Zainab is used to being the only woman on an oil rig. After a decade of drill-hopping and fighting to have her voice heard above the rabble, she knows all too well how to twist pieces of herself to fit into its rigid masculine machinery. But while the men she works with might come to accept a Sudanese Muslim woman working beside them, it’s another thing entirely for one to take the helm as their toolpusher – especially on the Clarissa Clyde, a rig with a suspiciously pristine track record and a reputation for getting the job done fast.

Called on by an old friend to oversee the Clyde’s final days on a high-stakes operation, Zainab leaves her heavily pregnant sister behind in Australia to investigate the crew and ensure the extraction goes off without a hitch. From the minute she arrives, however, it’s clear the men she’s meant to trust do not – or will not – trust her in turn. With every anomaly and oversight Zainab uncovers, the truth behind the Clyde’s exceptional service comes into terrifying focus, forcing her to confront something more powerful than the rig’s hierarchy: nature itself.

Informed by Yassmin Abdel-Magied’s breadth of experience as an offshore miner, At Sea is a taut exploration of greed, prejudice, and the long, explosive tail of environmental exploitation. The novel, interspersed with poetic fragments from an oceanic Greek chorus, toes the line between allegory and devastating realism over the handful of days we spend with Zainab and the Clyde’s crew. At Sea is a rare find amid a mid-year bumper crop of new fiction, both intimate in scope and unsettling in its broader prescience.