13th October, 7.30pm - David Szalay in conversation with John Lanchester, Flesh

Backstory, 71 Balham High Rd, SW12 9AP

We are very excited to welcome 2025 Booker Prize winner David Szalay to Backstory to discuss Flesh, a Backstory Book of the Month, when it was first published, with author John Lanchester (Capital, Look What You Made Me Do and more)

About the book:

‘Brilliant and wise on chance, love, sex, money’ David Nicholls ‘I was tearing through [Flesh], I never once slowed down’ Jennette McCurdy ‘Brilliance on every page’ Samantha Harvey ‘So much searing insight into the way we live now’ Observer

Through chance, luck and choice, one man’s life takes him from a modest apartment in Hungary to the elite society of London – in this captivating new novel about the forces that make and break our lives.

Fifteen-year-old István lives with his mother in a quiet apartment complex in Hungary. New to the town and shy, he becomes isolated, with his neighbour – a married woman – as his only companion. When a clandestine relationship begins between them, his life spirals out of control.

As the years pass, István moves from the army to the circles of London’s elite. His competing impulses for love, intimacy, status and wealth win him unimaginable riches, until they threaten to undo him completely. ‘An astonishingly moving portrait of a man’s life’ Booker Prize Judges, 2025 ‘A revelatory novel’ Sunday Times ‘Pure brilliance from the first to the (devastating) last sentence’ India Knight ‘Refreshing, illuminating and true’ Financial Times ‘One of the most astonishing books I’ve ever read’ Dua Lipa ‘Hugely entertaining, gripping like a thriller’ The Times ‘Visceral and compelling’ Gary Stevenson ‘Exciting, propulsive, emotional’ Sarah Jessica Parker

Tickets Available:

Ticket only - £15 (This ticket does not include a copy of the book. You can decide to buy a copy on the night, but this will be charged in addition, at the full price of the book.)

Ticket & book  (RRP £9.99 - £21 (To collect on the night.)