Oligarchy is Scarlett Thomas's fierce and brilliant new novel about power, privilege, and peer pressure. When Natasha, daughter of a Russian oligarch, arrives for her first day at an all-girl British boarding school, she finds herself thrown into a world of fierce pecking orders, eating disorders, and Instagram angst. Then her friend Bianca mysteriously vanishes, and the world of the school gets ever darker and even weirder.
Scarlett Thomas's first adult fiction since 2015 is a major return. Wildly frank, funny, and full of humanity, Oligarchy reminds us how insightful, vulnerable, brilliant, and misunderstood teenagers are, never more so than now.
Scarlett Thomas was born in London in 1972. Her widely-acclaimed novels include PopCo, The End of Mr Y and The Seed Collectors. As well as writing literary fiction for adults, she has also written a literary fantasy series for children and a book about writing called Monkeys with Typewriters. Her work has been translated into more than 25 languages.
She has been longlisted for the Orange Prize, shortlisted for the South African Boeke Prize and was once the proud recipient of an Elle Style Award. She is currently Professor of Creative Writing & Contemporary Fiction at the University of Kent in the UK. She lives in a Victorian house near the sea and spends a lot of time reading Chekhov and Katherine Mansfield.
She is currently working on a new novel and various projects for TV.