"I have never been faced with a moral crisis, let alone a matter of life or death."

Peter Simons doesn’t spend much time at home in his apartment. Thanks to his job at a multinational company, he is often flying around the world, enjoying a life of luxurious solitude in five-star hotels. So when he returns after being away for nine months and notices a strange smell coming from his neighbour’s apartment, he initially tries not to get involved, but when a body is discovered, Peter’s carefully cultivated detachment begins to crumble. And when new people move into the vacant apartment, he gets caught up in a petty dispute that will bring him to the brink of moral ruin.

Bystander is a pitiless, bold work of intense psychological realism narrated by a professionally successful but socially bankrupt anti-hero who expects global connection and local anonymity. It excoriates the contingency of contemporary morality, and, at a time of growing isolation, forces the reader to examine what it means to be a good neighbour.

Mike Steeves attended King's College University in Halifax, where he received a BA in Political Science and English Literature. He completed an MA in English Literature at Concordia University. Steeves lives with his wife and child in Montreal, and works at Concordia University. Giving Up is his first full-length book of fiction. Connect with Steeves on Twitter @SteevesMike.

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• Short-listed, Concordia University First Book Award

"Steeves is endlessly quotable...but never glib. In Bystander, serious ideas and entertainment value are so intertwined as to be effectively one and the same." —Montreal Gazette

"An enjoyably quirky and biting portrait of personal realpolitik, Bystander offers a credible complement to 'Fight Club' and 'American Psycho,' though one minus the chest-beating postures and litres of shed blood." —Toronto Star