The Imposter

Adam Napier is a down-and-out, a redundant office worker who moves to the country in the hope of writing poetry. But his quiet life is quickly turned upside-down by a chance meeting with Canning, a local landowner. Canning takes Adam under his wing, purporting to be his long-lost school friend - but Adam has no memory of him. Canning invites Adam to his enormous game park (a kind of Jurassic Park without the dinosaurs), where (it soon transpires) shady business deals are in the offing. The world of The Impostor is a world in which everyone (including Adam) is working towards the obliteration of history. Every character - the whole town, it seems - has a mysterious past they would like to forget. Canning even hopes to obliterate the landscape of his game park: it reminds him too much of his hated father. But, through a series of clever plot twists, Galgut hammers home a simple message: the past will come back to haunt you. What goes around comes around. South Africa as a nation may want to forget the past, but it's not that easy. At the book's dramatic finale, Adam faces a crossroads and a clear choice: will he risk his own life to protect someone else, despite their past crimes? Can a person ever have a right to a fresh start? Such questions are timely and important. -- Publisher details.