A female academic in her late twenties descends into madness amid the news that her husband, John, has been sleeping with students – but she’s not anguished for the reasons you think. In the wake of a petition calling for John’s removal, forty-something Vladimir moves to town and kicks off this psychosexual literary fiction turned thriller. As you may expect from a book narrated by a professor, there’s discussion around how modern – let’s say ‘woke’ – readings of literature disregard whether a story is well-written or true and place representation above anything else. The narrator is, herself, well-liked by her students who see her as cool and feminist. She’s cast in the role of the sexy older professor by Vladimir. And by projecting this representation onto her, they fail to see the awful things she’s capable of. Vladimir expertly shows how manipulative, self-serving people can thrive in liberal spaces simply by saying all the right things – a lesson that always bears remembering. MG

Published by Picador