Wendy Erskine for The Benefactors

AN OBSERVER BEST DEBUT NOVEL 2025

'I couldn't put this book down' - Sheena Patel, author of I'm a Fan

'This is powerful, masterful storytelling by one of the most exciting writers at work today' - Colin Walsh, author of Kala

'Perfectly pitched, surefooted, and charged with feeling' - Colin Barrett, author of Wild Houses

'What a beautiful, hilarious blast of brilliance' - Donal Ryan, author of Heart, Be at Peace

From the prize-winning author of Dance Move and Sweet Home, this is an astounding novel about intimate histories, class and money - and what being a parent means.

Meet Frankie, Miriam and Bronagh: three very different women from Belfast, but all mothers to 18-year-old boys.

Gorgeous Frankie, now married to a wealthy, older man, grew up in care. Miriam has recently lost her beloved husband Kahlil in ambiguous circumstances. Bronagh, the CEO of a children's services charity, loves celebrity and prestige. When their sons are accused of sexually assaulting a friend, Misty Johnston, they'll come together to protect their children, leveraging all the powers they possess. But on her side, Misty has the formidable matriarch, Nan D, and her father, taxi-driver Boogie: an alliance not so easily dismissed.

Brutal, tender and rigorously intelligent, The Benefactors is a daring, polyphonic presentation of modern-day Northern Ireland. It is also very funny.

Wendy Erskine is the author of two short story collections, Sweet Home and Dance Move. She was shortlisted for the Edge Hill Prize and the Republic of Consciousness Prize, longlisted for the Gordon Burn Prize and Sunday Times Audible Short Story Award, and she received the Butler Literary Award and the Edge Hill Readers' Choice Award. She edited the art anthology well I just kind of like it. A Fellow of the Royal Society of Literature, she is a frequent broadcaster and interviewer, and works as a secondary school teacher in Belfast. The Benefactors is her debut novel.