The unnamed narrator of William Rayfet Hunter’s debut novel, a mixed-race aspiring musician from Manchester, is plunged into an unfamiliar milieu when his posh university friend, Lily, invites him to spend a summer at her parents’ chateau in the French countryside. There’s an undercurrent of unease – at one point he is mistaken for staff – but the family are welcoming. Lily’s bisexual brother, Felix, a handsome actor and enfant terrible who has just emerged from a stint in the Priory, is especially friendly. A relationship develops, which brings perks for the narrator: Felix’s father gives him a cushy job at his property firm, and his mother promises to pull strings and get him an audition with the Royal Academy. It all seems too good to last – and so it proves.
Sunstruck is a story about identity and belonging. The protagonist had hung out with goth kids at school; his black best friend, Jasmine, teasingly nicknames him “WhiteBoy” because he is so out of touch with black pop culture. But when the action moves to London in the second half of the novel, and particularly after a black friend of Jasmine’s is badly beaten up by police at the Notting Hill carnival, a racial consciousness gradually awakens within him. He suspects that he’ll never be truly accepted in Felix’s world, and their relationship is troublingly imbalanced. Yet he can’t quite tear himself away: “The intoxicating sense of belonging, of moving through a space I didn’t know existed … this is something I cannot give up.”
