In a Strange Room

In a Strange Room is a 2010 novel by South African writer Damon Galgut, published by Atlantic Books.^[1][2] It was shortlisted for the Man Booker Prize in 2010,^[1] as well as for the Ondaatje Prize.^[3]

The novel is divided into three sections, namely "The Follower", "The Lover" and "The Guardian". It concerns Damon, a South African writer who is infected by wanderlust as he goes backpacking abroad and meet different people. In "The Follower", Damon meets a German backpacker named Reiner in Greece, and becomes his travelling companion. Subsequently, in "The Lover", he follows a Frenchman and two Swiss fraternal twins—a man and a woman—travelling through Africa. In both, Damon is aware of a homoerotic feeling which binds him to Reiner and Jerome, one of the twins. The final section takes place in India, where he is minding a female friend Anna with severe psychiatric illness and who is threatening suicide.