In Polite Society Melanie Sumner introduces us to Darren, a not-so-nice young woman from Tennessee who joins the Peace Corps in Senegal for lack of a better idea. Fitting in with Southerners was hard enough, but trying to understand friends, lovers, and herself while unemployed in a foreign country sends Darren reeling. The world that spirals around her is full of outrageous encounters, interracial affairs, and nights of drunken revelry.

Against the backdrop of a society that is governed by hospitality and good manners but is full of strangers and unfamiliar customs, Darren runs headlong into her own insecurities, fears, and desires.

It is not surprising that Melanie Sumner's remarkable fiction has received early recognition from The New Yorker, which published selections from this book. With sly humor and acuity, Sumner invents a youthful heroine who is stubborn and selfish, loving and libidinous, and, ultimately, unsparingly human. Polite Society marks the debut of a talented writer whose work resounds with unusual spirit and searing honesty.