The opening chapter of The Devoted Sister, Livia James’s new novel. Chapter 1 Now The Courtroom From across the hushed, fetid courtroom, the prosecutor, Mr Partington, peers at me over his spectacles, throwing me a look that says, now we have her, a smirk spreading across his pock-marked face. He waits. Is he […]
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A Girl of Slender Means
An extract from Lalya Lloyd’s memoir-cum-biography, A Girl of Slender Means, about the life of the author Tom Stacey, with whom she lived for twelve years at 128 Kensington Church Street (‘128’). He wants to know if the British ambassador has been beheaded yet. A thin rain mists the windscreen as I oblige the old […]
Four poems
Two Truths and a Lie Joni Mitchell doesn’t want to be called confessional She thinks Anne Sexton was a dirty liar Who couldn’t even be honest with her shrink But I don’t think the point of poetry is to be honest And I don’t think the point of life is to shrink I don’t know […]
Blurred Snapshot of Woman with Moon
Blurred Snapshot of Woman with Moon by Solange Rodríguez Pappe Translated by Miriam Tobin Every now and then a guy comes along. He’s not special and you know it, not the kind of guy to stick around. He sits next to you and starts talking. You put up with the spirals of smoke his empty […]
2021 Non-Fiction MA anthology: foreword
Elisa Segrave’s foreword to UEA’s 2021 Non-fiction MA anthology, published by Egg Box and available HERE. In early 1970, a friend and I travelled round America on Greyhound Buses, collecting underground newspapers. Many US towns had at least one. It was an exciting and turbulent time. In Chicago, before visiting the newspaper office of The […]
oh, my better self
An extract from a novel by Alastair Wong, oh, my better self. The pressure outside had dropped; red out now, but quickly becoming sunless. Fog curled everywhere around the tall white buildings, hanging loose off the tops of them, bending all the light around and making details—the subtle gradients between, say, white stone and […]
Virgin
An extract from Louise Pesery’s MA dissertation, Virgin, a TV comedy series. INT. JULIA’S HOME – JULIA’S BATHROOM – DAY EMMA It’s what? Julia is sitting on the edge of the bathtub. She is only wearing her underwears. Emma is facing her, confused. JULIA It’s stuck. EMMA Stuck? JULIA […]
Five poems
Playing Red Dead in Lockdown Thank you, game, for giving me an empty world with so much to do – acres of mountain paths and peaks that my fake horse can trot through; stretching valleys of foxglove, lavender, all wild and made of pixels. Thank you, coders, who crunched eighteen-hour days. I pay tribute […]
Eggshells
A short story. She felt her stomach cramp as the egg began to move downwards. Sunrise leaked through the curtains, shadows blushing. Beside her, Luke’s sleep-sour breath soft on her cheek. She took the lube out of the side desk. She poured a cool, clear dollop onto her palm, pulled down her underwear and […]
2021 Crime Fiction MA anthology: foreword
Elly Griffiths’s foreword to UEA’s 2021 Crime Fiction MA anthology, published by Egg Box and available HERE. ‘Do you feel an uncomfortable heat at the pit of your stomach?’ asks Sergeant Cuff in The Moonstone by Wilkie Collins. ‘I call it the detective fever.’ TS Eliot called The Moonstone, published in 1868, ‘the first, the […]