Western Lane : Longlisted for the Women's Prize for Fiction 2024

A deeply moving novel about grief, sisterhood and a teenage girl's struggle to transcend herself. Eleven-year-old Gopi has been playing squash since she was old enough to hold a racket.

When her mother dies, her father enlists her in a quietly brutal training regimen, and the game becomes her world. Slowly, she grows apart from her sisters. Her life is reduced to the sport, guided by its rhythms: the serve, the volley, the drive, the shot and its echo.

But on the court, she is not alone. She is with her pa. She is with Ged, a thirteen-year-old boy with his own formidable talent.

She is with the players who have come before her. She is in awe. An unforgettable coming-of-age story, Chetna Maroo’s first novel is a moving exploration of the closeness of sisterhood, the immigrant experience, and the collective overcoming of grief.