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Last Day on Earth

Eric Puchner

‘Despite my efforts at denial the new reality of our lives was beginning to sink in.’

A Play on Mothering

David Rakoff

‘His hands are a jewel box and I lean forward and peer in.’

First Love

Gwendoline Riley

‘It must be a dreadful cross: this hot desire to join in with people who don’t want you.’

The Maenad

Eliza Robertson

‘She feels the wildness enter her and keeps her eyes shut.’ New fiction from Eliza Robertson.

Mr Salary

Sally Rooney

‘My love for him felt so total and so annihilating that it was often impossible for me to see him clearly at all.’

Idioglossia

Eimear Ryan

‘There is no face more familiar than one’s own.’

All We Shall Know

Donal Ryan

‘Thoughts sharpen themselves on the flints of one another and pierce me like a knife in my middle, sunk deep and twisted around.’

Eel

Stefanie Seddon

‘The eel I saw was the one lying deep and quiet and alone in his coppery pool in the bush.’ 2016 Commonwealth Short Story Prize – regional winner for Europe and Canada.

Then

Mark Slouka

‘It was in January, I think. That weekend, more than any other, the thought of her leaving seemed impossible.’

Cat

Katy Simpson Smith

‘I didn’t dream because I had no memories.’

The Conveyor Belt

Louise Stern

‘Tall men that looked like insects crept out of cracks in the stones.’

Memoirs of a Polar Bear

Yoko Tawada

‘I was perfectly content with my new life until I began to write my autobiography.’

What’s Not There Can’t Hurt You

Sara Taylor

‘A shadow gained body and grew, looming over the bed, and he caught the impression of long teeth and many limbs, smelled something claylike and vegetal.’

Her Boy

Mika Taylor

‘She is the first dolphin mother, Peter her boy genius.’