The Independent: “One of the few “hot” books at Frankfurt was a novel by “a Muslim Irvine Welsh” – Londonstani by the journalist Gautam Malkani. Set in Hounslow, it is described by Fourth Estate’s Nick Pearson – who paid a six-figure sum for two books – as “the best debut novel I’ve read in a very, very long time”. Its sale provided former Picador publisher Peter Straus, of Rogers, Coleridge and White, with his first major deal as an agent, and Fourth Estate with its first big buy in the post-Caroline Michel era.”
Excellent UK litblog Short Term Memory Loss comments: “Initially hopeful this would turn out to be an answer to STML’s prayer for a truly London novel, conversations with a couple of editors who’ve read it seem to suggest it’s rather more frivolous than that, poking fun at the wannabe Asian gangstas rather than saying anything too meaningful about London today. Even more amusing was the agonising debate among French and Spanish publishers who snapped up translation rights about whether it will be possible to translate ‘aaiiight’ and ‘innit’ into the Romance languages. Verlan, perhaps? The first chapter appears in the new issue of Prospect Magazine, so go take a peek.”
Londonstani should be published sometime next year.
More on Londonstani:
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