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E-Friends
Emily Adrian
‘I had also, a week earlier, been fired for trying to sleep with my boss’s husband. I got the idea from a book, or maybe every book.’
New fiction by Emily Adrian.
Acts of Desperation
Megan Nolan
‘I wish I could step inside this memory and steady myself, put a cool reassuring hand on my own and convince myself to wait.’
An excerpt from Megan Nolan’s Acts of Desperation, shortlisted for the Sunday Times Young Writers Award.
Introduction
Sigrid Rausing
‘I don’t think we have quite processed yet what those months of isolation did to us – a time of fear and daily death tolls and also of unprecedented curtailment of our freedom of movement. But there were consolations.’
Editor Sigrid Rausing introduces the issue.
The Hour of the Wolf
Fatima Bhutto
‘Though I have had dogs all my life, Coco is my first real companion.’
Fatima Bhutto on grief.
Pure Colour
Sheila Heti
‘She had never seen that colour before. It was the colour of a father dying.’
An excerpt from Sheila Heti’s forthcoming novel.
In the Heart of the Hall of Mirrors
Chris Dennis
‘If the heart has a great hall then it must also have a dungeon.’
Memoir by Chris Dennis.
Waiting Room
Will Rees
‘A patient must heave their entire body into their mouth.’
Will Rees in search of a diagnosis.
The Physician
Nathan Harris
‘The boy is long dead, of course. Buried outside of town in a pile with the rest of the bodies.’
Historical fiction by Nathan Harris.
The Emperor Concerto
Julie Hecht
‘Upbringing is important, and I’ve never gotten over mine.’
Fiction by Julie Hecht.
what if mary auntie called me on my birthday
Akwaeke Emezi
‘i buy my own selling / spiels, i mean them all, i am so bored’
An Olive Grove in Ends
Moses McKenzie
‘The infamous Hughes family – known to police and hospital staff across the city.’
Fiction set in Bristol by Moses McKenzie.
Our Stratford
The Herak Family & Damian Le Bas
‘The Roma understand that a home doesn’t need axles and wheels to be “Gypsy”, and we look for other signs.’
Damian Le Bas introduces photographs taken by the Herak family.
The Picnic Pavilion
Debbie Urbanski
‘They are wearing dresses. I am not wearing a dress. Another difference is they’re dead and I am not dead.’
Debbie Urbanski on the BRCA1 gene.
a cold white wing
Kate Zambreno
‘I wonder what I sounded like, whether my voice was recognizable as the animal I had been.’
Fiction by Kate Zambreno.
The Starlings of Dunmore Died on the Eleventh of July
Dawn Watson
‘Black was thrown / in all directions.’
Beirut Fragments, 2021
Charif Majdalani
‘We live with the permanent sense of imminent disaster.’
Charif Majdalani on the situation in Beirut. Translated from the French by Ruth Diver.
Tender
Ariana Harwicz
‘Why can’t the heart keep still and why isn’t the brain smooth to the touch.’
An excerpt from Ariana Harwicz’s novel Tender.
Cold Enough for Snow
Jessica Au
‘I wondered how I could feel so at home in a place that was not mine.’
An excerpt from Jessica Au's novel Cold Enough for Snow.
Here Again Now
Okechukwu Nzelu
‘There was a division in his mind: home was Manchester; work was London, LA, Lagos.’ Fiction from Okechukwu Nzelu.
When We Were Birds
Ayanna Lloyd Banwo
‘Some days Darwin can’t work out how long he in the city.’
An excerpt from Ayanna Lloyd Banwo’s debut novel.
She Used to Sing Opera
Imogen Crimp
‘I used to be ashamed of it, though I’m not sure what exactly felt shameful.’
On training to be an opera singer.
Here Comes the Miracle
Anna Beecher
‘They so wanted to be the grown-ups still.’
An excerpt from Anna Beecher’s debut novel, shortlisted for the Sunday Times Young Writer Award 2021.
Two Poems
Yanyi
‘A hotel being where we buy the right to stay still when no place will stay for us.’
Two poems by Yanyi.
Violets
Alex Hyde
‘There was the enamel pail of blood. She couldn’t think what she had done with it.’
An excerpt from Alex Hyde’s debut novel.
The Colony
Audrey Magee
‘Imagine that, said Mairéad. A Frenchman and an Englishman squabbling over our turf.’
A linguist and a painter clash in this excerpt from The Colony by Audrey Magee.
Three Poems
Jana Prikryl
‘I struggled to put this into words as strong as my conviction, so what advice could I give you I said’
Three poems by Jana Prikryl.
In a Jar
Morgan Talty
‘It was a glass jar filled with hair and corn and teeth. The teeth were white with a tint of yellow at the root.’
A story by Morgan Talty.
Nights at the Hotel Splendido
Sam Munson
‘Everybody’s face looks different at night, especially outside. You see their real faces.’
A new story by Sam Munson.
From Another World
Evelina Santangelo
An excerpt from the novel From Another World, translated from the Italian by Ruth Clarke.
Two Poems
Alycia Pirmohamed
‘I encounter the first woman / by encountering my own face in the river. / Two bodies alike, one drenched / in inheritance.’ Two poems by Alycia Pirmohamed
