GUERRILLAS

Set on a troubled Caribbean island where Asians Africans Americans and former British colonials co exist in a state of suppressed hysteria Guerrillas is a novel of colonialism and revolution A white man arrives with his mistress an Englishwoman influenced by fantasies of native power and sexuality unaware of the consequences of her actions Together with a leader of the revolution they act out a gripping drama of death sexual violence and spiritual impotence Guerrillas depicts a convulsion in public life and ends in private violence Place and people are evoked with an intensity unrivalled elsewhere The novel comes with extraordinary force from the centre of a profound moral awareness of the world s plight Remarkable Guerrillas is a brilliant novel in every way and it shimmers with artistic certainty The New York Times Impeccable prose precise austere Guerrillas seems to me Naipaul s Heart of Darkness a brilliant artist s anatomy of emptiness and of despair Observer Now part of the Picador Collection a series showcasing the very best of modern literature