The Proof of My Innocence

Post-university life doesn’t suit Phyl. Time passes slowly living back home with her parents, working a zero-hour contract serving Japanese food to holidaymakers at Heathrow’s Terminal 5. As for her budding plans of becoming a writer, those are going nowhere.

That is, until family friend Chris comes to stay. He’s been on the path to uncover a sinister think-tank, founded at Cambridge University in the 1980s, that’s been scheming to push the British government in a more extreme direction. One that’s finally poised to put their plans into action.

But speaking truth to power can be dangerous - and power will stop at nothing to stay on top.

As Britain finds itself under the leadership of a new Prime Minister whose tenure will only last for seven weeks, Chris pursues his story to a conference being held deep in the Cotswolds, where events take a sinister turn and a murder enquiry is soon in progress. But will the solution to the mystery lie in contemporary politics, or in a literary enigma that is almost forty years old?

Darting between decades and genres, THE PROOF OF MY INNOCENCE is a wickedly funny and razor-sharp new novel from one of Britain’s most beloved novelists, showing how the key to understanding the present can often be found in the murkiest corners of the past.

Review

Wonderfully accomplished and darkly funny. The Proof of My Innocence is a murder mystery, a satire on Britain's ever right-ward drift, culminating in Liz Truss; and an inquiry into truth and perception. Jonathan Coe gets better and better -- Luke Harding

A brilliant, shrewd, satirical novel – gimlet-eyed, funny, very clever and a searchingly profound look at the state of this strange country of ours. -- William Boyd

The premier satirist of great British crapness is on killer form in this gag-a-minute mystery - who but Coe would think to structure a book around the abysmal transport police mantra “See It. Say It. Sorted”? ― Observer

Coe channels his anger and frustration at the direction his country has taken, as well as his abiding love for it, into prose of enduring beauty ― Guardian

The funniest serious novelist practising in this country ― Independent

A funny, smart and innovative exploration of contemporary British political dynamics -- Nussaibah Younis

A wonderfully farcical and absurd book that puts into perspective the political chaos of post-Brexit Britain ― Foyles

Full of energy... a madcap caper, a sideways memoir, a tricksy jeu d’esprit that is also a quiet defence of fiction in a post-truth age, and enormous fun to read ― Guardian

Deeply pleasurable, and a lot of fun. You emerge from it glowing -- iPaper

A new Jonathan Coe is always a treat . . . Coe is a master at exploring the pains of modern life -- Rosamund Urwin ― The Times

About the Author

Jonathan Coe was born a few miles from Bournville in 1961. The author of political satires such as Bournville, What a Carve Up! and Number 11, and family sagas such as The Rotters' Club and The Rain Before It Falls, his novels have won prizes at home and abroad, including Costa Novel of the Year and the Prix du Livre Européen (both for Middle England).