Umi Sinha, author of Belonging, will be in conversation with Laura Lockington at Shoreham Wordfest, 10 October.

Umi Sinha’s unforgettable debut is an intense, compelling and finely wrought epic of love and loss, of race and ethnicity, of homeland – and of belonging.

Lila Langdon is twelve-years-old when she witnesses a family tragedy after her mother unveils her father’s surprise birthday present – a tragedy that ends her childhood in India and precipitates a new life in Sussex with her great-aunt Wilhemina.

From the darkest days of the British Raj through to the aftermath of the First World War, Belonging tells the interwoven story of three generations and their struggles to understand and free themselves from a troubled history steeped in colonial violence.

Umi Sinha’s novel is partly set in Sussex and features the military hospital at Brighton Pavilion during the First World War. Umi teaches creative writing classes and workshops, runs a performance storytelling club and offers a mentoring and manuscript appraisal service for writers called Writing Clinic. She is also a trained mediator and trustee at her local community centre. She will be in conversation with Laura Lockington, founder of Brighton’s Bookish Supper Club and the Bookenders programme on Latest TV.

Tickets cost £6/£4. For more information and to book, click here.