Advertising helps fund Big Issue’s mission to end poverty
SPECIAL PRICE: Just £9.99 for the next 8 weeks
Subscribe today
Books

Luster by Raven Leilani: Funny, frank, intelligent and extremely readable

Luster is funny, frank, intelligent and extremely readable, writes Jane Graham

Luster by Raven Leilani is out now

Luster by Raven Leilani is out now

Luster, the debut novel by young New York writer Raven Leilani, is the story of a soul-searching young black woman lured into a bizarre love triangle with an older white man and his wife. Its power comes as a consideration of the shifting racial and sexual sands such women must negotiate.

Lockdowns have taken income away from hundreds of Big Issue sellers. Support The Big Issue and our vendors by signing up for a subscription.

Luster by Raven Leilani is out now
Luster by Raven Leilani is out now
Luster by Raven Leilani is out now

But that makes it sound very dry and typical. Instead, word for word, punch for punch, Luster is funny, frank, intelligent and extremely readable, its vulnerable protagonist as loveable as she is smart. And Leilani’s descriptions of everyday life tweeting, online shopping, trying not to hate her more successful peers or wallow in news stories which destroy her faith in human decency – well, that can’t just be her and me.

Luster by Raven Leilani is out now (Pan Macmillan, £14.99)

Advertising helps fund Big Issue’s mission to end poverty

READER-SUPPORTED SINCE 1991

Reader-supported journalism that doesn’t just report problems, it helps solve them.

Recommended for you

View all
Comedy Samurai by Larry Charles review – the joyous, painful business of making people laugh
Books

Comedy Samurai by Larry Charles review – the joyous, painful business of making people laugh

Bless Me Father by Kevin Rowland review – Dexys lynchpin bares his sensitive soul
Books

Bless Me Father by Kevin Rowland review – Dexys lynchpin bares his sensitive soul

Why I cut ties with my alcoholic dad
Addiction

Why I cut ties with my alcoholic dad

Top 5 books set in theatres, chosen by playwright Edward Carey
Books

Top 5 books set in theatres, chosen by playwright Edward Carey

Most Popular

Read All
Renters pay their landlords' buy-to-let mortgages, so they should get a share of the profits
Renters: A mortgage lender's window advertising buy-to-let products
1.

Renters pay their landlords' buy-to-let mortgages, so they should get a share of the profits

Exclusive: Disabled people are 'set up to fail' by the DWP in target-driven disability benefits system, whistleblowers reveal
Pound coins on a piece of paper with disability living allowancve
2.

Exclusive: Disabled people are 'set up to fail' by the DWP in target-driven disability benefits system, whistleblowers reveal

Cost of living payments: Where to get help in 2025 now the scheme is over
next dwp cost of living payment 2023
3.

Cost of living payments: Where to get help in 2025 now the scheme is over

Citroën Ami: the tiny electric vehicle driving change with The Big Issue
4.

Citroën Ami: the tiny electric vehicle driving change with The Big Issue