Exile by Jakob Ejersbo

Exile is set in Tanzania in the late 1980s and follows the late teenage years of Samantha, a second generation ex-pat. Packed off to an international boarding school by her violent father and alcohol dependent mother, Samantha is a self destructive loner. The school preaches cultural understanding but racial tensions run high. Pupils feel neither African nor any affinity for their European homelands, and Samantha finds that living as a white in Africa has made her 'grey inside'. Despite raising the family in Tanzania their parents want them to return to Europe. Those that go 'home' never stay as all they encounter is an alien land devoid of the privileged lifestyle they're accustomed to. Aware that, despite their expensive education, Africa offers them no future many of the pupils descend into a self destructive vortex of drink, drugs and crime. Samantha is one of the worst, seducing men and taking increasingly strong narcotics. Her actions only serve to alienate those close to her and draw the attentions of dangerous and violent males. Exile offers a shocking insight into the state of Africa in the 1980s and the failure of Europeans to save it, or themselves, from the downward spiral. [Rowena McIntosh]