The Underloved

A powerful modern fable from the Gordon Burn Prize-winning author of The Panopticon, Luckenbooth and Ootlin

'A fierce talent' The Times

There was a little boy who came from a family of Thugs.

In a remote town in the Scottish Highlands, a young boy with bright blue hair is growing up in a family to which he feels he doesn’t belong. His father, like all the men of his family, is an angry man who never talks about his feelings and wants his son to be just like him. But Little Thug is a sensitive boy, especially since his mother went up the apple tree and never came back down.

One day, Little Thug has enough. Escaping to the forest for the first time, he encounters a rare Scottish Wildcat, and then a world beyond his imagination. But is it a world to which he might finally belong?

Praise for Jenni Fagan

'The Modern Mary Shelley ... Fagan is a one-off' The Scotsman
'[Fagan] celebrates the resistance that makes us human' Big Issue
'An outstanding writer of the highest order' Lemn Sissay
'We're so lucky to have her books in the world' Kirstin Innes
'A tumultuous talent' Niall Griffiths
'A force of nature' Fern Brady