Dinner At The Centre Of The Earth Nathan Englander W&N €20.99

Political thriller, absurdist farce, globetrotting romance: multiple forms jostle in a beautifully written take on the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. Its central characters include: Prisoner Z, an American spy imprisoned in a secret Negev location; the guard who’s watched over him for 12 years; and the General, a controversial Israeli leader who’s the sole official to know of Z’s existence, and who now lies in a coma. As the novel spools back to the General’s glory days and Prisoner Z’s time on the run in Europe with a Parisian waitress, a complex meditation on right and wrong, and on trust and hope, takes shape.

Hephzibah Anderson