Told in three distinct voices, Short War brings together a rapturous teenage love story set in Chile, the hunt for the author of an eye-opening literary detective story and a complex reckoning with American political intervention in South America.

It's 1973, and Jewish-American Gabriel Lazris is sixteen years old and desperately in love with Caro Ravest, a Chilean Catholic. When the pair meet at a party in Santiago, something clicks. They fall fast, but with news of growing instability in Chile spreading even faster – partially thanks to Gabriel's Nixon-loving newspaper editor dad – can they stay together amid political uncertainty?

Decades later, Gabriel's American-raised adult daughter Nina heads to Buenos Aires in a last-ditch effort to save her dissertation. She quickly gets sidetracked: first by a sexy professor, then by a controversial book called Guerra Eterna. A document of war and an underground classic, Guerra Eterna destabilises Nina's identity and drags Gabriel's past into the light.

Lily Meyer's acclaimed debut novel explores US imperialism, class, family and identity against the backdrop of an increasingly unstable Chile. It's perfect fans of A Long Petal of the Sea by Isabel Allende and Half of a Yellow Sun by Chimamanda Ngozi, as well as readers of Claire Lombardo and Kristin Hannah.