One Small Voice An Observer best debut novel for 2023

A story of friendship and family, ambition and tradition, and a young man coming of age in a country on fire, by a dazzling debut voice

India, 1992. The country is ablaze with riots. In Lucknow, ten-year-old Shubhankar witnesses a terrible act of mob violence that will alter the course of his life- one to which his family turn a blind eye.

As he approaches adulthood, Shabby focuses on the only path he believes will buy him an escape - good school, good degree, good job, good car. But when he arrives in Mumbai in his twenties, he begins to question whether there might be other roads he could choose. His new friends, Syed and Shruti, are asking the same questions - together, buoyed by the freedom of the big city, they are rewriting their stories.

But as the rising tide of nationalism sweeps across the country, and their friendship becomes the rock they all cling to, this new life suddenly seems fragile. And before Shabby can chart his way forward, he must reckon with the ghosts of his past . . .

Dazzling and deeply moving, One Small Voice is a novel of modern India- of violence and prejudice, friendship and loyalty, community and tradition, and of a young man coming of age in a country on fire.