It takes him two hours to tell the story... the story of a fourteen-year old girl... the story of his daughter. His daughter who died.

When a girl dies in a car accident, returning home from school, her father is left to deal with his grief. Sent home from work for the crime of showing his emotions in front of strangers, he and his wife cannot bring themselves to utter their unspoken thoughts of guilt and blame. Alienated from the world and, to some degree, his own mind, and with his marriage slowly collapsing, the man starts to consider his grief.

With her beautiful and lyrical prose style, Ami Rao experiments with language to explore grief, one of the most complex of human emotions. Inspired by the essays of Barthes, this fragmented and philosophical novella is deeply moving.

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“Exquisite. Beautiful. Provocative. I love her writing.” (Jim Lawless, speaker and writer)

“A touching story of multicultural lovem desire, and achievement with ‘soul’ at its heart.” (Geoffrey Horton, musician and vocalist)

“I’ve never read such an accurate and telling evocation of the additional complications of personal creative exploration.” (Tim Hayward, writer, broadcaster and columnist)

BUY DAVID and AMEENA:

"Beautifully written and genuinely revealing. It is brilliant. A work of art, Centaur has a rhythm all of its own but more than that, it has an immense depth of soul and spirit. Declan has been brave enough to show himself raw, at his most vulnerable, and Ami has been clever and empathetic in her telling of the story. Together they have made magical music. The rhythm of the prose reads like a Declan Murphy-ridden race: beautiful and steady, balanced and spiritual before unleashing its dangerous sprint to the line." (Clare Balding)

"Emotional and honest, Centaur is an unflinching look at how Murphy 'came back from the dead' and the heavy price extracted for doing so. Centaur is a book haunted by ghosts: lost careers, lost memories, lost friendships and, most devastatingly of all, lost love... Not only a certain candidate for the William Hill sports book of the year but also sure to be on many non-sports fans' end-of-year lists." (Sarah Hughes Observer)

"A magnificent piece of work: never less than enthralling... a thing of dramatic beauty." (Mail on Sunday)

"Deeply powerful, [told with] grace and poetry... an entirely gripping drama." (Sunday Express)

"Brilliant, bold, at times brutal." (Sunday Telegraph)

"Heart-rending... a page-turner." (The Times)

"‘Really, really beautifully written… the most riveting descriptions. Extraordinary, quite brilliant… it’s an amazing read.’" (Sarah Brett and Nihal Arthanayake, BBC Radio Five Live Afternoon Edition)

"Wonderfully written... very moving." (Brough Scott)

"Primal, heartbreaking and inspirational. The story of triumph, fear, love and loss, it's a remarkable testament to beating the odds and reclaiming a life in the most dire of circumstances." (Booktime)

"Extraordinary: an outstanding book. Superb." (Matt Williams, BBC Radio 2)

"You can read and enjoy Centaur simply as a thrilling account of an elite sportsman who nearly died, but lived to ride again. There are beautiful insights too into the relationship between rider and horse. But it is also a book about how stories get told." (Caroline Sanderson The Bookseller)

"A stirring story." (The Sunday Times)

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