My Son’s Story, Nadine Gordimer

This is an absolute stunner. Enthralling, complex, surprising at every turn. I actually don’t want to say too much about it because the gradual unfolding is such a pleasure, but the rough sketch is that it’s a novel about a South African family designated by law as Coloured, fighting Apartheid while being internally riven by their own secrets. The story opens with the son encountering his father on a date with a mistress, and proceeds from there in a tense psycho-sexual drama. It’s phenomenal. You’ve got to read it.