Tamarin

by Priya Hein

Tamarin Bay, Mauritius, is a travel agent’s a tropical ocean, fishermen unloading their daily catch, children building sandcastles, surfers riding giant waves.

But just along the shoreline is the beach of La Preneuse, the taker of souls. The island is haunted with tragedy and the remnants of colonial rule.

But it is also home, where Anita Ram longs to be following the collapse of her marriage. After enduring a shocking betrayal and the sexism and racism of a cold Britain in the early twenty-first century, she finds comfort in simple things; her mother’s cooking, her childhood bedroom, and a handsome architect.

Will these be enough for Anita to find happiness again, or will the ghosts of her past consume her?

Following the international success of her debut Riambel, Hein’s heart-wrenching new novel reveals the violence and beauty inherent in her native Mauritius.

Genres: Fiction, Novels

160 pages, Paperback

Expected publication January 27, 2026

About the author

Priya Hein was born in Mauritius. She has published several children's books and short stories, and has contributed to a number of anthologies. In 2017 she was nominated by the National Library of Mauritius for the Astrid Lindgren Memorial Award. She was selected for the Women's Creative Mentorship Project for the University of Iowa International Writing Program. Her debut manuscript Riambel won the 2021 Jean Fanchette Prize. Priya lives in Munich and Mauritius with her family.

Reviews

[Bego Sanchez Oviedo · Rating 5 out of 5]

I came across this book by coincidence, and I truly enjoyed every part of it. Knowing little about Mauritius, I found it fascinating to follow the main character as her life unfolds between her beloved island and England. As an expat living abroad, I could relate to many aspects of her journey in different ways. It’s a delightful and thought-provoking read, one that stays with you and makes you question the deeply ingrained beliefs and behaviors we carry as women. Thank you, Priya Hein. One day I hope to write a book, and I can only wish it will be as precious as this one.

[Gumble's Yard - Golden Reviewer · Rating 3 out of 5]

What exactly was the definition of rape? Anita wondered.
Like the Dutch, French and English colonizers who had raped Mauritius so many years ago?
Again and again her island and her people had been dominated, oppressed, stripped bare, invaded by colonizers. To survive, what choice did they have but to give in and please their powerful masters? She sometimes wondered if the only way to resist was by not resisting.
The island had been desecrated by patriarchy, just as Anita had been by cousins and uncles who had inserted themselves into her childhood, erasing her innocence. As much as Anita tried to bury these memories in shallow graves, they always threatened to resurface every time a tropical cyclone loomed ahead.

 
Priya Hein’s debut novel “Riambel” – written in English, then translated into French and prize winning ahead of its actual English language publication in 2023, something which lead to some complex debates on its Booker eligibility – was set in the real life titular beach area in the South of Mauritius.  Narrated by 15 year old shanty-town dwelling Noemi, the ostensibly simple (almost cliched) storyline involving a relationship with a member of a rich and racist white French-Mauritian family for which her mother cleans, was enlivened by a series of other elements (including some very effective second person sections, some rather didactic lessons on her country’s troubled past, French and Creole poems, traditional Mauritian recipes). 
 
This her second novel also has her native Mauritian setting – this time the West Coast resort of Tamarin Beach (a coast I visited for my honeymoon, albeit further North).
 
The narrator Anita though starts the book in London considering (but not in the first chapter succeeding in booking) a flight back to her home of Mauritius – but the majority of the rest of the book tells the story of her difficult journey home.
 
Anita we find out moved to London on a University scholarship and there, after facing sexual advances from a University professor (one eventually exposed in the MeToo movement, but whose reputation was institutional unimpeachable at the time), ended in a marriage to Paul – one which to both their disappointment ended up childless and which by the time of the novel has dissolved to her despair. 
 
In Mauritius we learn of her troubled relationship with her much older sister – and her, for many years,  much closer one with that sister’s only daughter (her niece) but one which we surmise has recently turned into a form of betrayal which is associated with her current crisis. 
 
We also learn by implication of a difficult early childhood including some other examples of abuse.
 
In Mauritius she attempts a tentative relationship with the German father of a young child she meets and befriends on the beach – although her difficult past complicates her attempts. She also clears up her childhood bedroom – although we sense this is more of an attempt to cleanse more figuratively her past.  And the Island’s colonial past – with its history of slavery and (the reason her family came to the Island) indentured labour (as part of the Great Experiment) – forms a crucial background of exploitation.
 
The novel’s style does not always cleave to the “show not tell” mantra – so we are told for example that “Maya was a bubbly four-year old brimming with energy whose company Anita was beginning to enjoy. It was refreshing to see the world through the eyes of a child.” Or “Anita was starting to feel restless as the most painful memories of her former life in England flooded back to taunt her” – and can resort a little to rather obvious imagery for example “Looking at the sea spread before her, Anita suddenly felt like a grain of sand in front of its sheer immensity.”, “Staring at the vast expanse of sea ahead of her, she became acutely aware of the geographical confinement of the island, lost in the middle of the Indian Ocean.”
 
The novel has a signposted but still cleverly executed harrowing ending – and like its predecessor gives a fascinating insight in to a culture and perspective largely absent from literary fiction.
 
My thanks to Ben Reads Good and Indigo Press for a paper ARC won in a competition
 

Nobody knew her there. It was a place where she could wallow in her misery, away from judgements and questions about her failed marriage. Where she could plunge into bouts of introspection. She could let the tears mingle with seawater, every single drop a recrimination, reminding her of what she had lost: her husband, her job, her self-respect, her ability to see the future, her sanity. Her life. The last thing she wanted was for anyone to see her desolation.

 

[Tutankhamun18 · Rating 5 out of 5]

The novel itself follows Anita, who returns to her mother and home in Mauritius, after the breakdown of her marriage and leaving her job. We learn that she studied in England and met and married a man there, that she always wanted to be a mother and is in fact haunted by a child in her dreams or nightmares (motif) and that she hates her older sister, who was mean to her in her childhood and told her parents that she freed a sacrificial goat, which got her in a lot of trouble). We also learn that this sister has a child, which Anita does not, and that Anita loves this child and supports it as an Auntie, eventually evening inviting the young woman to London and letting her stay with her. Her Husband then ends up cheating on her with this younger woman who is also her niece, and while in Mauritius, she learns that this niece is now pregnant. Over the course of her time in Mauritius we also learn more about Anita and tha fact that she was raped by her professor while at uni. She meets a German man in Mauritius, Sven and his Daughter and forms a friendship with them. But then, Sven tries to kiss her and tries to touch her and she runs away afraid, this human connection ultimately seeing her as a piece of meat as well. The novel ends with her mother flying to England to identify her corpse, after she slit her wrists in the bath thinking of Mauritius. This is a massive shock and plot twist and likely the whole novel was in her mind, we read what she was thinking about and she never went back to her home or her mother. It’s harrowing, heavy, beautiful. I love it! Such a good story.

Here are some things, briefly, that I picked up on/enjoyed:

• Historical insertions about Mauritius
• Frequent use of similies (as and like) that compare things to the landscape, the beach, the ocean
• Evocative descriptions of settings that reflect and capture emotions
• Imagery of oceans, ghosts, blood and death throughout

—

“The day felt flat and grey, like a dead fish, when Anita boarded an early bus to the coast.”

“Like a ghost, she sat at the back of lecture halls, haunted the corridors, dragged her feet from one seminar to the next.”

“Drops kept falling, like infinitesimal mistakes gathering in a pail, a pond, a lake, an ocean.”

“The ebbing tide had formed ripples in the sand, and she enjoyed walking on the ridges that gently massaged her soles.”

[Tamsin · Rating 4 out of 5]

Pros: Brings Mauritius to life and effectively contrasts it with the UK. Credible portrayal of sexual harassment.

Cons: main character is uninspiring: she's nauseous all the time (actually could she be pregnant?) and mopes around a lot. Then ultimately accidentally kills herself. She has good reason to be suffering from grief, but her response is to mainly just mope.

[Nataliia Novyk · Rating 5 out of 5]

A beautifully written book that is very easy to read. The personal story intertwines with the history of the island, helping the reader understand its people and their past more deeply.
I highly recommend this book!

[Pierre Cadeux · Rating 5 out of 5]

5/5 stars. Strongly recommend!

[Tanisha Mehta Sagoo · Rating 5 out of 5]

I read Tamarin by the ocean, hoping to conjure the Mauritian landscape that shapes both the story and its author, but I could have read it in the middle of a snowstorm and Mauritius would still have risen from the pages.

Priya Hein has done a remarkable job, through the story of Anita Ram, of illuminating the underrepresented history of Mauritians.
Anita’s tale broke my heart in many lingering ways.
Tamarin is rich with complex characters, a compelling narrative, and a rare depth representing cultures and landscapes we don’t often see in mainstream literature.

You should definitely pick it up.

[Anso · Rating 5 out of 5]

I felt that while reading Tamarin, I had taken a journey from one island to another. From gloomy England and London, the city of ambition and commotion, to Mauritius, a hot, humid climate, filled with idyllic beaches such as Tamarin Bay and La Preneuse. Like the waves of the Indian ocean, glittering yet ominous, Priya Hein's writing enthralls the reader in a complexly layered melancholy. The protagonist, Anita's story, rocks between the past and the present. A story about coming home, the female student and immigrant experience, all topics that resonate with many readers (myself included). I especially appreciated the way Hein depicts Anita's attempts to relive her missed childhood by reconnecting with her mother and home through food. Don't be fooled by the lyrical writing; the stories of grief, betrayal, and multifaceted issues of identity, belonging, and reconciliation have a truly emotional effect.

Hein asks us to reflect on what we leave behind, what we return to, and how we carry our pasts with us.

[Lawrence Smith · Rating 5 out of 5]

I loved this book because it transports you to places that are described so vividly that you can smell, feel and taste what Anita, the main character, experiences. It is about love, intergenerational trauma and how the effects of slavery still shape the lives of Mauritians today. The characters are very well developed, the ending is truly amazing, and you'll want to read it again to grasp all the subtleties