Throw Me to the Wolves - Hardcover

McGuinness, Patrick

Hardcover

ISBN 10: 1787331466 ISBN 13: 9781787331464

Publisher: Jonathan Cape Ltd, 2019

Synopsis

**WINNER OF THE ENCORE AWARD 2020**
*LONGLISTED FOR THE CWA GOLD DAGGER 2020*

'This is literary fiction as it should be: in stylish, surprising, lyrical sentences we are forced to confront the hidden power structures, public and private, that control our everyday lives' The Times

A young woman has been murdered, and a neighbour, a retired teacher from Chapleton College, is arrested. An eccentric loner - intellectual, shy, a fastidious dresser with expensive tastes - he is the perfect candidate for a media monstering.

In custody he is interviewed by two detectives: the smart-talking, quick-witted Gary, and his watchful colleague, Ander. Ander is always watchful, but particularly now, because the man across the table is his former teacher - Michael Wolphram - whom he hasn't seen in nearly 30 years.

As the novel proceeds, we watch Wolphram's media lynching as ex-pupils and colleagues line up to lie about him. In parallel, we read Ander's memories of his life as a young Dutch boy in 80s England. Another outsider, another loner in a school system rife with abuse and bullying, Ander has another case to solve: the cold case of his own childhood.

Though it deals with historical abuse and violence in schools, and the corrupt power of the popular media, Throw Me to the Wolves is about childhood and memory. A perceptive and pertinent novel of our times, beautifully written and psychologically acute, it manages to be both very funny and - at the same time - shatteringly sad.

About this title

About the Author

Patrick McGuinness is the author of two previous books of poetry, two novels, The Last Hundred Days and Throw Me to the Wolves, and a non-fiction book about place, time and memory, and his mother's small Belgian border town of Bouillon - Other People's Countries - which was shortlisted for the PEN Ackerley Prize and the James Tait Black Prize, won the Wales Book of the Year, and the Duff Cooper Prize. He is Professor of French and Comparative Literature at St Anne's College, Oxford.

Edition details

• Publisher: Jonathan Cape Ltd
• Publication date: 2019
• Language: English
• ISBN 10: 1787331466
• ISBN 13: 9781787331464
• Binding: Hardcover
• Number of pages: 336