Genie and Paul by Natasha Soobramanien

One morning in May 2003, on the cyclone-ravaged island of Rodrigues in the Indian Ocean, the body of a man washes up on the beach.

Six weeks previously, the night Tropical Cyclone Kalunde first gathered force, destruction of another kind hit twenty-six-year-old Genie Lallan and her life in London: after a night out with her brother she wakes up in hospital to discover that he’s disappeared. Where has Paul gone and why did he abandon her at the club where she collapsed?

Genie’s search for him leads her to Rodrigues, sister island to Mauritius – their island of origin, and for Paul, the only place he has ever felt at home. Will Genie track Paul down? And what will she find if she does?

"Soobramanien vividly describes the forced deportation of people from the Chagos Islands, made homeless in the early 1970s to make room for a US military base... [she] makes increasingly clear as the book goes on, not just nostalgic literary tropes but real violations inflicted on real people... [and] deftly describes the experience of returning to a long-lost 'home' only to find that one is not fully recognised by those who never left." - The National

Also available as an eBook

Paperback: 240 pages
Publisher: Myriad Editions (16 Aug. 2012)
Language: English
ISBN: 978-1-908434-17-3
Size: 129mm x198mm