The critically acclaimed debut novel from the T.S. Eliot Prize-shortlisted poet -- Frances
is a graduate student spending a summer volunteering in rural France in the hope that tending
vegetables and harvesting honey will distract her from a scandal that drove her out of Paris
her research unfinished and her sense of self unmoored. At the eco-farm Noa Noa she comes
under the influence of its charismatic and domineering owner Paul. As his hold over her
tightens and her plans come unstuck she finds herself entangled in a strange uneven
relationship. On a fraught road trip across the South of France both are forced to reckon with
uncomfortable truths. A compelling and perturbing story of power passivity and the cage of
being 'good' Paul introduces a novelist of extraordinary perspicacity and lyricism.
