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Barry James is detained in a quarantine facility in the blistering heat of the Great Karoo. Here he exists in two worlds: the unforgiving reality of his incarceration and the lyrical landscapes of his dreams.
He has cut all ties with his previous life, his health is failing, and he has given up all hope. All he has to cling to are the meanderings of his restless mind, the daily round of pills and the journals he reluctantly keeps as testimony to a life once lived.
And then there's an opportunity to escape.
LONGLISTED FOR THE GUARDIAN'S NOT THE BOOKER PRIZE 2019
'The most credible dystopian novel I have ever read' Sunday Times
'A searing vision of an all-too-possible world... a profound and wholly original voice' Henrietta Rose-Innes
'A forceful and engaging tale that brilliantly blends the real and imagined world and is full of sparkling inventions. This page-turner is bound to be the talk of book circles' Niq Mhlongo
'Thought-provoking, alluring and sensitively written... a new thrilling talent' Cape Times
Barry James is detained in a quarantine facility in the blistering heat of the Great Karoo. Here he exists in two worlds: the unforgiving reality of his incarceration and the lyrical landscapes of his dreams.He has cut all ties with his previous life, his health is failing, and he has given up all hope. All he has to cling to are the meanderings of his restless mind, the daily round of pills and the journals he reluctantly keeps as testimony to a life once lived.
And then there's an opportunity to escape.
LONGLISTED FOR THE GUARDIAN'S NOT THE BOOKER PRIZE 2019
'The most credible dystopian novel I have ever read' Sunday Times
'A searing vision of an all-too-possible world... a profound and wholly original voice' Henrietta Rose-Innes
'A forceful and engaging tale that brilliantly blends the real and imagined world and is full of sparkling inventions. This page-turner is bound to be the talk of book circles' Niq Mhlongo
'Thought-provoking, alluring and sensitively written... a new thrilling talent' Cape Times
Shortlisted for the 9Mobile Prize for Literature
About the author
Marcus Low is a Cape Town-based writer and public health specialist. He completed a MA in creative writing at the University of Cape Town in 2009 – for which he wrote an early draft of ‘asylum’. He previously worked as Policy Director at the Treatment Action Campaign, an influencial South African civil society organisation that advocates for the rights and interests of people living with and affected by tuberculosis (TB) and HIV. He remains involved in public health policy both in South Africa and internationally. His novel ‘asylum’ was in part inspired by the incarceration of patients with drug-resistant forms of TB in South Africa circa 2008 – something he directly encountered in his work. He was born in Vryburg, South Africa in 1979.
