Longlisted for the Desmond Elliott Prize 2010.
The Desmond Elliott Prize is an annual award for a first novel written
in English and published in the UK. Worth £10,000 to the winner, the
prize is named after the literary agent and publisher, Desmond Elliott.
Click here to find out more.
Winner of the Costa First Novel Award 2009.
Costa Book Awards 2009 Judges' comment: "Captures the raw humanity of inner city life with extraordinary authenticity."
A Bangladeshi girl has fled an abusive arranged marriage and then finds she needs to escape the restrictions of her family, back home in England, and start out on her own. Along the way she meets characters who both surprise and shock. A totally engrossing book - touching, funny and sad.
| Primary Genre | Modern and Contemporary Fiction |
| Recommendations: |
Beauty – in both name and appearance – is a twenty-year-old Bangladeshi, back in England having disgraced her family by fleeing an abusive arranged marriage. Placed on the jobseekers’ treadmill, and under continuing domestic pressure, in desperation, she runs away.
Her encounters with officialdom, fellow claimants, and passers-by in the city streets, complicated by the restrictions and comfort of her language and culture, place her at the mercy of such unlikely helpers as Mark, a friendly, Staffordshire Bull Terrier-breeding ex-offender, and Peter, a middle-class underachiever on the rebound from a bitter relationship.
Determined and spirited, yet tormented by doubts, Beauty is forced to examine her own beliefs and think seriously about her future. While her brothers search for her across the city, the conflict between her desire for personal freedom and her sense of family duty deepens. What will she do?
A sharply rendered, compassionate and challenging portrait of a fragmented, multicultural urban England.
Beauty features in the following genres: Modern and Contemporary Fiction, eBooks of the Month, General Fiction, Fiction, Recommendations
Beauty is available in Paperback, Ebook
Beauty was written by Raphael Selbourne and published by Tindal Street Press
