Contemporary fiction: literary and general

Book SynopsisBarcode, Krisztina Toth's first substantial work in prose after four volumes of remarkable verse, consists of fifteen beautifully written and highly sensual short stories. Each story, apart from one, is told with poetic intensity and intimacy from a young, unnamed female narrator's point of view.

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Book SynopsisNEW FROM ENVELOPEBOOKS: When Professor Arthur Lash takes his American family back to Vienna in 1960 to visit his father, the comfortable assumptions of their life in upstate New York are suddenly overturned by the stresses of foreign travel.

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Book SynopsisA riveting financial thriller about temptation, choices, and the ruthless pursuit of profit and power in the City of London and the oil and gas fields of America. In 2014, environmentalists want to ban fracking, which has powered America to become the top oil producer in the world. Saudi Arabia is worried that too much supply will depress oil prices. One man has a plan that will make him billions. Into this world, twenty-four-year-old Sebastian has the seemingly good fortune to be offered a dream job working for Edouard de Tocqueville, one of the most powerful bankers in the City of London. But, dazzled by the opportunity laid out before him, Sebastian fails to see the devastating consequences of his actions...

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Book Synopsis"I have long since ceased to be surprised at how often incidents in my village end up with someone in the river..." My Village in the Valley is a quiet unassuming place where, on the whole, very little happens. Until, that is, we all get together to tackle aggressive drivers, disputed footpaths, yapping hearthrugs and the ubiquitous village fete. In my Village in the Valley, nothing is ever simple ... Original comedy from TV and radio scriptwriter Michael Bartlett (The Archers, BBC Radio Drama)Trade Review"Absolutely one of the best laugh out loud books you can treat yourself to ... IN SUMMARY- I would love this book to become a new sitcom. The writing is very visual, the characters are credible and the situations so utterly bonkers they are probably true!" ~ Goodreads reviewer

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Book SynopsisI’m anonymous. Irrelevant next to the real presence - the paint on the canvas … The hidden life of an artist is told through the work they leave behind. But every painting holds its secrets. And when your story has already been told in a painting by another's hand, sometimes it’s easier to live with the myth than admit the truth … Featuring Frida Kahlo, Laura Knight, Victorine Meurent and Suzanne Valadon, inspired by the life of Pre-Raphaelite painter Joanna Boyce. "An absorbing, modern retelling of artist Joanna Boyce. One of my favourites of the year so far"; "A book all students of art history should read"; "Definitely left its mark on me … 5 stars"Trade Review"Definitely left its mark on me ... 5 stars" -- Goodreads reviewer; "An absorbing, modern retelling of artist Joanna Boyce. One of my favourites of the year so far" -- Ems_bookscapes; "A book all students of art history should read" -- Instragram review; "Practically a feminist manifesto for women artists ... a love story about the hidden lives of artists and the urge to create ... Fabulously full of everything I didn't expect" -- Cotswold Life magazine

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Book SynopsisFrom the BESTSELLING author of Dust Life can change in a split second, and so it does for twenty-eight-year-old photographer Finn Chambers. One careless decision at the Cimitero Acattolico in the eternal city of Rome, finds him falling head first onto Shelley's tomb, to his death. He awakes to a beautiful afterlife surrounded by long-dead poets, artists and thinkers, including Shelley, Keats, Gramsci, Sanchez and the delightful Lady Mary von Haas, and these luminaries test Finn's values and principles in a way they have never been tested before. Uncomfortable truths require honest assessment when the 21st century's lust for celebrity, drugs, and fifteen minutes of fame, is questioned by others from centuries past but his new life finds much in common with his previous life, with love, art, sex, music, humour and irreverence, all experienced on this different and fascinating plane. For Finn Chambers there is life after death - and it's a life worth living.

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Book SynopsisHarald Voetmann's eye-opening English debut, Awake, is the first book of his erudite and grotesque trilogy about humankind's inhuman will to conquer nature In a shuttered bedroom in ancient Italy, the sleepless Pliny the Elder lies in bed obsessively dictating new chapters of his Natural History to his slave Diocles. Wheezing, imperious, and prone to nosebleeds, Pliny doesn't believe in spending his evenings in repose. No - to be awake is to be alive. There's no time to waste if he is to classify every element of the natural world in a single work. By day, Pliny the Elder carries out his civic duties and gives the occasional disastrous public reading. But despite his astonishing ambition to catalogue everything from precious metals to the moon, Pliny the Elder still takes pleasure in the common rose. After rushing to an erupting Mount Vesuvius, Pliny perishes in the ash, and his nephew, Pliny the Younger, becomes custodian of his life's work. But where Pliny the Elder saw starlight, Pliny the Younger only sees fireflies. In masterfully honed prose, Voetmann brings the formidable Pliny the Elder (and his pompous nephew) to life. Awake is a comic delight about one of history's great minds and the not-so-great human body it was housed in.Trade Review"Awake is original, piercing, and richly exhilarating. Voetmann's text is a sharp reminder of how powerfully and succinctly well-chosen words can create a world, render experiences, and express thoughts - in short, transport us, to places and in ways we could not have imagined." - Claire Messud, Harper's; "This strange novella concerns Pliny the Elder and his drive to catalog all of nature. The fluid prose owes much to translator Ottosen. One thematic thread is the contrast between the intellectual effort to rein in nature's extraordinary variety and man's ugly, ignorant cruelty...An interesting work and a good introduction to this unusual writer." - Kirkus; "Vivid, earthy, by turns hilarious, gross, and tragic, but always powerfully engaging. Reading and rereading this book remains a rare pleasure." - Susanna Nied; "A slim novel of ideas, seemingly turning its back on the present, or rather illuminating from within a turn that leads to the very history of European mentality." - Svenska Dagbladet;"A flawless and sparkling little monument to human life." - Information; "Reading Voetmann's books makes me feel so alive. His voice is like no other, his hold on his material masterful. You will never read anything like Awake - a hardcore, pulsating portrait of a first century Roman weirdo. A wonderful and unpleasant treasure." - Olga Ravn; "No one else can describe ancient life with such beauty and humor, while never sparing you from the gross and terrifying pain of being human." - Naja Marie Aidt; "With a scholar's knowledge and a poet's playfulness, Harald Voetmann brings us into the mind and times of its protagonist, Pliny the Elder. Visceral and lyrical, entertaining and provoking, it evokes a dazzling world on the brink of destruction, resounding with our own conflicted age." - Sjon; 'This is an interesting book. The writing is beautiful. A fine translation by J.S. Ottosen.' - Patti Smith

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Book SynopsisWang Wei has always chosen his words carefully. His unobtrusive presence has seen him through the reign of five emperors, but now, as his own time is running out, he immerses himself in an unbridled account of a life confined at court. From the early separation from his parents, sisters, and brother - who did not survive the operation into a eunuch - to the power struggles he has witnessed and endured, Wang Wei examines human relationships with precision and a catching sense of wonder. While rumours are weapons, it is love and its various forms of expression that most fascinate Wang Wei. Reaching into a secret and secluded world, Carlson's vivid prose is as delicate as it is enigmatic. A meditation on power and exclusion, love and loneliness, gender and identity, ageing and transformation, Eunuch is a compact masterpiece.Trade ReviewIn this work, Carlson explores loneliness, humanity, and the individual’s relationship with society. Its setting in a distant place and time creates a sense of defamiliarisation yet emphasises the timelessness of the ageing eunuch’s thoughts. Carlson’s clear, precise language is lyrical, often aphoristic, and the verbal snapshots are like Chinese poems or wood carvings; – Nordic Council Literature Prize Jury; Eunuch recognises the fragility of the happiness of emperors, idle officials, philosophers, and the rich who care only about their riches. Colourful and corporeal, Eunuch is a continuation of Carlson’s deep interest in science and culture – and the way in which an outsider and ageing figure regards the society he both is and isn't part of; – Kiiltomato

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Book SynopsisThe ideals of simple country living have captivated poets for a crow's age. But in the countryside that Tityrus knows, the beech trees tower like skyscrapers, mice wrestle each other, and the nearby island is infected by swarms of gulls. The forest is a source of energy, but also the home of a behemoth transformer substation and where a little boy has drowned. The shepherds are prescribed Ritalin, slip in the mud, cry without knowing why, and sustain themselves on mini pizza rolls. Wiese's poetry is as hilarious as it is gentle, moving gracefully between the everyday and the profound. Building with the narrative quality of a novel, Tityrus is both an elegy to a natural world that has long been overindustrialised, and a love letter to all that remains.Trade ReviewDuncan Wiese's subversive pastoral Tityrus shows how fraught life has become for the Arcadian shepherds among us. Refusing to sugarcoat Tityrus's experience of our fetid and worn-out world, Wiese uncovers the daily pathos and absurdities of contemporary life. This spare yet encompassing verse narrative, deftly translated by Max Minden Ribeiro and Sam Riviere, provides an insightful and haunting portrait of our time; - Denise Newman: I lost myself in this bittersweet sequence and it already feels like a place I've visited, a life I stowed-away in beyond the poems. A voice so compulsively readable, both tersely clear and compellingly mysterious that it gets into your head and starts narrating your own life; - Luke Kennard; A pastoral where the shepherd not only grazes his sheep, but also himself, the human - where human and animal overlap in a current of medicine, food, myth, alcohol - and love. So right on time is Tityrus; - Ursula Andkjaer Olsen

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Book SynopsisIn the sixteenth century, on the island of Hven, the pioneering Danish astronomer, Tycho Brahe, is undertaking an elaborate study of the night skyA great mind and a formidable personality, Brahe is also the world’s most illustrious noseless man of his time. Told by Brahe and his assistants—a filthy cast of characters—Sublunar is both novel and almanac. Alongside sexual deviancy, spankings, ruminations on a new nose—flesh, wood, or gold?—Brahe (a choleric and capricious character) and his peculiar helpers (“I would rather watch her globes tonight than icy stars”) take painstaking measurements that will revolutionize astronomy, long before the invention of the telescope. Meanwhile the plague rages in Europe…The second in Voetmann’s triptych of historical novels, Sublunar is as visceral, absurd, and tragic as its predecessor, Awake, but with a special nocturnal glow and a lunatic-edged gaze trained on the moon and the stars.

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Book Synopsis'Holy Mother who knows so much. Help me for I'm destroyed in the heart. Tell me is it love to be like this. That measures me on my days like the shadow on the mountain.' On a remote island off the West coast of Ireland in the 1970s, young farmer Micael catches sight of a girl on a beach with long hair so blonde it could be white. Befriending the girl and her travelling companions, a world of possibility opens up to Micael - but where there's opportunity, there is also peril ... Juanita Casey's astounding first novel is a cult classic ready to be rediscovered by a new generation of readers. Drawing on her own life and speaking for her marginalised com- munity, Casey offers a feminist and class-conscious story that explores the eternal choices of youth, between the comfort of a stifling domesticity and the promise and risk of the un- known, characterised in the incomparable wildness of the West of Ireland. The bestselling Casey takes her place alongside such writers as JM Synge and Kevin Barry - the missing connection between the two.Trade Review'A remarkable first novel by a remarkable woman.' - The New York Times

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Book SynopsisAs he explores his sexuality, Pete, a gay photographer, experiences the cruelties and injustices of a world completely at odds with the tenets instilled in him during childhood. While sharing a Notting Hill squat during a seemingly endless summer with friends Mel and Baz, he meets Brad, a mysterious American, at a happening in Chalk Farm. Travelling to California in search of Brad, Pete, seeking love and adventure, ventures halfway around the world looking for answers only to find them back home once he crosses over The Opal Causeway. Set in the early 1970s, The Opal Causeway is a coming-of-age novel embracing historical, environmental, racial, social and sexual themes still so relevant today. "A pleasure to read … so pitch perfect on important social issues. The historical theme of the Gay Liberation movement is neatly told, both in US and in UK." Alan Mahar, former Publishing Director of Tindal Street Press

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Book SynopsisWhen human remains are found deep in an Irish peat bog, the National Museum of Ireland takes charge and their bog body specialist, Carrie O’Neill, begins to investigate. She notices unexpected features on this well-preserved body and later tests suggest an intriguing history. As Carrie tries to make sense of all she learns, speculation sends people reeling. Repercussions ripple throughout the world, pulling Carrie into the ensuing controversy. She finds herself caught up in events that she has not foreseen and cannot control. The more she delves into the mystery that is the talk of every TV show, the more she is warned off. Fear and outrage mount as she prepares a much-anticipated exhibition of their precious discovery. The Find raises one almighty question that will shake up everything we think we know. "With great attention to detail, beautiful prose, and strong vivid characters – Holmes takes us on a fascinating journey where archaeology and religion meet in explosive tensions to reveal hidden dangers, historical mysteries and difficult choices. A page-turner from start to finish." Dr Emma Tollefsen, bog body scientist.

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Book SynopsisGreat loves, great theatre roles and great betrayals; rarely have the secrets and seductions of the theatre world been explored with such intensity. Michael Driscoll, the finest actor of his generation, is tempted by magnificent roles and manipulated when he accepts them. He reaches the dizzy international heights before his Faustian bargain catches up with him. Set in apartheid-era South Africa, The Play’s the Thing shows that it is when the world is at its most dishonest that we need the truth of theatre the most.

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Book SynopsisIt''s after a night in Cardiff''s loudest gay bar that Toni first lays eyes on Gav, a retired Welsh boxer, and his boyfriend Karol, an aspiring Polish photographer. The trio soon fall into an intimate, ambiguous love triangle. After a tragic event at a beach in Swansea, the trio are ripped apart, and Toni escapes to London, becoming caught between a convenient, loveless relationship and an illicit, lustful affair. Lost halfway between the British future she has always wanted, and the Eastern European past she has been running from, Toni can only wonder where and with whom she really belongs. Above Us The Sea is an ode to the tangled remains of lost loves and the imprints left by grieving souls, yearning for connection. This is a story of aching and emerging, intimacy and distance, set against an increasingly hostile landscape.

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Book SynopsisIn northeast Los Angeles, wildfires rage and coyotes stalk the neighbourhood streets. The wind blows heavy with smoke and, inside a rented bungalow on hilly Lemoyne Street, the air grows heavy with something else. Ropey closes his checking account and transfers his net worth to his sock drawer. Megan sharpens pencils and chops produce to obsession. Lyle tightens his grip on his girlfriend Egypt, whose growing dependence makes her question everything, especially Lyle. And Captain America, the cat of the house, finds his orange coat giving way to a nest of bleeding sores. As the fires burn ever closer, will the four friends wake up to their false paradise?

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Book SynopsisThis fascinating and remarkable book, ‘Spies and Scoundrels’, consists of two highly imaginative novellas. The first, ‘Time to Say Goodbye’, explores how England might look in 2026. Post pandemic with many unresolved problems remaining, Government finances are dire and the country is directionless and unstable. People have gone into voluntary lockdown to avoid the violence on the streets. The scene is set for a change of Government, with a radical plan. A scapegoat group in society is identified and vilified. History does indeed repeat itself. ‘Death’s Final Wicket’ is a spy thriller set in London, Oslo, Buenos Aires and Jerusalem. Bible Codes in the Torah (first five chapters of the Old Testament), supposedly point to various modern day events such as Hitler, Yasser Arafat and a nuclear war emanating from North Korea. Governments interpret these codes for their own ends. Meanwhile, a new terrorist organization, with its own plan, complicates matters. British Intelligence has the man with the right background to sort through the c

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Book SynopsisA novel

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Book SynopsisHere is a delight: MacDonald Harris''s colourful, fanciful, and moving Herma, the story of a wilful young woman who conquers the musical world of the Belle Epoque. Herma is many things: a glamorous story of a singer who rises from the choir of a country church to stardom at the Paris Opera: the parallel adventures of her agent and friendly enemy Fred Hite, filled with the excitement of the early days of aviation; and a provocative sexual intrigue whose twinned her and heroine, not brother and sister, are forbidden to each other by the secret that lies at the centre of their odd and intimate relationship. From its evocative beginnings in the pastoral Southern California of the turn of the century, Herma moves on to larger worlds: first the brash, adolescent San Francisco of the period, then the Earthquake, then the international world of opera in Paris at the most luxurious, opulent, and decadent moment of its history. Erotic, bejewelled, crowded with incident and a big, vivid cast of c

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Book SynopsisStylist Best New Fiction of 2024A Bookseller One to Watch'Manny and the Baby stood out for me from the first few lines. The beautifully balanced prose, the wonderful story, and sumptuous detail are constructed with poetic precision and held my attention right until the very end.' Jacqueline Crooks, author of Fire RushAn incredibly special writer, thoughtful and energetic, occasionally savage, wise beyond her years, with an eye and an ear for syntax that is masterful ... Varaidzo is the future, and Manny and the Baby is a book for the ages.' Nikesh ShuklaIncluded in NetGalley's 2024 Hot List London, 1936. Two sisters are ready to take the city and the world by storm. Bath, 2012. Two young Black men are figuring out who they are, and who they want to become. Manny Powell is forthright, intellectual, and determined to make her mark on the London literary scene. Her younger sister, Rita The Baby', just wants to dance. Chasing their dreams across smoky Soho jazz clubs, they soon find them

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Book SynopsisA Guardian Best Fiction Book of 2023 The brilliant new short story collection from the Arthur C. Clarke Award—winning author of The Animals in That Country. A family of cat farmers gets the chance to set the felines free. A group of chickens tells it like it is. A female-crewed ship ploughs through the patriarchy. A support group finds solace in a world without men. With her trademark humour, energy, and flair, McKay offers glimpses of places where dreams subsume reality, where childhood restarts, where humans embrace their animal selves and animals talk like humans. The stories in Gunflower explode and bloom in mesmerising ways, showing the world both as it is and as it could be.Trade Review‘McKay’s deployment of language is as exciting and original as her manipulation of ideas. The stories in Gunflower are provocative, poetic, vibrantly alive to contemporary concerns.’ -- Nina Allan * The Guardian *‘It’s not often that a short story collection feels like more than the sum of its parts, but Gunflower is a work of rare depth and skill.’ -- Doug Johnstone * The Big Issue *‘Startling, beautiful, and dangerous. McKay is the brightest of talents. We're lucky to have her.’ -- Robbie Arnott, author of Limberlost‘Amidst a pile of shed skin and fur, McKay moulds a kaleidoscopic and horrifyingly real portrait of life at the fringes. By turns gritty, surreal, and absurd, Gunflower isn’t afraid to weigh flesh on the scales of our own judgments, a delicate balancing act between life and death, connection and disconnection. Perhaps part Kelly Link and Ottessa Moshfegh, McKay delivers an assured follow-up to The Animals in That Country in her own singular voice that zeroes in on our anxieties and existential crises with deft and often poetic flair.’ -- Sequoia Nagamatsu, bestselling author of How High We Go in the Dark‘Gunflower is like a swarm of small earthquakes: nothing is steady anymore, and the world feels bigger, scarier, almost transcendent in its strangeness.’ -- Miles Allinson, author of In Moonland‘[Laura Jean McKay] has another sense, an extra one that we mortals do not have. She sees and feels the world differently. So acutely, so astutely, so uncannily.’ -- Sian Prior, author of Shy‘The genre-hopping short stories in Gunflower, written over the past two decades, offer invaluable insight into the obsessions that have compelled McKay to return to the page … McKay circles around her thematic obsessions — familial fracture, social and economic liminality, negotiations with motherhood, human and nonhuman subjectivities — and approaches them from multiple angles.’ -- Jack Cameron Stanton * Sydney Morning Herald *‘The stories in Gunflower move between genres and subjects with the queasy swiftness of a fever dream. They are united, however, in their exploration of life in an increasingly changeable and precarious word.’ -- Julian Novitz * The Conversation *‘[M]any of the stories in Gunflower end just as they seem to be approaching the edge of a cliff, giving rise to an uncomfortable sense of urgency. McKay’s ability to close the apparent distances between past and present, human and nonhuman, us and them, feels vital as we approach the precipice of the Anthropocene.’ -- Megan Cheong * Meanjin *‘Gunflower is distinguished by its tonal and formal variety: its bracing sense of the weird jostling with heartfelt compassion; the audacity of brevity and the artful unfolding of detail; a keen ear for working-class vernacular and the more sophisticated language of the educated middle class … Above all, McKay’s stories challenge us to make our own meanings … [Gunflower] is one of the most inventive short story collections I have read this year. It will delight the many admirers of The Animals in that Country and readers new to McKay’s thought-provoking fiction.’ -- Susan Midalia * Australian Book Review *‘The short stories in Laura Jean McKay’s Gunflower are weird and wonderful, just as you’d expect from the author of The Animals in That Country. Some of the concerns of the earlier book are in its follow-up, with a similar dreamlike, even fabulist take on a world that’s familiar but with improbable and fantastical twists. Funny, creepy and addictive.’ -- Michael Williams * Qantas Travel Insider *‘[A] cohesive collection of dizzying, formally inventive, marvellously unique stories … Laura Jean McKay’s latest work is a poetic and mesmerising collection for the holidays.’ * Melbourne Writers Festival *‘A strange and wonderful collection of short stories, set in a slightly “wrong” version of the real world … It’s an uncomfortable view of Australia, and the world, that will really push your thinking.’ * Zee Feed *Praise for The Animals in That Country: ‘A fierce debut novel … Her writing about people is filthy, fresh, and funny; this is prose on high alert, hackles up and teeth bared in every sentence. The novel becomes both a stirring attempt to inhabit other consciousnesses and a wry demonstration of the limits of our own language and empathy.’ -- Justine Jordan * The Guardian *Praise for The Animals in That Country: ‘This is a game-changing, life-changing novel, the kind that comes along right when you need it, and compels you to listen to its terrifying poetry. Compulsively readable and yet also pushing the boundaries of what is possible in terms of language and narrative, this is a brilliant and disturbing book that will make you rethink everything you thought you understood about non-human animal sentience and agency. I don’t think any reader can ever forget a voice like Sue the dingo’s — wise and obscene in equal measure. A triumph.’ -- Ceridwen Dovey, author of Only the AnimalsPraise for The Animals in That Country: ‘This is an absorbing and affecting book, and one to which I’m able to pay the highest compliment: that, in the days after finishing it, the world felt different to me, its animals not speaking but not silent either.’ -- Ben Brooker * Australian Book Review *Praise for The Animals in That Country: ‘The genius stroke of The Animals in That Country is the preternatural “body talk” of its animals … an affecting book, one that gets remarkably close to the unknowable wildness of animal sentience.’ -- Jack Callil * The Age *Praise for The Animals in That Country: ‘Laura Jean McKay, an expert in animal communication, has her animals speaking in hallucinogenic haikus — it’s disturbing but compelling, and somehow totally believable. I loved every bizarre, unexpected moment.’ -- Corinna Hente * Herald Sun *Praise for The Animals in That Country: ‘What a pertinent time to be reading The Animals in That Country … the responses and lockdown efforts of the government and authorities in this novel mirror the scenario unfolding around the coronavirus pandemic … The writing is vibrant, energetic, and refreshing, and the narrative leaps off the page. Jean is an unexpected and unforgettable main protagonist. She’s gutsy, raw, degenerate, and believable … [A] wild, engaging ride.’ -- Karen Viggers * The Australian *Praise for The Animals in That Country: ‘[The Animals in That Country] is disturbing and darkly comic, disrupting anthropocentric assumptions, revealing how animals might see our often violent intrusion into their lives … McKay’s innovation lies in the startling newness of the plot and the innovations in form in conveying animal voices as agentic and different … The Animals in That Country marks a striking new moment in animal representation in Australian fiction.’ * ALS Gold Medal Judges' Citation *Praise for The Animals in That Country: ‘What is so exciting about McKay’s novel is the way she refuses both anthropocentrism and the philosophical position that non-human animals are inevitably alien to us … [A]nother of the novel’s strengths is that its thought experiment is conducted without sentimentality, though it is always characterised by humour and warmth … The Animals in That Country will be the wildest ride you take all year.’ -- Maria Takolander * The Saturday Paper *Praise for The Animals in That Country: ‘As we grapple with a worldwide pandemic, Australian author McKay’s novel is incredibly timely and feels all the more real for it … filled with humour, optimism, and grace: a wild ride worth taking. An eye-opening glimpse into a world that’s turned upside down and eventually becomes its own version of whole.’ -- Carol Gladstein * Booklist *

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Book SynopsisA man jumps, the platform empties, then the stories begin. Filled with tales of tragedy, love, hope and frustration, Malachi McIntosh's debut collection of short stories offers surreal and satirical accounts of the many perils of contemporary life. From resistant mothers and unexpected corporate climbers, to doomed weddings and unwelcome visitors, these dark, comedic and uncanny stories contend with timeless concerns of parenthood, family, race and identity in the here and now. Whether characters are absorbed in social media or burying their grief, raising themselves up or taking others down, Parables, Fables, Nightmares brings a light to our interactions in an ailing world and heralds the arrival of a unique new voice in fiction.

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Book SynopsisShortlisted for the Sunday Times Literary Award 2022One of Brittle Paper''s 50 Most Notable African Books of 2021An epic tale narrated through the eyes of three women.Makhosi battles inner turmoil, unable to express her anger to her mother, Duduzile, a hardworking woman losing touch with her daughter.Nonhle, Makhosi's younger sister, watches the growing gap between them.The narrative unfolds the complex conversations within familieswomanhood, parenting, sexuality, and mental health. It's an epic tale told through the eyes of three women, navigating the delicate threads of love, pain, and resilience within the intricate dance of family bonds.

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Book SynopsisAnthology of Novel Extracts from The Bridport Prize Novel winners

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Book SynopsisWales, a mining village, pre-industrial revolution. A world of serfdom and squalor, its inhabitants oppressed by both Chapel conformist impulses and the predations of a new kind of capitalism being born. Sion, a metalworker, strikes up an illicit relationship with Katherine, the wife of the mineowner's personal dogsbody. And so begins the struggle of non-transactional and non-exploitative human love to be recognised in a place bent on the destruction and negation of that very thing. A mix of political anger, historical excavation, Celtic mysticism, praise of the human impulse to love and rage at avarice and exploitation, Of Talons and Teeth seeks to explore that moment when human beings and the natural beauties around them were turned into mere chattels; when Mammon became the only god worth worshipping.Trade Review"This unnerving tale spits and writhes off the page. Hypnotic, mythic and visceral — its prose hewn from deep beneath the soil. Griffiths is a twenty-first-century Faulkner."“Often untouchable and always utterly gripping, as British writers go Niall Griffiths is the very best in the business.”"Of Talons and Teeth affirms Griffiths as one my favorite writer’s working today. He’s a true marvel with language and in this historical exploration of man’s ongoing battle with greed and our inability to do anything but take from nature, comes the heart of a broken romantic. This is a real gem of a novel by a magician of a writer.”

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Book SynopsisA polyphonic novel of Teha'amana, Tahitian muse and child-bride to Paul Gaugin, from her point of view conveyed through the myths and legends of the islands. 'A feminist masterpiece.'Trade ReviewI am thrilled to be shortlisted for Scotland's National Book Awards for my first book; Teha'amana's story is unique and was, until now, untold. This is the song of the silenced, of the abused, and the colonised. This award nomination will take her story and that of her culture's to many more readers in the western world.

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Book SynopsisGrowing up in a council house in Leeds, Wes Brown dreamed of becoming a 'real' man like the ones in his ex-pro wrestler dad's tales of heroes and villains, gods and monsters. The only problem was he never told him they were fake. In this modern-day Pinocchio story, Wes follows in his father's footsteps in the hope of coming to terms with the fictions that make a man.

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Book SynopsisIt’s not what you think, it rarely is, so flick the remains of your rubbish cigarette down the drain and don’t pay too much attention to the rumours. Things have been going missing from the bedroom of the woman with the purple eye shadow. Stewart tries to pull in the punters at the ailing nightclub by installing a car park diorama of gorillas and meerkats. Meanwhile, Yvonne gets a new job and nobody knows what’s happened to Daz. At Jonnie Rabbett’s shooting club, Barbara ‘Bunny’ Rabbett dispenses pork pies and sage advice, “It’ll be right, love.” Vincent smokes cigarettes, smells of paint and finally gets to the bottom of what exactly happened to Dame Judy. He must ring Kirsten and let her know! Paul’s life flashes before him as he drives around town in his aromatic van, “I’m here for the chickens!” he shouts. Sports and Social is a collection of short stories about the remarkable everyday things that happen when remarkable everyday people get together.

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Book SynopsisFour stories of feathers, blood and eggs. A girl chases a different future on the back of a Suzuki 250. A sibling seeks her brother, hoping answers will heal. Inside the walls of her speaking house, a 'kept' wife tries to learn to be content with her identity. A young woman falls in love with a Goose and grows wings. These are journeys fuelled by love, loss and self-discovery, in which characters must fight or take flight. Stories by Helen Kennedy, Katie Hale, Louise Finnigan and Jacqueline Ward.Trade Review"An evocative and unflinching story which shines a light on fractured families, love, and regret, all seeped in Manchester's past, present and uncertain future. Incredibly moving and beautifully written, I loved it." - Gaynor Jones on 'The People's History Museum is Closed by Helen Kennedy.; "Ivy Wife is delicately spare, beautifully written and hauntingly melancholic tale about female identity in the face of a shapeless loss, that will linger long after the last line." - Lara Williams, Author of Treats, Supper Club and The Odyssey on 'Ivy Wife' by Louise Finnigan

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Book SynopsisDelve into a world of change and reinvention. Where relationships are as delicate as turtle eggs, and just as easily smashed. This poignant short story collection explores the pivotal moments that transform our lives. Jenny, whose life is defined by small disasters, discovers a bigger, more generous version of herself. A traveller girl might just win her race and alter her life's course. A widow, cut off in a riverside backwater, opens her heart to a stranger. In this captivating collection by award-winning writer, Alice Fowler, readers will be moved by the raw vulnerability of human connection, and the resilience that allows us to grow and thrive in the face of hardship. In change, Fowler's characters find the ability to be truly free.Trade Review"Poignant and perfectly paced, these lovely stories lean towards happy outcomes, compassionate compromises, unexpectedly rewarding friendships and good deeds." - Eithen Farry, The Daily Mail, UK. "These are precious things: stories written with delicacy and heart. Chance meetings and significant moments are rendered precisely and to such moving effect, in this deeply skilful and wise collection." - Wendy Erskine; "A wonderful, flawless and fantastic collection. The one book you MUST buy this year if you want to read a masterclass of affecting writing." - Linda Hill's Book Bag; "Alice Fowler's collection of short stories capture precise and intimate moments of being. Caught out by sudden and capricious turns in emotion, Fowler asks us to observe the whimsical, often callow, responses humans make as they declare who they are in the face of grievance and loss: humans preparing to start again. Fowler's spare and modest style underscores a particular sensitivity to the relationship between individuals and their natural environment; the way in which green spaces and forms of botanical and organic life can alleviate and disperse negative emotion, entangled, unresolved habits of mind." - Sally Bayley; "Fowler has weaved a collection of stories out of fine, tender threads. Each one vibrates with her compassionate observation of life in its multitudinous forms." - Vanessa Onwuemezi; "These elegant, atmospheric short stories are filled with passion, renewal and movement. Each has a certain quiet strength all of its own, drawing us into rich histories and dramatic moments of change." - Imogen Robertson

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Book SynopsisAn angry spat in a Cornish pub haunts two men, an activist and a politician, across decades, leading them onto an iceberg with a ravenous polar bear as their sole company. A heart-pounding tale of enduring love and tragedy against the backdrop of climate catastrophe.

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Book SynopsisIn a town full of secrets the truth must be uncovered before it's buried forever. When a police detective is found murdered in the town of Wakestead, all clues point to local woman Amma Reynolds. Amma has a clear motive. She hates the police for failing to properly investigate her brother's death, which was written off as an accidental drowning. Amma has always believed her brother was murdered. Could she have killed DI Mark Stormont in revenge?Former detective and private investigator Erin Crane is hired to find out. As she digs deeper, Erin realises that first she needs to uncover why Amma's brother turned up dead in a river all those years ago. Even if it means tearing her friendship with DI Lewis Jennings apart. Because there are some secrets the Wakestead police force would rather stay buriedPraise for previous novel The Blame;'Searingly topical' The Telegraph on The Blame'Shocking' Heat on The Blame

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Book SynopsisA gripping story of a young woman growing up in the harsh setting of a Nevada ranch in the 1940s. No More Giants combines a deep love for the land with a bracingly honest view of family conflicts and the loss of dreams. Jenny struggles to survive and escape from the frustrations and hatred of her parents. Ignored when first published, No More Giants is now recognized as a classic work about women in the American West.

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Book SynopsisA by turns humorous, touching and harrowing story concerning Yu-Jie, a Social Media Manager for a local MP facing a PR disaster in the midst of a wave of social outrage stirred up by a troubling crime.

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Book SynopsisPascal implants his eye with a green lens that promises to open a Virtual Reality world. While he waits for it to kick in, his critical ex-boyfriend/editor, a ramshackle novel about Goddesses, and the first Covid-19 lockdown make the real world an awkward and unpleasant place to be.

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Book Synopsis"His stories shimmer like revelations – the clarity, mystery, beauty, depth, and sheer, thrilling peculiarity of ordinary life when the veil lifts. They’re exhilarating to read, just as exhilarating to re-read." —Deborah EisenbergChildhood does not last long in the Argentine mountains of Córdoba, and adult lives fall apart quickly. In disarming, darkly humorous stories, Federico Falco explores themes of obsessive love, romantic attachment and the strategies we must find to cope with death and painful longing.In the middle of a blizzard a widow watches the ruin of her late-husband’s garden, until suddenly she sees a woman running naked in the falling snow. After telling her parents she is abandoning her Christian faith, a girl becomes infatuated with a Mormon missionary who reminds her of a boy killed in her village years before. When his family’s home is lost, a father desperately offers his daughter’s hand in marriage to anyone who will take them in. And a town’s mayor tries to fulfill his father’s dying wish – to design the perfect cemetery.Trade Review"The quiet assurance with which Falco addresses rural environments represents a departure recalling the perspectives of writers from the northern hemisphere such as Denis Johnson, Knut Hamsun or Tobias Wolff." —The Times Literary Supplement"Expansive and ingeniously crafted—an unforgettable collection." —Kirkus, starred review"Falco proves himself as a fine storyteller." —Publishers Weekly"These rich and authentic portraits of Argentinian lives are well worth seeking out...You could imagine Alastair McLeod or John McGahern paying homage. (5 stars)" —RTÉ"Moving, morbid, and humorous at the same time." —LA Review of Books"Falco is a master of the short story."" —Martin MacInnes , author of INFINITE GROUND and GATHERING EVIDENCE"His stories shimmer like revelations – the clarity, mystery, beauty, depth, and sheer, thrilling peculiarity of ordinary life when the veil lifts. They’re exhilarating to read, just as exhilarating to re-read."" —Deborah Eisenberg , author of YOUR DUCK IS MY DUCK"Each powerful story captivates and I cannot recommend this collection enough." —Morning Star"When people praise Chekhov, stories like this are what they're thinking of." —James Crossley, Madison Books"Croft’s translations of the stories in A Perfect Cemetery are loyal to the profound beauty, rootedness, and longing they portray." —World Literature Today"At long last, Argentine author Federico Falco finally has a full-length work in translation. A Perfect Cemetery is a 2016 collection of five stories, several of which are much longer than traditional short stories (thankfully so). With confident prose, storytelling verve, and remarkable consideration for both character and landscape, Falco writes impressively well. Though plights of fancy embroil each of Falco’s characters, they are conveyed with a compassion and authenticity that make them seem utterly lifelike." —Jeremy Garber, Powell's Bookshop"Every word and sentence, including those of Croft’s sincere and illuminating note that concludes the volume, should be savored, consumed in a rush only during those moments when you’re flying down the summer streets with Silvi on her bicycle as she searches for the boy she believes she loves." —On the Seawall"As so often in this compelling collection, the stories only open out once you finish them." —David's Book World"The succinctness of the plotlines in these stories is inversely proportional to their vast narrative expanse, to everything the writing is able to carve out between the sharply curtailed dialogues and all that simmers underneath." —La Nación"Perfectly honed... [Falco’s] skill is apparent in the originality of these plots, the economy and naturalness of the characters’ conversations, and in the meticulous observation of a gesture that may encapsulate whole central motifs" —Ñ Magazine

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Book SynopsisSet from 1954 until present times in Cornwall and London, the story begins with seven-year-old Sarah Hodges, a mixed-race child and her loving parents. Music, particularly jazz is a major part of their family, a backdrop to her Cornish childhood and her adult life in London. She considers how to navigate her way as an outsider throughout. A major life event, together with people she meets helps her to reflect upon her own identity.Trade Review‘Themes of race and identity are explored in rural and urban environments, and found to be problematic in both. Growing up and becoming aware of these issues, coupled with oppressive gender attitudes she encounters, Sarah’s innocence seems to be gradually eroded. And yet, despite Sarah’s life struggles, there is a sense of joy, and a positivity, that flows throughout her life’s narrative. Grounded and anchored by family and friends, our protagonist finds delight and comfort in the simple things - shared meals, music and companionship. This marks Anna’s drama out from others that might deal with such crucial subjects in a less optimistic way. Above all, there is hope.’ David Brett, The Word Bookshop, London; ‘I Hear a Melody gives an insightful and rich perspective into how it feels to be a child growing up within two cultures as she navigates her own identity in Britain.’ Oluwatoyin Odunsi, Creative Producer and Head of Learning and Participation, Brixton House, London; ‘unique, memorable, and brilliant storytelling.’ Lorna Wells, playwright, writer and lyricist

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Book SynopsisWillard, his mother and his girlfriend Nyla have spent their entire lives in an endless journey where daily survival is dictated by the ultimate imperative: obey the rules, or you will lose your place in the Line. Everything changes the day Willard s mother dies and he finds an incomprehensible book hidden among her few belongings...Trade Review'An enthralling work of high imagination and storytelling flair.' - Donal Ryan 'Line is an extraordinary novel – gripping, unsettling, brilliant.' - Roddy Doyle 'A powerful, discomfiting fable of uncertainty and failure, poetically crafted, politically pointed, a Ballardian take on the near-now that shows us how fleeting our idea of absoluteness really is.' - June Caldwell 'Line is a modern parable of the most ambitious kind. A Grapes of Wrath for the age of digital capitalism.' - Rónán Hession 'Beautifully written, terrifyingly intelligent, shot through with poetry, political nous and a darkly comic sensibility. Queuing up for a loaf of sourdough will never feel quite the same again.' - Hilary Fannin 'Sharply funny and astute.' - Sarah Moss, Irish Times 'Reads like a lost pulp fiction classic.' - The Times 'A dystopian tale worth queuing up for... Bourke's world-building is epic.' - Independent 'Groundbreaking speculative fiction.' - Doug Johnstone, Big Issue

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Book SynopsisDaring, witty, and strange, the twelve stories in Large Animals confront what it means to have a body. Jess Arndt's often-unnamed narrators battle with inhabiting a form that makes them feel both deeply uncomfortable and detached, constantly challenging the limits of gender and reality as they try to connect with other people and with themselves. These are stories that rebel against accepted ideas of human identity and present a new normal that is as ambiguous as it is messy. In 'Moon Colonies' the narrator's disconnect with their body leads them on a masochistic gambling spree. In 'Jeff', Lily Tomlin mistakes Jess for Jeff, triggering a hilarious and unhinged identity crisis. And in 'Contrails', a character calls each of their ex lovers the night before surgery, confronting a gut-twisting fear of becoming non-existent. Soupy, visceral, and often disconcerting, Large Animals sets a new standard for language, challenging our concepts of gender and body in a way that feels radical, insightful, and incredibly relevant.Trade Review"...joins in with the classics of loaded, outlaw literature... this is an electric debut." Maggie Nelson; "Everything in Jess Arndt's Large Animals veers towards the supernatural. Everything is strangely bodily and shape-shifting. Hugely original, this debut is wild." - Isabel Waidner; "Jess Arndt has crafted a queer uncanny, an eerily recognizable landscape of dark magic and darker humor where the instability of bodies, desire, relationships, and the self take on a supernatural dimension. A tremendously exciting collection." - Michelle Tea; "Jess Arndt is like a queer Kafka''- Ingrid Contreras, New York Times editor's choice author of Fruit of the Drunken Tree. “Each time I pick up a book, this is the voice I’m hoping to hear. Honest, agitating, queer, visionary. Arndt refuses binaries, haunting the space between. The pleasure of Large Animals is in the bite.” - Justin Torres, author of We the Animals "Strange, smart, and probing... an important voice on timely questions of the body politic." - Elle “Arndt’s vivid, rollicking stories represent a new kind of American outlaw literature, of transgression and nonconformity and queerness and heart, all told in a propulsive, original voice.” - Literary Hub “Metamorphosis―of time, of space, of character―is exposed in every playful sentence of Large Animals. Language will not be kept in its form. Life, poetry, gender are always in the process of transformation, and this fundamental condition is at the heart of Jess Arndt’s stories. Large Animals is a strange and beautiful must-read.” - Dorthe Nors, author of Karate Chop and So Much for That Winter "Jess Arndt’s writing is so strange and imaginative that it provides release from the real world." - The Cut "Arndt tells stories that resemble handfuls of ribbons―vibrant, overlapping, tangled, seemingly more middles than beginnings and endings. . . . Arndt’s keen, wild stories are truly original, and readers will hope for more." - Booklist "Arndt’s short stories are delicious flights of fancy, or obsession, or fertile curiosity―or, more accurately, some beguiling combination of all three...This is a playful and provocative collection, full of sly, deft turns of phrase and striking imagery." - Publishers Weekly “[A] bold new literary voice, borderless and brave.” - O, The Oprah Magazine "Reading Arndt is like walking toward a shimmering desert mirage and being met with a cloud of acid instead of an oasis of cool water… A deeply transgressive, riveting shot out of the gate. Arndt is one to watch." - Kirkus Reviews

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Book SynopsisIt's 1992 in Portland, Oregon. Fifteen-year-old Julie Winter moves through her days as if underwater - watching skaters through the constant rain, detached from her best friend's crushes, listening to the same B-side REM song on repeat. The rest of the world is caught up in the AIDS crisis, the war in Yugoslavia, and grunge. But to Julie it's all background. No one at home talks about her older brother, a once-champion swimmer who could be living in Berlin, or could be anywhere. And although she spends her time searching for pictures of him in the pages of Swimmer's World magazine, she'd never considered swimming herself. Until Alexis, captain of the swimming team, tries to recruit her. What starts as a flirtation and an infatuation becomes a chance to join in with the world, find out what really happened to her brother, or finally let him go. Yearning, stifled, and sharp, Dryland is an anti-coming out novel that captures gauzy queer exploration at its quietest and its most loud.Trade Review"Be still my gay grunge heart" - Beth Ditto “Sara Jaffe’s Dryland is the perfect indie-rock love song, an anthem for lonely 90s queer kids—a little melancholy, a little surly, a little dirty." - Andrea Lawlor, Paul Takes the Form of a Mortal Girl "Remarkable. It's realism, but its realism brushes ever so deftly against the allegorical, making the novel shimmer, part diary, part dream" - Maggie Nelson, The Argonauts "A brilliant, beautiful, and evocative first novel, full of historical and experiential details that I had never quite articulated to myself and was so grateful and happy to find written down. Sara Jaffe is a treasure." - Elif Batuman, The Idiot "A gorgeous, layered, meticulous, clamoring, beating heart of a thing." - Sara Marcus, Girls to the Front "Moving sideways with its weight of secrets, this novel never strikes a false note"- Kirkus

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