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What is the What
What is the What
Jul 30, 2025 12:17 PM

Author:Dave Eggers

What is the What

What is the What is Dave Eggers's astonishing novel about one of the world's most brutal civil wars

Valentino Achak Deng is just a boy when conflict separates him from his family and forces him to leave his small Sudanese village, joining thousands of other orphans on their long, long walk to Ethiopia, where they find safety - for a time. Along the way Valentino encounters enemy soldiers, liberation rebels and deadly militias, hyenas and lions, disease and starvation. But there are experiences ahead that will test his spirit in even greater ways than these . . .

Truly epic in scope, and told with expansive humanity, deep compassion and unexpected humour, What is the What is an eye-opening account of life amid the madness of war and an unforgettable tale of tragedy and triumph.

'If there was ever any doubt that Dave Eggers is one of our most important storytellers, What Is the What should put it to rest... [A] strange, beautiful and unforgettable work' San Francisco Chronicle

'A remarkable book: harrowing, witty, wretched, delightful; and always compelling, always surprising' London Review of Books

All of the author's proceeds from this book will go to the Valentino Achak Deng Foundation. Read more at: www.valentinoachakdeng.com.

Reviews

Read Dave Eggers' What is the What – it's the best book of the year

—— Guardian

If there was ever any doubt that Dave Eggers is one of our most important storytellers, What Is the What should put it to rest... [A] strange, beautiful and unforgettable work

—— San Francisco Chronicle

The narrative carries considerable literary weight with a rare grace

—— Spectator

A captivating mood piece, delicate and wistful

—— Evening Standard

As satirical and gut-wrenchingly emotional as it is horrific, Zone One is the zombie tale at its literary best

—— SciFi Now

A cool, thoughtful and, for all its ludic violence, strangely tender novel

—— New York Times Book Review

Punchy cocktail of horror, comedy and social critique

—— Metro

Often simultaneously arch and sombre, Whitehead's narrative flares with a sociological intelligence

—— Benjamin Evans , Daily Telegraph

What Whitehead does really well is anchor his apocalypse in the small, heartbreaking details of everyday humanity, giving his end-of-days a bleak, sad humour that is all its own

—— Alison Flood , Sunday Times

It's tense, suspenseful and terrifying... Yet, he's also very funny at times and anyone who has ever had dealings with a HR department will appreciate his asides at the zombies in personnel

—— Ann Marie Stanton , Irish Independent

Whitehead's witty spin on the zombie apocalypse is an enjoyable read and is highly recommended

—— Zombies and Toys

It's monochromatically unsettling and blackly comic, as any zombie-related fiction should be. It's also one of the most gut-wrenchingly emotional reads of the year, with tragedy complex and inevitable enough to be Shakespearian... the tension is through the roof. The humour is perfectly pitched... He uses the entire situation to skewer and satirise... But where Zone One truly flourishes is in its depiction of the heartbreaking loss; loss of the chance to be simply mundane, loss of a perfectly formed stronghold and the relationships built up within. At moments like these, the book is quite startlingly, heartbreakingly beautiful, regardless of the subject matter... Whitehead's prose is engrossing, simultaneously verbose and casual enough to stroll off the page and shake your hand... even George A Romero would have to marvel at Zone One... what'll be more interesting is whether Whitehead will ever write anything as astounding as this again

—— Gareth Hughes , SciFi Now

1Q84 is certainly an engrossing, other-worldly mystery to lose yourself in, with a good deal of humour and a considerable thiller-esque page turning pull... Reading it is an intense and addictive experience, and this is no mean feat at all. However, it is also far more than that- it's a highly ambitious work, which raises more questions than it resolves in its intricate plot. A more optimistic take on George Orwell's 1984, kicking off in April that year just like the latter's dystopia, it is concerned with postmodern issues such as the rewriting of the past and the slippery dividing line between fact and fiction, exploring just how uncertain our grasp of reality can be, especially as the world we were born into morphs into somewhere quite different.... For all its fantasy surface and sexy details, this is a work of considerable and haunting complexity, which is likely to resonate a long time after one has stopped turning its numerous pages.

—— Madeleine Minson , Standpoint

Contains enough of his weird offbeat allure to satisfy devotees

—— Benjamin Evans , Sunday Telegraph

Portrayed in a fluid language that veers from the vernacular . . . to the surprisingly poetic.

—— San Francisco Examiner & Chronicle
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