The Boy Next Door

Irene Sabatini's captivating first novel, THE BOY NEXT DOOR, offers readers a rare and often painfully honest glimpse into life in post-independent Zimbabwe. And yet there is much light and hope and yes, love - genuine and hard-earned - in this book as well. A true pleasure.

One of the most engaging novels about inter-racial love to be published this century . . . entertaining, ambitious and packed with news from elsewhere, leavened by the precious optimism of youth. Don't miss it.

What a worthy winner of the 2010 Orange Award for New Writers. This is an exuberant, tender and often humorous love story . . . Irene Sabatini is a born writer, and she has told a completely engrossing story which combines brilliantly realised fictional characters as well as evoking the only too real sad degradation of a once-thriving country.

A tender, powerful debut, this story makes an indelible imprint.

Irene Sabatini's captivating first novel, THE BOY NEXT DOOR, offers readers a rare and often painfully honest glimpse into life in post-independent Zimbabwe. And yet there is much light and hope and yes, love - genuine and hard-earned - in this book as well. A true pleasure.

A fine and accomplished first novel...full of understanding, insight and powerful beauty.