The novel is set in post-apartheid South Africa and follows David Lurie, a middle-aged English professor at the Technical University of Cape Town. After an impulsive affair with a student, he refuses to repent publicly before a university committee and resigns his post in disgrace, retreating to his daughter Lucy’s isolated farm in the Eastern Cape. The balance of power in the country is shifting, and both father and daughter become victims of a violent attack, which forces them to confront their strained relationship and the complex racial dynamics of the new South Africa