You People

by Nikita Lalwani

The Pizzeria Vesuvio looks like any other Italian restaurant in London - with a few small differences. The chefs who make the pizza fiorentinas are Sri Lankan, and half the kitchen staff are illegal immigrants.

At the centre is Tuli, the restaurant's charismatic proprietor and resident Robin Hood, who promises to help anyone in need. Welsh nineteen-year-old Nia, haunted by her troubled past, is running from her family. Shan, having fled the Sri Lankan civil war, is desperate to find his.

But when Tuli's guidance leads them all into dangerous territory, and the extent of his mysterious operation unravels, each is faced with an impossible moral choice.

In a world where the law is against you, how far would you be willing to lie for a chance to live?

Genres: Fiction, Contemporary, Literary Fiction, Audiobook, Ebooks, Race, British Literature

240 pages, Hardcover

First published April 2, 2020

About the author

Nikita Lalwani‘s work has been translated into sixteen languages. Her first novel, 'Gifted' – the story of a child prodigy of Indian origin growing up in Wales – was longlisted for the Man Booker Prize, shortlisted for the Costa First Novel Award and won the inaugural Desmond Elliott Prize for Fiction. Her second, 'The Village', was modelled on a real-life ‘prison village’ in northern India, and won a Jerwood Fiction Uncovered Prize. Her third novel 'You People' (2020), follows Tuli (the proprietor of an Italian restaurant) and his employee Shan who, having fled the Sri Lankan civil war, is desperate to find his family.

Reviews

[Emily B · Rating 4 out of 5]

I didn’t put any thought into this book before choosing it as an audiobook. I needed something to listen to on my walk to work and this was available through my library app. I’m glad I took a chance on it. It was an easy and pleasurable listen, the story being interesting and meaningful but not too heavy or flippant.

[luce (cry bebè's back from hiatus) · Rating 4 out of 5]

| | blog | tumblr | ko-fi | |

3.75 stars (rounded up)

“People can see you, but they don’t want to see who you are.”

Given Britain’s political climate (in other words: the madness of Brexit) Nikita Lalwani’s You People is a poignant and incredibly relevant novel. Set in London, Lalwani’s story takes place in 2003 (get ready for some nokia-related nostalgia) and focuses on Nia and Shan, respectively a waitress and a cook, both of whom work at Pizzeria Vesuvio.

Although her father is Bengali nineteen-year old Nia ‘passes’ for white and is often mistaken for Italian. Having been raised by her Welsh mother Nia has never been in contact with her father or his culture. After years of putting up with her mother’s spiralling mental health and alcoholism Nia is eager to leave her hometown. University however doesn’t go as planned and she flees to London.
With a few white lies on her part Nia is hired by Tuli the owner of Pizzeria Vesuvio and soon she is enthralled by him. Yet Tuli—a Tamil who grew up in Singapore—with his philanthropist ways seems too good to be true. How can he afford to help so many other people? Why do people go to him?

“He is a walking set of choices and consequences: love thy neighbour, the greater good, take your pick. This image of him—of them—filters and echoes through her memory, there are a thousand iterations or more. She can never be certain of its imprint or impact. She tells herself the story as it unfolds from this moment. She does it to understand him, and so to believe in his cure.”

Having left his wife and son behind, Shan, a Tamil from Sri Lanka, is wrecked by guilt. His passage to Europe doesn’t go as planned and he falls more and more into debt. While at first, out of naïveté or perhaps desperation, he believes that he can at a later date be joined by his wife and son, once in London, he realises that the agents who organised his ‘trip’ are little more than conmen. London too isn't the city he'd envisioned and he finds it hard to make enough money to survive each week, let alone pay his debts or the passage of his loved ones. It is Tuli, his new boss, who comes to his aid.

“They all know, everyone knows, that he did it partly for them, partly for himself, there is no way to disentangle the motivation and purify it.”

Unlike Tuli’s other employers Nia has never been subjected to xenophobia or racism. While her life has been less than ideal—punctuated by poverty, emotional neglect and abuse—she has a simplistic view of immigrants and her government, and it in her time at the Pizzeria Vesuvio Tuli challenges her idealistic notions. Nia is shocked to learn of what Shan was subjected to in Sri Lanka and that for him to be an ‘illegal’ immigrant is better than the alternative, which may be death, torture, or imprisonment.

“So, the question would be—is it better to tell all of the truth, one hundred per cent, and get deported, or is it better to tell mostly the truth, with a few untruths, and become legal?”

Yet, in spite of their different backgrounds and circumstances, both Nia and Shan are wracked by guilt. They both left someone behind in order to survive and as the novel progresses their two narratives become entwined with each other.

What stands out in Lalwani’s novel is the ambience and imagery that are the backdrop to Nia, Shan, and Tuli’s lives. Through the scenes that take place at the Pizzeria and the ones that take place on London’s busy roads, Lalwani’s creates a portrait of community life. Her ear for accents and mannerism brings to life many different people and their cultures.
Through a few description Lalwani emphasises the characters' environments. Occasionally she does so by focusing on a small detail, or by presenting the setting of a scene in an almost cinematic way.

“The glass was spotting with rain again and there was something sublime in how the red and yellow lights outside were permeating each individual bubble of water with colour.”

The unease that pervades Nia and Shan’s narratives builds up in a quiet crescendo. Although ‘not much’ seems to go on, both the characters and the readers are aware of the dangerous and vulnerable position Shan is as he spends most of his waking time unsure whether his loved ones are alive and in fear of being deported.
You People is not an easy read. The violence against and dehumanisation of ‘illegal’ immigrants is horrifying. They do not have the freedom that most people—me included—take for granted. To even speak of or refer to people as ‘illegal’ seems wrong. Yet, sadly that is how they are seen by the government. There is one particularly harrowing scene in which the immigration enforcement turns up and what follows will haunt both the readers and the other characters. The ‘not knowing’ what is going to happen to them is terrifying. That a person can be simply taken away like this is horrifying.

“They have come from the government, the logo is all over them, they think they are invincible, that is how these people see themselves. Someone has told them that they are the good guys, like those superhero films, where the audience is instructed to cheer for each every violence act committed in the name of freedom.”

Both narratives are told from a third point of view but while Nia’s sections are in the past tense, Shan’s are in the present tense. This switch between tenses suited the characters and their storylines. Nia herself says that she is always looking back, whereas Shan is stuck in a fraught present, not knowing his fate or the one of his loved ones.

“Already she was looking back at life and saying to herself, I was young then, as thought that idea of youth was over.”

Rather than using ‘Nia’ or ‘Shan’ the narratives often address them as ‘she’ and ‘he’. This might annoy some readers, and it does take some using to, but once you’ve leaned into the flow of Lalwani's prose you might appreciate the ambivalent mood that this technique creates.

“There had always been this relationship with fiction, she imagined it could offer her blueprints for living, loving, dying—that it could save her, let her know how things should be.”

I loved the scenes which depicted interactions between the Vesuvio staff. Although Shan is far too preoccupied by his life to socialise with the other Tamil cooks, he finds himself bonding with Ava, who is a waitress at the Pizzeria. Nia, who is seen as a white British girl, feels somewhat left out by her colleagues. It is Tuli who quickly becomes the central figure of her ‘new’ life and seems to take an interest in her.
The character dynamics were as nuanced as the characters themselves. Although the cast of characters is fairly small, and the story is mostly focused on Tuli, Shan (his wife and son) and Nia (her mother and sister), however short their appearances may be Lalwani's characters struck me as incredibly realistic.
It was interesting to see Tuli from different perspectives. His characters always retains a sense of mystery, and for most of the narrative readers are never sure of who he truly is.

Nia and Shan’s stories are steeped in loneliness. As they try to reconcile themselves with their past decisions and their new circumstances their worldview is irrevocably altered. While this novel certainly doesn’t provide easy solutions or happy endings, what it does offer us and its characters is hope.

Occasionally there were the odd descriptions which were a bit too purple for my taste ( “her whole physicality is streaked with the force of these tight lines of feminine power” / “that solid, satisfying element which ran down her spine like the hard chocolate centre of a Feast ice-cream bar”).
For the most part however I appreciated the aesthetics created by Lalwani's idiosyncratic way of presenting a scene or articulating a phrase.

You People is a deeply melancholic and heart-rendering novel one that I would describe as being the book equivalent of an independent film. Lalwani's quiet yet atmospheric style and her character-driven and introspective story won’t appeal to everyone...but I do hope that her novel will strike a chord with those readers who are looking for a poignant and necessary story.

Read more reviews on my blog / / / View all my reviews on Goodreads

[Gumble's Yard - Golden Reviewer · Rating 4 out of 5]

“But then you would never intervene in anything,’ he said, not in an arguing way, just with this odd, eerie hush in his voice. ‘Let me ask you something. What about the basic idea of just being there? Just taking part, responding to need, not walking on by. To be present rather than absent, to forgo being a bystander?”

I previously read Nikita Lalwani’s Booker longlisted debut novel “Gifted” (which was also the inaugural winner of the “Desmond Elliot Prize”). That book, by the Indian born, Cardiff raised novelist featured as a protagonist the mathematically gifted daughter of an Indian Maths lecturer at Cardiff University, the daughter going to Oxford at only 15.

This book too features, as one of its two alternating first party narrators, a (part) Indian-descended, South Welsh raised girl who goes to Oxford, but otherwise the circumstances are very different.

Our two narrators both work at a London Pizza restaurant (at sometime early-mid 2000s), and over time we learn their backstory.

Nia (and her sister Mira) are the daughters of Sharon – Sharon, estranged from her Inland Revenue employed Father and housemaker mother, moves to Newport at eighteen and takes up a bohemian lifestyle, her daughters being born as the result of one-night stands and Sharon sinking into alcoholism, verbal abuse and extreme poverty. Nia successfully applies via an access scheme and gets a place to study PPE, but is sent down after one-year, dragged down by Mira and Sharon’s neediness, and in her anger flees to London (although still consumed with guilt over leaving her sister to cope with her mother).

Shan is a Tamil. Married in Sri Lanka to an academic and with a young son, and son of a campaigning Tamil journalist on a pro-opposition Sinhalese newspaper. When his father is first tortured and then executed in the street, Shan in panic seizes his wife’s wedding jewellery and uses it to buy a single passage to Europe. He believes he is protecting his wife and child and that he can pay for them to follow. Circumstances do not match his naïve expectations: the agent is treacherous and the passage is arduous (albeit he is one of the lucky few to make Europe); the UK itself is far less welcoming than he expected (he cannot find a way to make enough money for even the essentials); and his wife will not return his calls.

The Pizza restaurant is Vesuvius, run by the larger than life Tuli, part of a Tamil diaspora (his parents having grown up in Malaysia and he having been raised in Singapore and studied at the LSE) – he now joint owns the restaurant which serves as a base from which he operates an “unofficial open-door policy for waifs and strays”, employing a mix of Tamil cooks (the restaurant is well known as a safe house for Tamil immigrants) as well as others like Nia, operating a money lending business (but one where he lets the recipients set the repayment terms), and acting as a general fixer and sorter-out for anyone (but particularly immigrants – both legal and illegal) that come to him, aided in all of this by the Irish Catholic priest from the nearby church.

As the story progresses – Nia (whose naivety seems suggested by her name) gradually gets more involved in Tuli’s operations and comes to understand more of the ambiguity of what he does: his bending of the rules (for example understating earnings to assist benefit claims, pretending to be offering training rather than employment so as to not imperil asylum claims); his involvement with immigrants trying, like Shan, to get his family to join them leads him to involvement with people smugglers and even drug dealers; his willingness to believe those who come to him lead him to unwittingly sheltering people who deceive him as to either their legal status (when the immigration raid for which Tuli has prepared is launched on his premises, it’s the one person he does not expect who is their target) or their relationships (Nia is particularly exercised by a Hungarian that Tuli supports through a divorce case against an English woman, who claims he beats her).

Tuli pushes back on her idealistic views:

“‘It’s like that. Let’s say that being legal is better than being illegal. So far so good, lah? Telling the truth is better than lying. Again, who is going to disagree? But if you want to apply to become legal, then by doing the application and alerting people to yourself, you are running a very large risk of being deported from the country. So, the question would be – is it better to tell all of the truth, one hundred per cent, and get deported, or is it better to tell mostly the truth, with a few untruths, and become legal?’”

“‘Look,’ he said. ‘Don’t you understand – someone like Shan or Guna or anyone else – they are going to do this anyway. You know that. You know that the situation is dire in Sri Lanka, that people are risking their lives on a daily basis, come on, Nia. What do you think? That my being involved has any effect other than this: making sure that I can point them towards the most reliable, careful way of doing it?’”

Shan’s involvement is more personal – as Tuli finally traces his wife and son, and Shan’s desperation and impetuosity puts the three of them (and his family) at risk.

At times the book can feel like a rather uneasy mix of a worth topic but unsuccessful: Nia seems always several steps behind the reader, Shan is not entirely convincingly voiced. The most interesting character – Tuli – remains something of an enigma.

Where the book is strongest is where the worlds of immigrants and natives overlap, and in fact in two scenes where the “You People” of the title is used.

One is in a scene where Shan is confronted by the mother of a young boy he often comes across walking to work and is obsessed by (as he reminds him of his son) – at the time the young boy is ill and she blames “you people” for the overcrowded hospitals and long waiting times she endures.

You’re right, he thinks, I have taken something from you by living here, and simultaneous, in dream, like hands closing round a neck in threat, pressing as if they might close off the cord of breath, shut things down so fast, he thinks . . . but I can live too. If I live, does it really mean you will die, lady? If my boy comes here, my small tiger cub, my baby son, does it mean that your sweet boy will die? What if my boy had died there, lady, in my country? What then?

This scene slightly ruined later by a slightly unnecessary reconciliation between the two.

The second is when Tuli first lets Nia assist his work – going out to recycling bins to look for things to assist families in need:

‘The things you people throw away!’ he said, getting out of the car,

He talked her through the routine. This was a good time generally to pick up discarded items in good condition; after a few hours you would have the problem of dew. You wanted to be looking for furniture rather than utensils or electrics: tables, chairs, drawers, that kind of thing.

Nia has to force herself not to engage in a check-your-privilege battle

“She began to formulate an appropriately withering reply (come on, they may be white, but these are more your people than mine, you’re the one who is the big guy restaurateur in this bloody bourgeois area, the skips I know in Newport are not like this, and so on,”

Something made more poignant for the reader (although oddly not remarked by Nia) by its immediate recollection to the first phone call we see between Nia and Mira when Mira effectively brings Mira up short by almost threateningly saying “I’ve been doing the skips again—’”

“By ‘doing the skips’, Mira meant she was doing what they had done whenever things got to their worst and their mother was out of action – gone to the skips of the local supermarkets after dark and rifled through the packages for unused food. The safest parts were from the bakery – bread rolls, Danish pastries, bagels, all baked that morning and thrown that night. They didn’t ever take the fish or meat, even if they were in three layers of clingfilm, not just because you might get sick, but because by that point, if you were rifling through rubbish, you weren’t about to start cooking when you got back.”

And this is perhaps the greatest strength of the book – its examination of the moral trade-offs of assisting with migrants, set against a clever examination of class in Britain. The author is particularly good on accents:

Of Nia:

“She had her mother’s curves and hair, but a new voice by now, shorn of the Welsh wool. That was one of the first things she did at Oxford, along with getting rid of her home bleached locks. She remembered wearing those new vowels like furs, feeling that showy and ridiculous. It wasn’t just the accent, it was the timbre of those new vowels like furs, feeling that showy and ridiculous. It wasn’t just the accent, it was the timbre of her voice. She’d worked on lowering it from the baby girl pitch to which it sometimes leaned.”

Of the Hungarian’s wife.

‘I am looking for Mr Tuli,’ she said in one of those generic Eng lish voices: class less, accent less and as well constructed as her outfit. It takes one to know one, thought Nia, and she could tell straight away that the woman had done a good ironing job on whatever her original creasing would have been.

Overall a worthwhile read.

My thanks to Penguin Books UK for an ARC via NetGalley.

[Jin · Rating 3 out of 5]

Do you know these books which definitely deserve to be read and even more needs to be written because they discuss such important aspects of community and life? This is one of those and unfortunately it is hard for me to give it a recommendation.
When it comes to literature, I like to work through the pages, the sentences, even get through some words. Because in the end, the reward is unexpected, the outcome being a fantastic sensation of new views, emotions and opinions about a certain topic I have not yet felt or thought of.

This book touches many different new things I haven't known before but it couldn't touch my heart or my head. The end didn't have any impact so I was disappointed. Also, I wished the author would have chosen a different ending (while I understand why she chose this one). I bonded to both characters, Nia and Shan, to some extent but not enough to really dig into the story. I love London and I also know the problems with illegal immigration and asylum applications, etc. but it didn't really give me new thoughts. It felt like scratching only the surface or narrow character studies of Nia and Shan which was too little to convince me.

It's such a pity because I really wanted to like this book, I loved the cover, the basic idea. The book is somewhere between 3-4 stars.

[Elizabeth George]

Lalwani shines a light on immigration in London, particularly on illegal immigration. We are taken into the world of Shan, an illegal immigrant from Sri Lanka whose people are being persecuted and murdered. We are also taken into the world of Nia, a young woman from Wales with a drunken Welsh mother and an absent father. Their paths cross at a pizzeria called Vesuvius run by Tuli, a man who keeps his secrets well-hidden and his determination to save his foreign (and mostly illegal) workers from the clutches of the deportation police. All Shan wants is to be reunited with his family, to bring them to London so that they might establish a life for themselves there. All Nia wants is permanent removal from her mother's drunken lifestyle and the rescue of her younger sister who remains behind as watchdog and caretaker. The author gives us a real sense of what it's like for people who are desperate just to be safe, to have a life among the people they love, to do what's right for those people and for others. I learned a lot from immersing myself in their world and in the vividness with which it was depicted by the author.

[Brittany (whatbritreads) · Rating 4 out of 5]

This book was brilliant, though I don’t think it’s something I would recommend to everyone. The read here is so intense at times it’s difficult to push through because this book didn’t feel like fiction for the most part. Knowing that these experiences are being had daily is jolting and it broke my heart. It was written with such delicacy without shying away from the brutal nature of the refugee crisis and the attitude towards immigration in the UK.

The writing was really beautiful, it flowed really nicely and the descriptions used set the scene really well. The two protagonists we flip between in the story were interesting in their own rite, and while they had a shared experience in some aspects they couldn’t have been more different. I liked the environment in which the story was set up in as well, it was quite simple yet effective. Although, nothing about the ins and outs of their situation was simple at all really.

There were discussions here of family, identity and belonging which were quite sad and difficult to grapple with at points but really important and moving. It also touched on morality a little bit and how we perceive wrongdoing so skewed in such an immoral world it’s hypocritical. I found that it ended up being quite surface level though, due to the length of the book. I would have liked to have gone deeper into the pasts of these characters and exactly how they ended up in their situations and what life was life for them before. I think it just would’ve strengthened that understanding and sympathy and really built on the connection to the characters as readers.

Overall a very gruelling but insightful read full of heart. I liked the overall story arc and thought it was really engaging.

[Katia N · Rating 4 out of 5]

Poignant and understated story focused on the people working in a restaurant in West London. I think I know the place the author had in mind. And maybe it helped me to understand the story better. But it is not that important. It is told from two perspectives of people working there. Unusually for modern fiction, it depicts the characters facing moral dilemmas and ambiguity. I love this in the fiction. But nowadays, many stories are just told to preach or express a single point of view. This book is different and it does not shout. And it is emotionally moving as well. Inevitably, at the end it moves gears to a bit of melodrama. It could probably do without it in my view. But still it is memorable and thoughtful piece of contemporary fiction.

I might write more about the subject matter later. But for now, it is probably the best contemporary story by the anglophone writer I've read so far this year. Albeit I have not read too many.

[Krystelle · Rating 3 out of 5]

This book is an absolutely vital piece of literature, and it brings to the reader a series of moral and ethical quandaries that are sure to stick with them for a long time after the final page is turned. This book looks at the lives of those working in a pizzeria, at least half of whom have left their countries as illegal immigrants in the wake of horrific human rights violations and war. There's a lot of important moral messages to be found in these pages, and the characters by themselves, once the initial setup is complete, are interesting microcosms of humanity and the human condition.

With that being said, the fundamental difficulty that I had with this book was that it lacked in respect to the buildup and the payoff. I understand it is largely a character study, but once we reach the crux of the story there are so few pages left there's little room to develop once everything has been established. The implications of this book are immense, and there's a lot of questions to be asked and answered with respect to racism, ethics, human rights, caring for others, and war crimes.

To treat people with the love and respect that they deserve by mere virtue of their existence as living beings should not be radical, and yet it has become as such in a world marred by a political divide. This book reframes that, gives you little slices of personhood with the connection needed to characters to see that privilege warps perceptions of reality, but I just wish it had taken it a little bit further.

[Lauren · Rating 2 out of 5]

I was drawn to this book after reading that it discussed life from an illegal immigrants POV and that it asked questions on morality in an immoral world, so in principle, the idea was very intriguing and somewhat highly important.

However, I found the plot to be very simplistic and at times it felt like I had read pages and pages and nothing had actually happened. The writing was very descriptive and vivid yet sometimes a little fruitless. The characters were also quite underdeveloped in my opinion. Shan's character had such an important narrative, discussing life as an illegal immigrant living in the UK but I didn't feel that the writing evoked enough emotion or displayed enough urgency to be able to pull this storyline off. Shan's storyline was also overshadowed by Nia's character most of the way through the book. Nia, is a young welsh girl that arrives at the restaurant, who has experienced an abusive childhood. But again, her character and plot didn't develop enough to answer the big questions abuse and neglect raise so it felt a little unnecessary to use this backstory.

All in all, the idea is exciting and the novel has some beautiful writing in it, but the execution of the plot/characters was a little disappointing.

[Sarah · Rating 5 out of 5]

‘You People’ by Nikita Lalwani is a wonderful novel about the struggle to belong. Told in part by Nia, a bright mixed-race Welsh girl who heads to London after dropping out of university and by Shan, an illegal Sri Lankan immigrant, much of the dialogue and some the action takes place in the Pizzaria Vesuvio where they both work. Gradually they learn to trust each other. Nia listens to Shan’s concerns about his wife and baby; for much of the novel he is desperate to hear from Devaki who is angry that he fled. When he understands that his family are journeying towards him, he is terrified what the traffickers will do to her.
Whilst Nia does not have to contend with problems of a geographical magnitude, she has had to harden her heart. Her mother is an abusive alcoholic and her younger sister Mira is extremely vulnerable. Yet Nia refuses to go home and carries with her an undercurrent of guilt all the time. Like Shan she has gone against the wishes of her family.
At the centre of these transitory people’s lives is Tuli. Owner of the restaurant, he spends much of his time lending ‘illegals’ money as well as helping them with their paperwork, giving them jobs and hiding them from Immigration officials. But why is he doing these potentially very dangerous things? Lalwani is a marvellous creator of character, mainly through dialogue but also through little details about clothing or movement. Nia is ‘around Tuli in that restaurant, right there watching the granular decisions he held like sand in his palm, so fearlessly every day, she hoped that she would learn how to spread light instead of darkness.’ Tuli is adored by the people he protects yet he seems a little shady, not always the best judge of character. Where does his money come from? Why does he appear friendly and yet distant? Over the course of the novel we begin to understand who he is but it is not until the dramatic climax that we can be sure.
Lalwani’s novel is a superb evocation of the extraordinarily stressful life of the illegal immigrant. She highlights how they are battling in every area of their lives, living with loss, hardship, racism and fear. And, occasionally, other people understand and connect.
My thanks to NetGalley and Penguin Books UK for a copy of this novel in exchange for a fair review.

[The Book Sheelf · Rating 5 out of 5]

Gosh, I loved this book and I can’t quite believe that I haven’t seen it plastered across my Bookstagram feed in the weeks before and weeks since its release on the 2nd of April.

Set in and around the Pizzeria Vesuvio, a small Italian restaurant owned by the enigmatic Tuli, You People focuses primarily on the characters of Nia, a mixed-race welsh teen fleeing a very unhealthy home environment and Shan, a Sri Lankan Tamil fleeing persecution and desperately trying to reconnect with his wife and son while living in constant fear of discovery and deportation.

Very much character driven and, in the end, posing far more questions that it ever answers, this isn’t a book you finish feeling content that all the threads of the story have been nicely and neatly wrapped up for your convenience. I think the, (in my opinion, unfairly) low Goodreads rating is a result of this not feeling like a ‘complete’ story, it’s more of a tableau, a very character-focused window into a London restaurant and the people who work there. It’s a fitting approach to a book that deals with themes such as immigration, morality and truth, issues that are ongoing, complex, shrouded in ‘fake news’ and rarely wrapped up with a comfortable ending.

I loved this book. Nikita Lalwani’s prose is beautiful, the characters are interesting, complex and vibrant and you really, truly feel the ‘buzz’ of the Pizzeria Vesuvio as you read. I particularly loved the huge question mark that hangs over the mysterious Tuli, the good samaritan who sometimes seems too good to be true.

A brief but beautiful split-narrative that shines a light on a version of London (and the UK) that many of us will never see. A must read for my fellow character-driven enthusiasts.

[aqilahreads]

do you...........judge a book by its cover?????? i have to be honest that i do like most of the time 🤪🤪🤪 ((and also just most of the time getting myself disappointed LOL))

I MEANNNNN look at how pretty this cover is?!!?? ofc i couldnt resist!!!!!! but the story itself didnt do any justice :(((((( omg maybe its just me.......DNF-ed @ 40% bc it got to a point where i dont even understand what i was reading lololol. the plot sounds really interesting though - about the lives of illegal immigrants working at a pizza restaurant. ugh i wished the execution of the plot was better. :")

[Eleanor · Rating 3 out of 5]

3.5, RTC.

Later: This has definite ambitions to be a state-of-the-nation novel, although its focus is narrow enough (one pizzeria in South London; two point of view characters, Welsh waitress Nia and Sri Lankan pizza chef Shan) that it might be more productive to read it as a London novel. Shan has left behind his wife and child, and is both horribly ashamed and desperate to get them to England; Nia, who’s fled an alcoholic mother, is determined to get to the bottom of restauranteur Tuli’s not-so-legal extracurricular activities (he operates the pizzeria like a safe house for undocumented asylum-seekers). The ending is a touch sentimental, but it provides satisfying narrative closure, and Lalwani’s depiction of the “hostile environment” is thoroughly terrifying.

[Ali · Rating 5 out of 5]

This is a bit of a slow burn book. It starts simply enough, but as the book progresses the pace steadily picks up along with the complexity and the emotional depth. The book deals with big issues, sure - immigration, the Tamil plight in Sri Lanka, addiction and poverty, but it also hits hard on intimate issues - what makes a good person, what can be forgiven, how we communicate and miscommunicate. It generates a surprising amount of tension around human motivation. The book also draws joy out of the every day - in the vivid, loving descriptions of working people, London in rain, the lights in a supermarket and in the book's broader celebration of the day to day act of trying to live better. It is an ultimately hopeful book.

[Barry · Rating 5 out of 5]

A novel inspired by a PhD thesis on Sri Lankan refugees. Really persuasive, immediate writing.

[Melanie Caldicott · Rating 3 out of 5]

Well written but needed more development

Challenging themes and well-written prose but disappointing in lack of depth to plot and characters. Left feeling like this passed me by.

[Khai Jian (KJ) · Rating 4 out of 5]

"We are all flawed, all capable of making a mistake - the question is what happens after the mistake?"

Thank you Times Reads for sending a review copy of You People by Nikita Lalwani to me. This is truly another gem which deserves more attention than it is having right now.

The story was told from the perspectives of 2 main characters: Nia (whose mother is a Welsh and father a Bengali) and Shan (a Tamil from Sri Lanka, and now an illegal immigrant in London). Both are staffs of a restaurant named Pizzeria Vesuvio owned by Tuli (a Tamil who grew up in Singapore). Nia left her hometown as she intends to free herself from her abusive alcoholic mother. Shan on the other hand left his wife and his child behind and escaped from the aftermaths of the Sri Lankan civil war to London. We then have Tuli, a philanthropist who is always there to help the illegal immigrants and sometimes, those who are in need of help.

You People is a heavily character driven story. Nikita Lalwani's character work is solid. From the characters of Nia and Shan, the author manage to craft out their guilt for leaving their past life even though they succeeded in pursuing a new life in a new place. Throughout the book, we see how Shan and Nia reconcile themselves with their past decisions. Shan's character is definitely my favourite. The main issue as highlighted in this story is the life of illegal immigrants in UK. This was brought out through Shan's character. From Shan's perspective, we understand a little of Sri Lankan civil war (i.e. the Sri Lankan Government vs the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam) and most importantly, the treatment of illegal immigrants in the UK. The violence and dehumanization of illegal immigrants by the government authorities in the UK were highlighted throughout the story. Apart from this, the prejudicial attitude against immigrants by the public (not only happening in UK but the whole world) was brought out through Shan's character. Tuli's character is also a major highlight. The author questions the "grey area" of morality through Tuli's character as Tuli uses his own extreme methods in helping those who are in need. What is right and wrong is always blurred from Tuli's perspective.

You People is a quiet read. The story is very descriptive, slow paced and there is not much happening in the story. But behind such a quiet and calm atmosphere, the author raises some serious issues which demands attention by the public. You People is a solid 4.5/5 star read to me. It is not for those who enjoys fast-paced and plot driven stories. But if you enjoy stories which raise fundamental questions behind the facade of solid character work and poetic writing style, this is definitely the one for you.

[Anusha Siobhan · Rating 4 out of 5]

‘To possess such a heart, to look outward like that.... An audacious heart.’ This is one of the first ways Nia describes Tuli, the enigmatic proprietor of the small Italian restaurant at which she works. Tuli has a reputation for making the lives of London’s most vulnerable a little easier and safer, although his motivations and methods remain a mystery to all involved.

Those who know Tuli are simultaneously enchanted by and somewhat fearful of him. Lalwani captures this perfectly in the uneasy admiration with which her characters move within his orbit.

Nia is escaping her own tumultuous past, and the story flicks between her reflections and those of Shan, who has fled war-torn Sri Lanka in search of a better life. I often struggle with changing points of view, however Lalwani moves effortlessly between the two. The differing perspectives are both vital to the unfolding narrative.

No word was wasted in this book, and I was left with both a deep sense of loss and somehow, hope.

(The striking cover is an added bonus!)

[holly · Rating 4 out of 5]

although set in 2003 this feels even more relevant than ever considering all of the stop the small boats rhetoric saturating our media and politics …very affecting story really liked it

[Read More Women · Rating 4 out of 5]

“So, the question would be—is it better to tell all of the truth, one hundred per cent, and get deported, or is it better to tell mostly the truth, with a few untruths, and become legal?”

Kamila Shamsie hit the nail on the head when she described You People as “an exceptional novel about the Britain we live in, even if we choose not to see it”. Weaving together two narratives of life in Britain today, Nikita Lalwani crafts this incredibly poignant story that, without wanting to sound too cliche, desperately needs to be told. When was the last time you read a novel about a middle-aged Sri Lankan immigrant and a young Bengali waitress who often ‘passes’ as white? Both of these characters are on the run, fleeing the civil unrest of their home country or the tumultuous family life they’ve left behind.

This is a really important, beautifully written novel that invites you to experience the intimacy of other people’s lives. It is subtly political yet uncompromising, readable and honest, capturing a side of London that most of us never see. Everyone needs to read this book.

[Lisa · Rating 3 out of 5]

I thought this was a great story idea but it began too slowly. It was too detailed when detail was irrelevant and there was too much holding back on the plot for later reveals as flashbacks. The parallel storylines were bogged down with Nia’s story. The narrative would have been tighter and pacing more interesting if it were dropped. The pace did finally quicken and the novel was more interesting in the final 60 pages. But the author approached the subject of war refugees and asylum very well. How dare anyone think that immigrants and refugees have an easy life, are lazy, and take from the taxpayers. How dare you privileged SOBs. Maybe some people would open their minds if they would read this.

[Violet · Rating 3 out of 5]

Really like this novel which sees a naive character, Nia, who has experienced poverty but passes as white despite her father being Indian, learning more about her new colleagues in London and what it means to be in the country illegally. The author does a great job saying enough without going into too much detail, and I liked the different characters' perspectives. You feel their pain and their hope as you read.and as they wait to know if their families made it, etc. It was moving - at times a bit slow - but I felt quite invested in the characters.

(Free ARC from NetGalley)

[Vitória · Rating 4 out of 5]

3.5 ⭐️

[anautumnaldream · Rating 3 out of 5]

This book was like reading through someone’s diary? At times it felt invasive but also I couldn’t really stop?

Considering the whole Brexit thing, this book might have brought up a whole lot of nostalgia for the people who actually do live in Britain. Even I felt nostalgic about the place for heaven’s sake!

It’s mostly focused on Nia, a Bengali nineteen years old who’s currently waitressing and Shan, a Tamil from Sri Lanka who’s working as a cook at the same pizzeria. It’s called Pizzeria Vesuvio and it’s sort of like a haven for people of colour who are trying to survive in London.

Nia, a Bengali girl who’s also half Welsh and passes as white, sometimes even being mistaken as Italian, is a wonderfully written character. Despite being white-passing, Nia’s life hasn’t been full of sunshine and flowers. Her mother’s mental health keeps deteriorating and the alcoholism doesn’t help her mother either, Nia finally leaves her behind and tries for Uni but that fails too. So she moves to London. She has never been connected to her father’s culture and values because he just wasn’t in the picture. In London, she meets Tuli, a Tamil guy who owns Pizzeria Vesuvio. Nia can see that almost everyone, including herself, has fallen for Tuli in some way or the other. Nia can’t quite digest this either, that Tuli is this all-good person who’s taking in strays like it’s going out of business. Her internal struggles really play well in this book.

Then comes Shan, a guy who left behind a family in Sri Lanka. A guy who realises that the company that arranged for him to come to London was very much a con and that, it is still a better life than the one he left behind in his home country. Initially, he was hopeful that he would be joined by his wife and child soon but as the realisation of the con comes, that hope is gone. It’s hard making it in London and the pay is barely enough to clear his debts and send anything home. He is clearly struggling a lot and in comes Tuli, who lends a helping hand and for Shan, this is a heavenly intervention. A saint come to save him. He misses his family like he would miss his arm but he’s also aware that they can’t really join him while he’s not stable yet. That guilt wrecks him regularly.

The book is set up in Nia’s and Shan’s povs and Nia’s POV reads like a look at the past and like her, Nia’s story is all about reflection about her past and how she tends to only look at the things that have happened and how she sometimes can’t get out of it where Shan’s story speaks of a struggle of a daily kind. The kind of grief and stress that builds up daily without let up. It was very well done but I do wish that it wasn’t in the third person? Yes, it is one of those rare times that I think first person might have worked better.

Apart from this one I really don’t have too many complaints. The way Nia comes to an understanding about the racism and how immigrants face such hardships in life on a daily basis if they are not legal and what Shan went through back in Sri Lanka and how it all really makes lives so very hard for the illegal immigrants. Then there’s Shan, who’s left behind essentially his whole life for a chance at a better life and then, to realise that his opportunity wasn’t such a great opportunity after all. The guilt of it and the stress of having to deal with it is shown so wonderfully.

The major takeaway from this one is Lalwani’s writing of Nia, Shan and Tuli. While everything is happening in the pizzeria and those scenes that happen on the roads and how it all ties into the community and creates such a great picture. Just a great look into the community that might not get a lot of light shed on. There’s this sense of fear that you start to have when the government department people come and try to find and take in ‘illegal immigrants’ and yes, it sounds just as horrifying as it was to read it. A story of loneliness and a whole new outlook into the immigrants of London, how white passing people can still be very much ignorant of what goes on in the world. It was just so much to experience and I very much enjoyed it.

[Peter Thompson · Rating 5 out of 5]

I have just purchased and read YOU PEOPLE and I recommend you to do the same. It is a thoughtful and uplifting story about the denizens of PIZZERIA VESUVIO, just down the road in Archway. This is a downmarket restaurant with living accommodation over and the proprietor, cooks, barmen and waitresses are almost all refugee Tamils fleeing persecution in Sri Lanka and striving to do the right thing under the shadow of the rule of law. They dream of one day working for Pizza Express. The proprietor, Tuli, is the Good Shepherd who saves and protects them from the hostile environment and from the occasional raids by immigration enforcement. He is endlessly patient, kind and generous with his money. But where does he get it from? Don’t ask. YOU PEOPLE is a heartwarming morality tale for our time and I thoroughly enjoyed it.

Peter Thompson 9 Hillfield Park N10 3QT

[cherry · Rating 1 out of 5]

1 star.

Read this on audiobook, and I regret that a lot. The voices the narrator makes each time someone talks drove me to insanity. The accents, the high-pitched squeals for children, the weird tones in the wrong places. Everyone sounded like they were on helium, and it was so difficult to follow the story when all I could think about was how much I hated everyone.

Plot-wise, I didn't understand anything. It was too slow to begin with, too confusing near the middle, and I'd already given up by the end.

Character-wise, I didn't like anyone. Shan, especially, made me incredibly angry, with how he CHEATED on his wife, who he was trying to bring into the country. Disgusting, and it wasn't even addressed.

Overall, I just couldn't connect to this book, on any level.

[Shequita Harvey · Rating 4 out of 5]

Beautiful writing! If you love character-driven novels over plot-driven novels, this is a great choice. I loved the characters in this novel, the richness the author gives to their language & personalities, their relationship to one another and their immediate community, and how Tuli, the proprietor is a force who brings them together but doesn't determine the nature & contours of their relationship to one another. Among the restaurant workers, the protagonist Nia seems to be the one whose life seems least complicated on the surface. But it is because of her difficult past that she is able to open herself up to the lives of the immigrant/refugee staff who experience their own challenges & tragedies. I listened to the audiobook... fantastic reader!

[Marthe De Haan · Rating 3 out of 5]

A very interesting perspective of 2 people working at a pizzeria in London, one an illegal immigrant from Sri Lanka who has fled leaving his wife and child behind, and the other a young Welsh lady who has fled home at a young age to get away from her alcoholic and abusive mother. It shines a light on some complex moral dilemmas around themes like immigration and abusive. The reason I didn't give it more stars is because I felt the build-up was slow, and some bits of the story felt like unfinished thoughts, flitting from one thing to another, which didn't make it as gripping or engaging as I'd hoped.

[Joanne Cartwright · Rating 5 out of 5]

Set in a pizzeria in London this book is the raw face of personal struggle, with each of the characters having a secret, a past to run from and a future to hope for.
Staffed with its fair share of illegal immigrants and those waiting for news of their asylum applications the pizzeria is run by Tuli, a shady character with, at times, dubious motivations.
The book is an intense and emotional read that provokes more than one pause for thought about the plight of many that is never really known or understood by the masses.

[Christina · Rating 5 out of 5]

"In a world where the law is against you, how far would you be willing to lie for a chance to live?"

Synopsis: The Pizzeria Vesuvio looks like any other Italian restaurant in England’s capital - with a few small differences. For instance, half the staff are illegal immigrants fleeing Sri Lankan state persecution of the country’s Tamil minority.

Kitchen-hand Shan grapples with the insecurities of undocumented life in London, whilst fearing for the life of his wife and son back home. Meanwhile, 19-year-old Welsh-born waitress Nia grapples with her identity as the mixed-race daughter of an alcoholic. Their stories intersect through the enigmatic Tuli, Vesuvio’s proprietor who provides assistance to those who slip through the cracks of the British legal system on the side.When Tuli’s efforts to help Shan’s family lead the trio into dangerous territory, the novel reaches a thrilling climax which demonstrates the struggles of navigating life in modern-day Britain without the security of citizenship or whiteness.

You People surprised me; I found myself unabsorbed by the first 30-40 pages and almost considered giving up. But I persevered and I’m so thrilled that I did. Lalwani’s crafting of vibrant scenes and morally-complex, three-dimensional characters ensures that the novel quickly develops into a riveting character study of the immigrant experience of Britain - and once the narrative picked up and the novel raced towards its end, I couldn’t put it down!

I definitely recommend You People (hence the 5-stars despite the shaky beginnings!)