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Honk Honk to Udvada

Chandrahas Choudhury

‘Oh Uncle, it’s such a historical day,’ said Zahra. ‘The eight hundredth anniversary of our arrival in India after we faced so much persecution in Iran, and we’re going to such a big bash, and all you can think about is emus. What will Dr Billimoria think of our family?’

The Wrong Square

Neel Mukherjee

‘Something as fundamental to intelligence as counting was eluding him.’

Poor Lucky Kolyvanova

Ludmila Ulitskaya

‘The red girls’ school stood opposite a grey boys’ school, built five years after it as if to proclaim the rational symmetry of the world.’

Dreamed in Stone

Jon Fosse

‘You were a chasm that cracked and turned into stones, and then the stones lay there, beautifully laid, in a wall.’

To Detroit

Benjamin Markovits

‘Things started going wrong at my ten-year college reunion – or I guess I mean that I realized how wrong they had gone.’

Othello Sucks

Upamanyu Chatterjee

Younger Daughter’s declaration that ‘Othello sucks’ prompts a conflicted response from Father.

Sticky Fingers

Arun Kolatkar

‘Selecting the right kind of a tomato was crucial for the scam to work.’

Her Lousy Shoes

Tracy O’Neill

‘On good days, he could believe that that was exactly what he appeared to be: pedestrian, a pedestrian, a walker, walking, going places, on the ups, possessing two healthy feet at least.’

Drone

Hari Kunzru

‘Rich men have been building tall on this hill for centuries.’

Every Person’s Little Treasure

Liliana Heker

‘It occurred to Ana that this was a woman who often left things hanging.’

Exit Strategy

Ivan Vladislavić

‘The corporate storyteller is having a bad day.’

Shoes

Anjali Joseph

‘Like scraps of leather, oddly shaped, things from life, people and sayings and objects, found themselves spliced together.’

Old-Age Rage

Daisy Jacobs

‘He’s not himself’, Mum says in the kitchen. Well, who is he then? Is he 40 per cent of his young self? Ten? Do I still have to love him as much as ever, this 90 per cent stranger?

Enzo Ponza

Joanna Walsh

‘I was still quite a small girl when I decided to kidnap Enzo Ponza.’