Exactly What You Mean

From an exciting new voice in literary fiction comes a brilliantly innovative, tender and unsettling novel exploring what it means to lose our innocence

Surrounded by the dramatic beauty of Guernsey, a teenager discovers a secret and finds his betrayal has the power to ruin adult lives. In London, a marriage shot through with infidelity leads to a quest for revenge, resulting in a series of simultaneously comical and catastrophic events. And in California, as wildfires threaten landscapes and lives, a young veteran struggles with the trauma of war, seeking solace at a local ranch.

In this extraordinary debut, a cast of characters grapple with unexpected betrayal, the loss of innocence and the lies we tell.

With sharp insight, Ben Hinshaw illuminates the unnerving nature of what it means to grow up, to be a teenager playing at adulthood and an adult playing games.