Winner of the Orange Prize and the PEN/Faulkner Award for Fiction The poignant - and at times very funny - novel from the author of State of Wonder and Commonwealth Somewhere in South America, at the home of the country's vice president, a lavish birthday party is being held in honour of the powerful businessman Mr Hosokawa Roxanne Coss, opera's most revered soprano, has mesmerised the international guests with her singing It is a perfect evening - until a band of gun-wielding terrorists takes the entire party hostage But what begins as a panicked, life-threatening scenario slowly evolves into something quite different, a moment of great beauty, as terrorists and hostages forge unexpected bonds and people from different continents become compatriots, intimate friends, and lovers