Goblin

Goblin is a child like no other.

She is an oddball and an outcast. But she’s also a dreamer, a bewitching raconteur, a tomboy adventurer whose spirit can never be crushed.

Running feral in World War II London, Goblin witnesses the carnage of the Blitz and sees things that can never be unseen…but can be suppressed. She finds comfort in her beloved animal companions and lives on her wits with friends real and imagined, exploring her own fantastical world of Lizard Kings and Martians and joining the circus.

In 2011, London is burning once again, and an elderly Goblin reluctantly returns to the city. Amidst the chaos of the riots, she must dig up the events of her childhood in search of a harrowing truth. But where lies truth after a lifetime of finding solace in an extraordinary imagination, where the distinction between illusion and reality has possibly been lost forever?

"The best debut fiction by a Scottish author since 2012... A profoundly affecting, intellectually challenging and beautifully written fable ... a marvellous piece of work." 
- Stuart Kelly, Scotsman

"Enthralling... a captivating debut... Dundas presents us with an iconic protagonist: a powerful imaginative force who looks beyond the façade of 20th Century Britain and sees a fairy tale of lizard kings and dolls with shrews’ heads." - Alastair Mabbott, Herald

"A captivating and capricious debut that explores with a deft hand the ‘creature world’ we all carry somewhere inside." - Mary Paulson Ellis

WINNER Saltire Society First Book of the Year 2017 LONGLISTED The Guardian Not the Booker Prize 2018