Going Home: One of the Observer's Debut Novels of 2024

'I will never forget these characters: so pained and funny, so brilliantly drawn, wrestled with and forgiven' HELEN GARNER Boy-made-good Teo Erskine is back in the north London suburb of his youth, visiting his father - stubborn, selfish, complicated Vic. Things have changed for Teo: he's got a steady job, a brand-new car and a London flat all concrete and glass, with a sliver of a river view. Except, underneath the surface, not much has changed at all. He's still the boy seeking his father's approval; the young man playing late-night poker with his best friend, unreliable, infuriating Ben Mossam; the one still desperately in love with the enigmatic Lia. Lia's life, on the other hand, has been transformed: now a single mum to two-year-old Joel, she doesn't have time for anyone - not even herself. When the unthinkable happens, Joel finds himself at the centre of a strange constellation of men - Teo, Vic, Ben - none of whom is fully equipped to look after him, but whose strange, tentative attempts at love might just be enough to offer him a new place to call home.