The Promise won the Booker Prize in 2021. Brutal emotional truths hit home in Damon Galgut’s deft, powerful story of a diminished family and a troubled land.
Damon Galgut’s powerful tale of an unlikely friendship in an uneasy time, set in a dilapidated rural hospital in post-apartheid South Africa.
When Laurence Waters arrives at his rural hospital posting, Frank is instantly suspicious. Laurence is everything Frank is not - young, optimistic and full of new schemes. The two become uneasy friends, while the rest of the staff in the deserted hospital view Laurence with a mixture of awe and mistrust. The town beyond the hospital is also coping with new arrivals, and the return of old faces, in a world where the past is demanding restitution from the present.
Damon Galgut
About the Author
Damon Galgut has been shortlisted three times for the Booker Prize and won in 2021 for his ninth book, The Promise. He is a South African playwright and novelist, who wrote his first novel aged 17.Other nominated books by Damon Galgut
Damon Galgut’s haunting evocation of one man’s search for love and a place to call home - a novel of longing and thwarted desire, rage and compassion.
