One of the
Wall Street Journal
's Ten Best Books of 2024 • A
Guardian
Selection for Best Fiction of 2024 • A Chicago Public Library Must-Read Book of 2024 • Named a Best Book of 2024 So Far by the BBC An ingenious, devastating, explosive novel about the ramifications of choice from "one of the most original and talented authors working today" (NPR).
"How ought one to live?" This is the question that obsesses London-based publisher Ayush, driving him to question every act of consumption. He embarks on a radical experiment in his own life and the lives of those connected to him: his practical economist husband; their twins; and even the authors he edits and publishes. One of those authors, a mysterious M. N. Opie, writes a story about a young academic involved in a car accident that causes her life to veer in an unexpected direction. Another author, an economist, describes how the gift of a cow to an impoverished family on the West Bengal–Bangladesh border sets them on a startling path to tragedy.
Together, these connected narratives raise the question: How free are we really to make our own choices? In a scathing, compassionate quarrel with the world, Neel Mukherjee confronts our fundamental assumptions about economics, race, appropriation, and the tangled ethics of contemporary life.