Brazzaville Beach

'I live on Brazzaville Beach ... I am here because two sets of strange and extraordinary events happened to me ... One in England, first, and then one in Africa.' On Brazzaville Beach, on the edge of Africa, Hope Clearwater examines the complex circumstances that brought her there. Sifting the details for evidence of her own innocence or guilt, she tells her engrossing story with a blunt and beguiling honesty that not only intrigues and disturbs but is also completely enthralling. %%%'I live on Brazzaville Beach ... I am here because two sets of strange and extraordinary events happened to me ... One in England, first, and then one in Africa.'

On Brazzaville Beach, on the edge of Africa, Hope Clearwater examines the complex circumstances that brought her there. Sifting the details for evidence of her own innocence or guilt, she tells her engrossing story with a blunt and beguiling honesty that not only intrigues and disturbs but is also completely enthralling.

“'As intelligent as anything you're likely to read... slips by like a thriller' Time Out'A brilliant storyteller... a book which stretches, tantalizes and delights' Financial Times'A most extraordinary parable about mankind... quite unlike anything else I have ever read' Sunday Express'Brazzaville Beach exudes confidence; Boyd has grown in authority from book to book. Things are by turn hilarious and edgy but always under control' Sunday Times”

'As intelligent as anything you're likely to read... slips by like a thriller' Time Out 'A brilliant storyteller... a book which stretches, tantalizes and delights' Financial Times 'A most extraordinary parable about mankind... quite unlike anything else I have ever read' Sunday Express 'Brazzaville Beach exudes confidence; Boyd has grown in authority from book to book. Things are by turn hilarious and edgy but always under control' Sunday Times

William Boyd was born in 1952 in Accra, Ghana and grew up there and in Nigeria. His first novel, A Good Man in Africa (1981), won the Whitbread First Novel Award and the Somerset Maugham Prize. His other novels are An Ice Cream War (1982, shortlisted for the 1982 Booker Prize and winner of the John Llewellyn Rhys Prize), Stars and Bars (1984), The New Confessions (1987), Brazzaville Beach (1990, winner of the McVitie Prize and the James Tait Black Memorial Prize), The Blue Afternoon (1993, winner of the 1993 Sunday Express Book of the Year Award), Armadillo (1998), Any Human Heart (2002, winner of the Prix Jean Monnet) and Restless (2006, winner of the Costa Novel of the Year Award). His latest novel is Ordinary Thunderstorms (2009). Some thirteen of his screenplays have been filmed, including The Trench (1999), which he also directed, and he is also the author of four collections of short stories: On the Yankee Station (1981), The Destiny of Nathalie 'X' (1995), Fascination (2004) and The Dream Lover (2008). He is married and divides his time between London and South West France.

Winner of the James Tait Black Memorial Prize 'A most extraordinary parable about mankind. Quite unlike anything else I have read' Sunday Express On Brazzaville Beach, on the edge of Africa, Hope Clearwater ponders the strange circumstances that led her to leave her husband John, and his mathematical obsessions, in England and venture to Africa to help world-renowned scientist Eugene Mallabar with his studies of wild chimps. But the more Hope studies Mallabar, the more she comes to believe that something isn't right. That behind Mallabar, and his obsessive work, there lies another, more sinister truth: one that might also help explain Hope's reasons for leaving England . . . 'Brilliant, daring. A gripping and compulsive story' Herald 'Hilarious and edgy' Sunday Times Look out for William Boyd's other titles in Penguin: [Thumbnails of other reissues: Any Human Heart/Armadillo]

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