Scenes from Early Life

The startling new novel from the author of King of the Badgers and the Man Booker-shortlisted The Northern Clemency.

I was a baby during the war. We stayed inside for months. All my aunts took turns in feeding me. I couldn''t be heard to cry. You see, there were soldiers in the streets. They would have known what a crying baby meant. So I had to be kept silent. No, not everyone came out of the war alive.

One family''s life, and a nation - Bangladesh - are uniquely created through conversation, sacrifice, songs, bonds, blood, bravery and jokes. Narrated by a young boy born into a savage civil war, ''Scenes from Early Life'' is a heartbreaking, funny and gripping novel by one of our finest writers.