Low - Jeet Thayil

Ullis went to the bathroom and carefully unfolded the business card and placed it on the sink. Then he rolled up a note and snorted the last of his wife's ashes.

Following the death of his wife, Dominic Ullis escapes to Bombay in search of oblivion and a dangerous new drug, Meow Meow. So begins a glorious weekend of misadventure as he tours the teeming, kaleidoscopic city from its sleek eyries of high-capital to the piss-stained streets, encountering a cast with their own stories to tell, but none of whom Ullis - his faculties ever distorted - is quite sure he can trust.

Heady, heartbroken and heartfelt, Low is a blazing joyride through the darklands of grief towards obliteration - and, perhaps, epiphany.

'Jeet Thayil delights not just in pushing the bounds of possibility, but in smashing them to smithereens.' John Burnside