An insightful and compelling read, revealing life in an orthodox Jewish suburb of North London. I loved the Jewish sayings, prayers and blessings that introduce each chapter. I particularly liked it when Ronit is reunited with Esti, her childhood girlfriend...

In a cramped synagogue in north-west London, the eminent elderly rabbi passes away. On the other side of the Atlantic, his estranged daughter, Ronit, hears of her father's death and returns to London for the funeral. She has not returned home in fifteen years. Ronit looks forward to a week or two of revisiting old friends, perhaps settling old scores. But she finds the community she grew up in a more confusing place than she'd anticipated. Particularly when she is unexpectedly reunited with Esti, her childhood girlfriend, who has taken a very different path in life. "Disobedience" is a hugely enjoyable and warm-hearted portrayal of characters caught between two worlds, and a wise exploration of sexuality, tolerance and faith.

Naomi Alderman, a graduate of the famous creative writing course at the University of East Anglia, looks set to become a major literary star judging by the wealth of talent displayed in this exciting debut.

"The notion of "Orthodox Jewish Hendon" is a tricky one to sell; even the addition of lesbians, as in "this is a novel about lesbians in Orthodox Jewish Hendon" is unlikely to set a publicity department on fire. But it is a wonderful novel... Nothing is quite as the lazy-minded might expect it to be: forbidden desire is not unequivocally good, deterministic religion is not unequivocally bad. Orthodoxy absolutely glows out of the pages of Disobedience, as rich and fresh and fascinating as this lovely novel itself." The Sunday Times

Paperback - 272 pages

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