'Who ends up in the kitchen, Gabe?' 'Misfits', he said, 'psychos, exiles, culinary artists, and people who just need a job'. In The Kitchen is Monica Ali's stunning follow up to Brick Lane. It opens with a mysterious death in the cellars of a smart, cosmopolitan hotel and over the course of the ensuing pages, peels back the layers of polyglot London to reveal the melting pot which exists below. Once again it confirms Monica Ali not only as a great modern storyteller but also an acute observer of the vagaries of a contemporary culture.