What a worthy winner of the 2010 Orange Award for New Writers. This is an exuberant, tender and often humorous love story . . . Irene Sabatini is a born writer, and she has told a completely engrossing story which combines brilliantly realised fictional characters as well as evoking the only too real sad degradation of a once-thriving country.
A tender, powerful debut, this story makes an indelible imprint.
Irene Sabatini's captivating first novel, THE BOY NEXT DOOR, offers readers a rare and often painfully honest glimpse into life in post-independent Zimbabwe. And yet there is much light and hope and yes, love - genuine and hard-earned - in this book as well. A true pleasure.
A fine and accomplished first novel...full of understanding, insight and powerful beauty.