A Person of Interest

SHORTLISTED FOR THE WOMEN'S PRIZE FOR FICTION 2026SHORTLISTED FOR THE BOOKER PRIZE 2025FINALIST FOR THE ORWELL PRIZE FOR POLITICAL FICTION 2026A WATERSTONES PAPERBACK OF THE YEAR 2026A moment is all it takes to shatter a family. The echoes last a lifetime...'Ferociously smart and full of surprises' Eleanor Catton'Engrossing... Full of brains and mystery' TelegraphOne evening, ten-year-old Louisa and her father, Serk, take a walk out on the breakwater. They are spending the summer in a coastal Japanese town. Hours later, Louisa wakes on the beach, soaked to the skin. Her father is missing: presumably drowned.This sudden event shatters their small family. As Louisa and her American mother return to the US, Serk's disappearance reverberates across time and space, and the mystery of what really happened that night slowly unravels.A Book of the Year for the Guardian, Time, New Yorker, Esquire, Vanity Fair, FT and Barack Obama'Big, bold and surprising' Guardian'Illuminates the buried secrets of the human heart' Oprah Daily'Gorgeous... Almost impossibly heartbreaking' New York Magazine'It will make your head spin in the best way' Dakota Johnson'Endlessly dazzling' VogueREADERS LOVE FLASHLIGHT'Compelling, fascinating, original. Read this book''Five stars. Heartbreaking''A beautifully written story of a family across decades''I loved it - the best read in years. Glorious''Absolutely brilliant'

Freundschaft, Liebe, Sex und Macht: »Vertrauensübung« ist ein intensiver Roman, der mutmaßliche Wahrheiten erdrutschartig mit sich reißt.Sarah und David gehören zu den Auserwählten, die an der Elite-Schauspielschule CAPA aufgenommen werden. Sarah stammt aus einfachen Verhältnissen, David aus reichem Elternhaus. Wie ihre Mitschüler:innen konkurrieren sie um die Sympathien ihres Lehrers Mr Kingsley, dem eigentlichen Star der Schule. Kingsley ist ein Charismatiker, der jeden Raum zum Leuchten bringt und dann durchschneidet wie eine Messerklinge. Selbst die Eltern haben keinen Einfluss darauf, was innerhalb der Schulmauern geschieht. Als Sarah und David ihren Unterschieden zum Trotz eine Beziehung anfangen, ziehen sie alle Aufmerksamkeit auf sich ¿ und setzen damit eine Dynamik in Gang, die der Welt außerhalb der Schule über Jahre Rätsel aufgibt. Bis zwei Außenseiterinnen sich Gehör verschaffen und unseren Blick auf das, was damals geschah, auf Intimität und Inszenierung, Fakt und Fiktion, Geltung und Gewalt radikal verändern.

Two outsiders are drawn together in a powerful, emotionally gripping story of love and war - the debut novel from the Booker Prize-shortlisted author'A major world writer' New York TimesIn 1955, a new student arrives at a small college in the Tennessee mountains. Chuck is shy, speaks English haltingly, and on the subject of his earlier life in Korea he will not speak at all. Then he meets Katherine, a beautiful and solitary young woman who, like Chuck, is haunted by a dark episode from the past.Without quite knowing why, these two outsiders are drawn together, each sensing in the other the possibility of salvation.'Epic and intimate' The New Yorker'A first novel of extraordinary sensibility and transforming strangeness' Los Angeles Times'Elegantly wrought' Vanity Fair

This summer, meet Regina Gottlieb as she becomes entangled with a magnetic professor - and his volatile wife...'A raw, wild, hurtling foray into the tangled realms of sexuality' Jennifer Egan'Fantastic... I wanted to read it all the time' Meg WolitzerIn the heat of September, and the heady rush of starting her graduate degree, Regina Gottlieb is entranced by her controversial professor Nicholas Brodeur. Against all advice, she becomes embroiled in his world, only to betray him in a passionate love affair with his charismatic, volatile wife.This is the story of Regina's mistakes, which begin in the bedroom and end - if they do - fifteen years in the future and thousands of miles away.'A book that fulfils all the promise of a long, hot summer' New York Magazine'Smart and witty...so delicious' Washington Post'Surprised me and thrilled me' The New Yorker'An amazing book' Michael Cunningham

SHORTLISTED FOR THE BOOKER PRIZE 2025<BR>WATERSTONES FICTION BOOK OF THE MONTH<BR>LONGLISTED FOR THE WOMEN'S PRIZE FOR FICTION 2026<BR><BR>A moment is all it takes to shatter a family. The echoes last a lifetime...<BR><BR>'Ferociously smart and full of surprises' Eleanor Catton<BR><BR>'Engrossing... Full of brains and mystery' Telegraph<BR><BR>One evening, ten-year-old Louisa and her father, Serk, take a walk out on the breakwater. They are spending the summer in a coastal Japanese town. Hours later, Louisa wakes on the beach, soaked to the skin. Her father is missing: presumably drowned.<BR><BR>This sudden event shatters their small family. As Louisa and her American mother return to the US, Serk's disappearance reverberates across time and space, and the mystery of what really happened that night slowly unravels.<BR><BR>A Book of the Year for the Guardian, Time, New Yorker, Esquire, Vanity Fair, FT and Barack Obama<BR><BR>'Big, bold and surprising' Guardian<BR><BR>'Illuminates the buried secrets of the human heart' Oprah Daily<BR><BR>'Gorgeous... Almost impossibly heartbreaking' New York Magazine<BR><BR>'It will make your head spin in the best way' Dakota Johnson<BR><BR>'Endlessly dazzling' Vogue<BR><BR>READERS LOVE FLASHLIGHT<BR><BR>'Compelling, fascinating, original. Read this book'<BR>'Five stars. Heartbreaking'<BR>'A beautifully written story of a family across decades'<BR>'I loved it - the best read in years. Glorious'<BR>'Absolutely brilliant'

A BEST BOOK OF THE YEAR: The New Yorker ¿ Time ¿ New York ¿ The Washington Post ¿ NPR ¿ Los Angeles Times ¿ The Boston Globe ¿ The Guardian ¿ Vanity Fair ¿ Elle ¿ Town & Country ¿ Oprah Daily ¿ The New York Post ¿ 48 Hills ¿ Financial Times ¿ The Economist ¿ Esquire (UK) ¿ Kirkus Reviews ¿ Electric Literature ¿ PEN America ¿ The Chicago Public Library ¿ Los Angeles Review of Books<BR><BR>One of President Obama's Favorite Books of 2025<BR><BR>"EXPLOSIVE." (The New York Times Book Review) ¿ "GORGEOUS." (New York) ¿ "SHOCKING." (NPR) ¿ "DEVASTATING." (The Washington Post) ¿ "ASTONISHING." (The Atlantic) ¿ "MARVELOUS." (NBC's Weekend Today in New York)<BR><BR>Short-listed for the Booker Prize ¿ Long-listed for the National Book Award ¿ Long-listed for the Andrew Carnegie Medal ¿ Short-listed for the Women's Prize for Fiction ¿ Finalist for the Anisfield-Wolf Book Awards ¿ Finalist for the Orwell Prize ¿ Short-listed for the Mark Twain American Voice in Literature Award ¿ Winner of the Chautauqua Prize<BR><BR>A TeaTime and Get Lit Book Club Pick<BR><BR>One summer night, Louisa and her father take a walk on the breakwater. Her father is carrying a flashlight. He cannot swim. Later, Louisa is found on the beach, soaked to the skin, barely alive. Her father is gone. She is ten years old.<BR><BR>Louisa is an only child of parents who have severed themselves from the past. Her father, Serk, is Korean, but was born and raised in Japan; he lost touch with his family when they bought into the promises of postwar Pyongyang and relocated to North Korea. Her American mother, Anne, is estranged from her family. But now it is just Anne and Louisa, adrift and facing the challenges of ordinary life in the wake of catastrophe. United, separated, and also repelled by their mutual grief, they attempt to move on. But they cannot escape the echoes of that night. What really happened to Louisa's father? <BR><BR>A monumental new novel from the National Book Award winner Susan Choi, Flashlight spans decades and continents in a spellbinding, heart-gripping investigation of family, loss, memory, and the ways in which we are shaped by what we cannot see.