*A RADIO 4 BOOK OF THE WEEK*

'An Orwell for today's poor' - The Times
'This is McGarvey at his best' - Observer
'Breaks your heart and boils your blood' - Big Issue

If all the best people are in all the top jobs, then why is Britain such a fucking bin fire?

Britain is in a long-distance relationship with reality. A ravine cuts through it, partitioning the powerful from the powerless, the vocal from the voiceless, the fortunate from those too often forgotten. This distance dictates how we identify and relate to society's biggest issues - from homelessness and poverty to policing and overrun prisons - ultimately determining how, and whether, we strive to resolve them. So why, for generations, has a select group of people with very limited experience of social inequality been charged with discussing and debating it?

I've sat on cold pavements with beggars, asking them why they would rather wander the streets than live in supported accommodation. I've pleaded with alcoholics to give sobriety one last shot before they end up dead - and read their obituaries in the paper weeks later. I've sat with youth workers at their wits' end as diversionary services are cut amid a surge in gang and knife violence. Too many people remain so far from this nightmarish social reality that even when they would earnestly wish to bring about change, they don't know where to start. So start here.

Praise for Darren McGarvey:

'The standout, authentic voice of a generation' Herald

'Utterly compelling' Ian Rankin, New Statesman

'Brilliant' Russell Brand

'An absolutely fascinating individual' Owen Jones

'Offer[s] an antidote to populist anger that transcends left and right... articulate and emotional' Financial Times

'McGarvey is a rarity: a working-class writer who has fought to make the middle-class world hear what he has to say' Nick Cohen, Guardian

The Sunday Times Top Ten bestseller.
Winner of the Orwell Prize 2018.
Named the most 'Rebellious Read of the 21st Century' in a Scottish Book Trust poll.

Darren McGarvey has experienced poverty and its devastating effects first-hand. He knows why people from deprived communities all around Britain feel angry and unheard. And he wants to explain . . .

So he invites you to come on a safari of sorts. But not the kind where the wildlife is surveyed from a safe distance. This book takes you inside the experience of poverty to show how the pressures really feel and how hard their legacy is to overcome.

Arguing that both the political left and right misunderstand poverty as it is actually lived, McGarvey sets out what everybody – including himself – could do to change things. Razor-sharp, fearless and brutally honest, Poverty Safari is an unforgettable insight into modern Britain.

'Another cry of anger from a working class that feels the pain of a rotten, failing system. Its value lies in the strength it will add to the movement for change.' - Ken Loach, director of Kes