NINA X

'This moving tale of growing up in a Maoist cult, and the traumatic aftermath, explores ideas of freedom, control and identity with warmth and humour.' - Observer. This award-winning novel is 'literary gold'. - Sunday Times. Nina X has never been outside or met another child. She has no books, toys or privacy. Nina X has a lot to learn. She has no mother or father; she has Comrade Chen, and her Comrades Uma, Jeni and Ruth. Her closest emotional connection is with the birds she sees when she removes the plasterboard that covers her bedroom window. Comrade Chen has named her The Project. She is being raised entirely separated from the false gods of capitalism and the cult of the self. He has her record everything in her journal to track her thoughts. In order to keep her identity pure, her words are erased, over and over again. But that was before. Now Nina is in Freedom, and all the rules have changed. She has to remember that everything is opposite to what she was told, and yet Freedom seems to be a very confusing and dangerous place. A most brutal and innovative novel which is challenging, horrific and visceral, experimental and humane, but also a deeply serious of a mind-bending cult and the difficulty a survivor has in adjusting to the world of normality. 273pp, paperback.