The Cockroach
A novella.
Kafka meets The Thick Of It in a bitingly funny new political satire from Ian McEwan
That morning, Jim Sams, clever but by no means profound, woke from uneasy dreams to find himself transformed into a gigantic creature.
Jim Sams has undergone a metamorphosis. In his previous life he was ignored or loathed, but in his new incarnation he is the most powerful man in Britain – and it is his mission to carry out the will of the people. Nothing must get in his way: not the opposition, nor the dissenters within his own party. Not even the rules of parliamentary democracy.
With trademark intelligence, insight and scabrous humour, Ian McEwan pays tribute to Franz Kafka’s most famous work to engage with a world turned on its head.
Readers also enjoyed
Ian McEwan
Some novels ask readers to escape reality. Ian McEwan's fiction does the opposite, drawing them deeper into it, where ordinary moments quietly unravel into moral dilemmas, hidden fears, and life-altering consequences. His stories are rarely driven by spectacle. Instead, they reveal how a single decision, misunderstanding, or chance encounter can echo across decades, making him one of the defining voices of contemporary literary fiction.
Born in Aldershot, England, in 1948, McEwan spent much of his childhood following his father's military postings across Europe, North Africa, and Southeast Asia. Living between cultures gave him an early awareness of displacement, history, and the unpredictability of human experience, themes that would later become woven throughout his novels. After studying English at the University of Sussex, he joined the pioneering creative writing program at the University of East Anglia, where he began shaping the precise, psychologically rich style that would become his hallmark.
More books by Ian McEwan
