Fieldwork as a Sex Object

A new novel of incels, influencers and AK-47s – from the Women’s Prize-shortlisted poet and provocateur

‘One of the most urgent voices of tomorrow’ Harper’s Bazaar

I mute the audio. I replay the video four times.
It is not me. It is my fucking face.

Amrita Chaturvedi goes by Amy. Amy identifies as a communist on Twitter (her profile omits a stint on Big Brother and a millionaire daddy running the show at the High Court of Delhi).

Then reality hits: a deepfake porno of her forwarded around by WhatsApp aunties goes viral. On her birthday, Amy wakes to a mob stoning in the digital town square that could cancel the likes of Kim Kardashian.

Her executioners? A cartel of unhinged virgins styling themselves after V for Vendetta – except these keyboard warriors are on a ruthless crusade to wipe out desi jezebels and Make India Hindu Again.

A muscular, monumental work of internet literature in which the online turns offline turns bloody, Fieldwork as a Sex Object is not a novel you read but a novel that reads you: what are you prepared to risk for what you claim to believe?