Bright

The first novel by a Thai woman to appear in English. A book equal parts melancholic and exuberant, by an author with a knack for finding the gap between who we are and who we'd like to be.When five-year-old Kampol's father tells him to sit on the kerb and await his return, the confused boy does as he's told. He waits and waits, until eventually he realises his father may not be coming back. In his parents' absence, Kampol is adopted by the community and raised on rotation by the local adults.Flea markets, the search for a ten-baht coin, pet crickets eaten for dinner, bouncy ball fads, and loneliness so merciless that it kills a boy's appetite: Duanwad Pimwana's urban vignettes form an off-beat and myth-like coming-of-age story about an unforgettable young boy and the community surrounding him.