THE SOUTH

A mesmerising tale Both heartbreaking and joyful MICHAEL CUNNINGHAM A radiant novel of the longing that blooms between two boys over the course of one summer about family desire and what we inherit from celebrated author Tash Aw Shimmeringly intelligent and elegiacally intimate YIYUN LI CHOSEN AS A TIMES GUARDIAN and FINANCIAL TIMES BOOK OF 2025 When his grandfather dies a boy named Jay travels south with his family to the property he left them a once flourishing farm that has fallen into disrepair The trees are diseased the fields parched from months of drought Still Jay s father Jack sends him out to work the land or whatever land is left Over the course of these hot dense days Jay finds himself drawn to Chuan the son of the farm s manager different from him in every way except for one Out in the fields and on the streets into town the charge between the boys intensifies Inside the house the other family members confront their own regrets and begin to drift apart Like the land around them they are powerless to resist the global forces that threaten to render their lives obsolete At once sweeping and intimate The South is a story of what happens when private and public lives collide It is the first in a quartet of novels that form