New Boy: Othello, Retold

Shakespeare’s Othello is ingeniously transplanted into a high school setting in this taut story about teenage friendship and racial tension.

Arriving at his fourth school in six years, diplomat’s son Osei knows he needs an ally. Luckily he hits it off with Dee, the most popular girl in school. But one student can’t stand to witness this budding relationship: Ian decides to destroy the friendship between the black boy and the golden girl. By the end of the day, the school and its key players – teachers and pupils alike – will never be the same again.

The tragedy of Othello is transposed to a 1970s suburban Washington schoolyard in this powerful drama of alienation, adolescence and friends torn apart.

‘A compact and intense read full of twists, turns and intrigue’ Daily Express

‘New Boy, with its angsty teenagers, racial frictions and a magnificently fleshed out antagonist, is a tense and tight read… A heady rollercoaster of emotions’ Observer

SHAKESPEARE RETOLD: Time travel. Zombies. Power-hungry media moguls. This is Shakespeare as you’ve never seen him before: nine iconic plays transformed by the best novelists of our time, with covers by Michael Craig-Martin.