Lords of Serendipity

Lords of Serendipity Synopsis

A SHARPLY FUNNY AND MOVING NOVEL WHERE THOUSANDS OF MILES APART FROM EACH OTHER, TWO GIRLS HAVE THE SAME DREAM . . .

'Tender, eviscerating, perfect'
Junot Dìaz, Pulitzer Prize-winning author

'Biting, ambitious, very funny'
Wall Street Journal

'Vast, hilarious'
Times Literary Supplement
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Devi is a Sri Lankan village girl who dreams of going to Harvard. Devi's father cleans toilets in a five-star hotel to pay for his daughter to be tutored by a dapper young Indian man - who might not be the Oxford scholar he claims to be on Whatsapp . . .

Katrina is a middle-class American girl whose life has been designed to get her into an elite liberal arts college. Katrina's father teaches extra courses at a mediocre technical university to pay for his daughter's academic experiences. Meanwhile, his tech bro TA expertly extorts money from international students terrified of flunking out and being deported . . .

Set between contemporary Sri Lanka and the United States, Lords of Serendipity is a global campus novel for the 21st century. A funny, moving, and sharply observed story about dreams and ambition meeting corruption and hypocrisy, about strivers and hustlers, and the lengths parents will go to for their children.
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PRAISE FOR LORDS OF SERENDIPITY

'Combining wicked satire with genuine hope, Lords of Serendipity takes on the financial, moral and cultural crises plaguing modern academia. An old-fashioned Dickensian tale, it sweeps across continents and campuses. Biting, ambitious, very funny' Wall Street Journal

'Randy Boyagoda's Lords of Serendipity is utterly fantastic and timely beyond belief. This is the campus novel we've all been waiting for: tender, eviscerating, perfect'Junot Dìaz, Pulitzer Prize-winning author of The Brief Wondrous Life of Oscar Wao

'One of this novel's most striking features is its combination of savage irony and genuine tenderness. The writing may be biting, but there is real hurt and passion beneath' Times Literary Supplement

'A book that's a feast, an occasion and a celebration. Randy Boyagoda delightfully skewers the industrial-academic complex but also creates moving characters who seem to have walked in from the dorm and faculty meeting next door. The result is as moving as it is hysterically funny' Gary Shteyngart, New York Times Bestselling author of Vera, or Faith

'This is a new kind of campus novel, a wicked but humane satire...' Tom Perrotta

'A sparkling, humane, and irresistible campus novel. As Randy Boyagoda celebrates (and subverts) the comedy of college, he offers what any good education should: not a microcosm, sealed off from the world, but a wide-ranging, free-thinking inquiry into life beyond the ivory tower' Garth Risk Hallberg, author of City on Fire