Inspired New York TimesDeliciously funny Helen OyeyemiEnormously entertaining Lionel ShriverSmart, brilliant I love it so much! Joanna CannonA wickedly caustic tale of a student who stumbles on a literary treasure.Anna Brisker, a once promising student, has fallen behind. Her PhD on inspiration is overdue and instead she busies herself with power-eating strawberry pop tarts and watching as her doctoral peers fly off to take posts at prestigious universities.Alone over the holidays, Anna strikes up an unexpected and life-changing friendship. But what can Helen Langley, a middle-aged antiquarian bookbinder, have in her possession that might unlock Annas thesis and her chronic inertia And what laws will Anna break to get itLean and compulsively readable, Talent is a literary romp that delights in its wicked lampooning of the academic world and asks how far we should go to meet our potential. And in Anna Brisker, we have an audacious heroine who cannot help but shine with mordant brilliance.