Author(s): Simon Wroe

Literary Fiction

Following his expulsion from school, seventeen-year-old dreamer Ellis Dau is sent to work with his father. His father is editor of The Chronicle, the last bastion of free speech in their strange, strange land. And it is under threat: from heavy-handed policemen, mysterious revolutionaries, and the resident Russian billionaire.

As Ellis navigates his collapsing, blacked-out city - and his feelings for the oligarch's beautiful daughter - he realises that some things are worth fighting for. But can he save his family and the newspaper fuelled only by youth, grain spirit and unrequited love?

Holden Caulfield by way of Gary Shteyngart, Ellis Dau calls to mind the narrators of Skippy Dies, Submarine and Absurdistan, but has a charm and energy which is very much his own.