Winner of the Arthur C. Clarke Award 2020'The great African novel of the twenty-first century' Tade ThompsonOn the banks of the Zambezi River, a few miles from the majestic Victoria Falls, there was once a colonial settlement called The Old Drift. In 1904, in a smoky room at the hotel across the river, an Old Drifter named Percy M. Clark, foggy with fever, makes a mistake that entangles his fate with those of an Italian hotelier and an African busboy.So begins a cycle of unwitting retribution between three Zambian families as they collide and converge over the course of the century, into the present and beyond.'Extraordinary, ambitious, evocative, dazzling' Salman Rushdie'Brilliant . . . heartbreaking' Sunday Times'Electric . . . Serpell is a major talent' Financial Times'Charming, heartbreaking and breathtaking' Carmen Maria MachadoLonglisted for the Debut Crown Historical Writers Association Award 2019Longlisted for the Center for Fiction First Novel Prize 2019