From the Booker-shortlisted author ofThe Year of the Runaways, a blazing new novel with a deeply moving family mystery at its heart

Nayan Olak keeps seeing Helen Fletcher around town and on his daily run out to the Peaks. Shes come back to the old house at the end of the lane, with her teenaged son, Brandon, though nobody seems to remember much about her. Some trouble at school, back in the day. A certain defensiveness. Nayan is powerfully drawn to her, though he doesnt quite know why.

He hasnt risked love since he lost his young family in a terrible accident twenty years before. All his energy has gone into work at the union, where hes now running for the leadership against accomplished newcomer, Megha. Its a huge moment for Nayan, the culmination of everything he believes. But as he grows closer to Helen, and to the possibility that their pasts may have been connected, much more is suddenly threatened than his chances of winning.

‘In this thoughtful, searching excavation of interlocking tragedies and contemporary politics, Sunjeev Sahota offers us a novel at once Shakespearean and thrillingly of our time’ Sarah Thankam Mathews, author ofAll This Could Be Different

‘Fearlessly contemporary and flawlessly observed,A Spoiled Heartconfirms Sunjeev Sahota’s position as one of our essential novelists’ Karan Mahajan, author ofThe Association of Small Bombs