Thirty-eight pages into Lloyd Jones’s new work, Hand Me Down World, the snail collector describes the shells of snails as being unique in their ordinariness. It is a striking line because as the book unfolds, we meet many types of ‘ordinariness’ contained within a completely unique book.

Hand Me Down World is a thing of beauty, with the story of Ines (not her real name), an African refugee who travels to Berlin looking for her son, becoming a modern-day parable of betrayal, love, dignity and courage in the face of unimaginable obstacles.

Jones’s craft shines through in both the deceptively simple language and the structure of the book as a whole. We don’t hear from Ines herself until the fourth part and by then we have heard all about other people’s impressions and memories of (and guilt connected with) Ines. We know this silent, dignified woman, who has always known intimately what survival is, has had to deal with both humane and inhumane responses to her circumstance. What we don’t know, until Ines speaks herself, is how the world appears from her perspective. And what she tells us may not be what we were expecting.

Jones has created a thoroughly modern story of people-smuggling, illegal immigrants, racism, dispossession, discontent and honour while seamlessly weaving beauty, breath, love and landscape throughout his pages. We hear from ordinary men (and it is mostly men) who turn against Ines, and the ordinary men and women who support and assist the black African woman washed up on the coast of Italy.

And then, there is the fifth part. I won’t spoil the read but Hand Me Down World packs a fierce emotional punch. It is rare to find a writer who can take very contemporary complex and divisive issues such as international adoptions, privilege, tourism, border security, nationalism, and gender politics and turn them into a compelling, breathtaking, heartbreaking read. Hand Me Down World is a truly remarkable book.