This powerful, hypnotic novel is set in the trenches during WW1, and is a stream of consciousness meditation by Alfa, a Senegalese soldier fighting for France against the Germans. As the novel opens, Alfa's good friend Mademba is killed, and Alfa devotes himself to vengeance. It's an unrelentingly violent and brutal novel, which comments on race and masculinity, war, colonialism, and madness, but is written in a mythical, poetic style, and is bleak and sad. It has won a number of literary awards, most notably the 2021 International Booker Prize.