Six years have passed since the horrifying events that the narrator of this novella irecounts, since he and three of his friends headed up to the South of France planning to work in the grape harvest, gain life experience and, by extension, acquire ‘literary capital’. Now, with the perspective afforded to him by the years, Munir sets out to recount those events exactly as they happened, with no embellishment and with a commitment to tell the absolute truth. As is always the case, however, this narrator is highly unreliable and full of arrogance, and the reader discovers this as he reads his reflections on the role of stories and the possibilities of truth-telling. 
 
As he interlaces transcripts from his diary with his own reflections about literature and experience, Munir guides his reader into reading his story exactly as he intended it to be read. He revisits the weeks spent in France, which did not play out as idyllically as they anticipated, and which give raise to reflections on class, food and the bigger powers that are at play behind every decision we make. 
 
Living Things is a self-aware novella that meditates on the role of writing and storytelling. Its narrator really makes the text shine: pretentious and not very likeable, fictional Munir looks at a variety of living things and reflects on how they exist in our current world.