SHORTLISTED FOR THE GOLDSMITHS PRIZE

A charismatic cult leader is dead. One by one his followers are being assassinated. Enter Gallio.

Gallio does counter-insurgency. But the theft of a body he’s supposed to be guarding ruins his career. Years later, the file is reopened when a second body appears. Gallio is called back by headquarters and ordered to track down everyone involved the first time round. The only problem is they keep dying, in ever more grotesque and violent ways. How can Gallio stay ahead of the game when the game keeps changing?

Prizes

Short-listed for The Goldsmiths Prize 2015 (UK)

Brilliantly original and absurdly compelling ... it’s a book you’ll read in one, frantic gasp * Guardian *
Brilliantly original and absurdly compelling ... it’s a book you’ll read in one, frantic gasp * Guardian *
Richard Beard is one of those rare writers whose novels are at once radically inventive and brilliantly entertaining. Acts of the Assassins … is as joyously original as it is a page-turner to read -- Tom Holland * Daily Mail *
The Acts of the Assassins is…spectacularly successful. It is thoughtful and clever and brutal and true… It is a Chinese puzzle box of a novel. A garden of forking paths. A page-turner. A modern classic -- Benjamin Judge * Book Munch *
Extraordinarily funny...confident and enchanting * Guardian *
It is a darkly funny, virtuoso performance… so cleverly done it almost winks at the reader -- Phil Baker * Sunday Times *

Richard Beard’s most recent book is Acts of the Assassins, which was shortlisted for the Goldsmiths Prize.

In the twenty years since his first book he has published critically acclaimed novels and narrative non-fiction, including Becoming Drusilla, the story of how a friendship between two men was changed by a gender transition.

He was formerly Director of the National Academy of Writing in London, and is now a Visiting Professor at the University of Tokyo and has a Creative Writing Fellowship at the University of East Anglia. He is an optimistic opening batsman for the Authors Cricket Club.