Her latest fiction follows Sissy Olikara, a US-based translator reflecting on her 1970s childhood in the outskirts of the Zambian capital Lusaka. The end result is profound and long-lasting'

After two acclaimed novels, Kalayil has scored a hat-trick with her third, an emotionally resonant, semi-autobiographical story about growth and change and coming to terms with loss'

The book is well written and has a very gentle, languid feel - you are slowly drawn into the story with lovely descriptions of nature and family life from the eyes of a child ... an involving book with good characters, story, and a setting that will be new to a lot of people - would recommend'

A tenderly written, fascinating and thoughtful semi-autobiographical novel. [It] looks at the presence of memories that bruise, that affect and create our future selves, it is wonderfully readable and gently provocative too'

A finely structured family story ... It is written with serious respect for its characters and their story. There are no villains. It is about people in credible situations and people who are almost all trying to behave well. This is difficult to bring off and Kalayil is evidently a novelist of real talent'