The Sly Company of People Who Care - Rahul Bhattacharya

A twenty-six-year-old Indian cricket journalist decides to give up his job and travel to a country where he can 'escape the deadness of his life'. So he arrives in Guyana, a forgotten colonial society of raw, mesmerizing beauty. Guyana is a complex country, a place with a foothold in both South America and the Caribbean, and the narrator soon experiences its many charms and contradictions. From the beautiful, decaying wooden houses in Georgetown, through coastal sugar-cane plantations, to the dark rainforest interior home to a secretive society of diamond-hunters, he is absorbed by this fantastic world. But he is not just seduced by the country: he is also captivated by the feisty and dangerous Jan and together they embark on an adventure which takes them to a new country and a new life.

In this dazzling and ambitious debut novel, Rahul Bhattacharya has created a story that follows the shape and rhythms of life, not art. In the manner of Don Quixote, this is a picaresque narrative that captures the heady adventures of travel, the overheated restlessness of youth, and the paradoxes of searching for life's meaning in the escape from home.