Set in Guyana, this tells the story of Galton Flood, a man who grows up humiliated by his fiercely puritanical mother and undermined by the successes of his older brother. He moves away to the anonymity of a small harbour town where he meets Gemma, a woman who unwittingly fuels his despair and drives him to an act of brutal violence. And so the slow fuse of gradual derangement burns on, pulling him further into his own agonized and paranoid world. Galton Flood, anti-hero, has become neither lovable nor malign, but the victim instead of a terrible vulnerability.
First published in 1978, 'The Murderer' is an extraordinary novel of chilling truthfulness and a story of memorable tension.
Winner of The Guardian Fiction Prize.
