At night we walk in circles

SHORTLISTED FOR THE PEN/FAULKNER AWARD FOR FICTION. LONGLISTED FOR THE DYLAN THOMAS PRIZE. A breath-taking, suspenseful search for the truth of one man’s spectacular downfall, from Daniel Alarcón, one of the New Yorker’s 20 best writers under 40. Set in an unnamed South American country, a narrator we know little about pieces together the story – from journals, interviews, gossip, second-hand reports – of a young man called Nelson who travels through the mountains with a playwright and a motley collection of actors, performing a play that years earlier upset the authorities and had the playwright imprisoned. Nelson regrets leaving Ixta his girlfriend, who has since become pregnant with another man, the consequences of which will in the end overwhelm Nelson.