Synopsis
In this haunting debut collection, Julia Armfield maps the skin and bones of her characters through their experiences of isolation, obsession, love and revenge.
Teenagers develop ungodly appetites, a city becomes insomniac overnight, and bodies are diligently picked apart to make up better ones. The mundane worlds of schools and sleepy sea-side towns are invaded and transformed, creating a landscape which is constantly shifting to hold on to its inhabitants. Blurring the mythic and the gothic with the everyday, Salt Slow considers characters in motion – turning away, turning back or simply turning into something new entirely.
Winner of The White Review Short Story Prize, Armfield is a writer of sharp, lyrical prose and tilting dark humour. ‘Salt Slow is exemplary. A distinct new gothic, melancholy, powerful and poised,’ says China Miéville, author of The City & The City.
Wickedly clever and darkly comedic, Armfield's stories look at women's bodies and their experiences in society through an eerie, otherworldly lens. For fans of Carmen Maria Machado, Sophie Mackintosh and Megan Hunter.
Details
19 March 2020
9781529012590Reviews
Salt Slow is exemplary. A distinct new gothic, melancholy, powerful and poised.China Miéville, author of The City & The City
Unafraid to venture beyond realism’s limits, Julia Armfield refashions our contemporary existence as an eerie, care-worn dreamworld, taking our quotidian anxieties and desires and handing them back to us empathetically remade . . . Armfield is a significant, exciting talent.Sam Byers, author of Perfidious Albion and judge of The White Review Short Story Prize 2018
This debut collection is both wild and wonderful, packed with mythical transformations that take place in the most ordinary of contemporary settings . . . vivid . . . visceral . . . marvellous.Daily Mail
Reading this collection is the only thing you need to do right now. Reading this collection is the only thing you ever need to do. Armfield is an enormous, gut-wrenching talent.Daisy Johnson, Man Booker Prize shortlisted author of Everything Under
