Winner of the COSTA First Novel Award.


Beauty--in both name and appearance--is a 20-year-old Bangladeshi, returned to England after having disgraced her family by fleeing an abusive arranged marriage. Forced onto the job-hunter's treadmill and under extreme domestic pressure, she cracks and runs away. Her encounters with officialdom, fellow claimants, and strangers in the city streets, complicated by the restrictions and comfort of her language and culture, place her at the mercy of such unlikely helpers as Mark, a friendly, Staffordshire bull terrier-breeding ex-offender, and Peter, a middle-class underachiever on the rebound from a bitter relationship. With determination and good humor, Beauty moves ever closer to making her choice between family duty and personal freedom. All the while, however, her brothers are searching for her across town. Can she make the choice herself, before she's forced to? A sharply rendered, compassionate, and challenging portrait of a fragmented, multicultural urban England.