Search results for ""Author Irenosen Okojie""

"Precise and illuminating." - Bernardine Evaristo OBE.Shortlisted for the Edge Hill Short Story Prize, the Saboteur Awards, the Shirley Jackson Award and the Jhalak Prize.Lovelorn aliens abduct innocent coffee shop waitresses. Ghosts of errant Londoners haunt the Underground, caught between here and the hereafter. Brave young women seek erotic empowerment... at their own peril.These are the worlds of Speak Gigantular, the startling debut short story collection from acclaimed author Irenosen Okojie MBE. Understated in her humour and razor-sharp in her observations of humankind, Okojie's eclectic anthology offers an unflinching gaze into the darkest corners of the human experience.Sexy, serious, and often downright disturbing, this brilliant debut collection sizzles with originality."A work of rare confidence, luminous imagery and full of hidden sharp edges." - Nina Allan, winner of the Grand Prix de l'Imaginaire."Irenosen Okojie's Speak Gigantular should, if there is any literary justice, place her in a circle with writers like Shirley Jackson, Margaret Atwood, and Angela Carter." - New Orleans Review.

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Shortlisted for the Edge Hill Short Story Prize, the Saboteur Awards, the Shirley Jackson Award and the Jhalak Prize. A startling debut short story collection from the award-winning author of Butterfly Fish. Okojie's collection of stories are captivating, erotic, enigmatic and disturbing. Irenosen Okojie's gift is in her understated humour, her light touch, her razor-sharp assessment of the best and worst of humankind, and her unflinching gaze into the darkest corners of the human experience. Okojie has created a world with errant Londoners caught between here and the hereafter, where insensitive men cheat on their mistresses and can only muster enough interest to fall for one- dimensional poster girls and where brave young women attempt to be erotically empowered at their own peril. Sexy, serious and at times downright disturbing, this brilliant debut collection sizzles with originality.

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Betty Trask Award winner 2016. A stunning debut from the author of Speak Gigantular.A fragile outsider living in London, Joy struggles to pull the threads of her life back together after her mother's sudden death. Emptiness consumes her and, needing to fill the gaps of her loss, she finds she is drawn to a unique artefact inherited from her mother - a warrior's head cast in brass that belonged to a king in eighteenth century Benin, Nigeria.Joy is haunted by a beautiful young woman who appears in her photographs, familiar yet beguilingly distinct, the woman trails her wherever she goes. Joy begins to dream of a different time, a different place. She feels an inexplicable pull towards this mysterious female, and a past revealing itself through clues is scattered in her path. As family secrets come to light, she unearths the ties between her mother, grandfather, the wife of the king, a fearsome warrior, and the brass head's pivotal connection to them all.Haunting and compelling, Butterfly Fish is a richly told story of love and hope; of family secrets, power, political upheaval, loss and coming undone.'a novel of epic proportions... I fully expect to see Butterfly Fish on many an award nomination list.' Yvvette Edwards'A stunningly well-written book, juggling different timescales with great skill. Benin itself is vividly imagined in a historical narrative that runs in parallel with the contemporary London one. It is a wonderful novel." Simon Brett OBE'A wonderful, richly drawn novel, cleverly juxtaposing scenes from everyday London with African folklore and mysticism.' Joanne Harris

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I loved it. Vivid, brutal, moving and tender. This is heartfelt and immersive. Joanne HarrisCurandera is the mesmerising by-product of Okojie''s extraordinary imagination and writing that is mindbogglingly glorious. Yvvette EdwardsIn the mountainous town of Gethsemane, 17th-century Cape Verde, a mysterious woman''s arrival sparks a series of strange events that will leave the town''s inhabitants changed: men sporadically blind in the afternoons, children disappearing and reappearing without warning and infertile women pregnant with the memories of past births.In present-day London, a quartet are brought together by their fascination with ritual, miracles and a life beyond the mundane. Botanist Therese lives with Azacca, a soulful Haitian musician, Peruvian drifter Emilien, who is haunted by the past, and adventurous Finn, who is increasingly drawn to living life on the edge.With the past and present beginning to blur into one,

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'Okojie is a dazzlingly wild, bold and imaginative writer who tells stories with captivating originality and intense drama' Bernardine Evaristo 'Dazzling . . . A feast for the senses' Diana EvansWinner of the AKO Cain Prize____________In this collection of short stories, offbeat characters are caught up in extraordinary situations that test the boundaries of reality . . . A love-hungry goddess of the sea arrives on an island inhabited by eunuchs. A girl from Martinique moonlights as a Grace Jones impersonator. Dimension-hopping monks sworn to silence must face a bloody reckoning.And a homeless man goes right back, to the very beginning, through a gap in time. Nudibranch is a dark and seductive foray into the surreal.____________PRAISE FOR IRENOSEN OKOJIE 'One of the most original and innovative writers to emerge in many a year'ALEX WHEATLE MBE'Okojie has a sharp eye for the twisting stories of the city, and a turn of phrase that switches from elegance to brutality in a single line'STELLA DUFFY

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An artist, a cop, a cowboy, several fly fishermen and even a reluctant romance novelist inhabit these revealing and often hilarious stories. An old man ends up in a high-speed chase with the cops after stealing the car that blocks the garbage bin at his apartment building. A stranger gets a job at a sandwich shop and fixes everything in sight: a manual mustard dispenser, a mouthful of crooked teeth, thirty-two parking tickets and a sexual identity problem. Everett skewers race, class, identity, surrealism and much more in this exceptional work. Published for the first time in the UK, this is truly a masterful short story collection from a genius of American storytelling. The book is introduced by critically acclaimed British author, Irenosen Okojie.

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