-what are you like-

The new edition of my DEBUT short story collection – what are you like- is now out with RedSquirrel Press!

We had to do a big new print run because the book went and WON the 2020 EDGE HILL PRIZE!

The JUDGE’S VERDICT: ‘…absolutely packed with quietly brilliant writing and with humanity. And which, in its variety, is almost like a showcase of all of the things that short fiction can be. It expands the idea of what a short story can be, and of what a collection of short stories can be, and in a very exciting and fascinating way. It’s a wonderful book.’      —David Szalay, award-winning novelist and judge of the Edge Hill University Short Story Prize

CLICK here  to go to the publisher’s website where you can buy the book, P&P free

I’m *particularly thrilled* about this little book because these stories are more me than anything else I’ve done, plus because the book itself is such a beautiful object. It’s extra special that my son Nicolai Sclater  (@OrnamentalConifer) did the artwork for the cover, and that the book design was done by my friend Gerry Cambridge

The BLURB:

“Shelley Day’s stories explore what we can’t quite grasp. They celebrate the uncertainties of language. The settings here are exquisitely imagined no-man’s-lands- at once strange yet oddly familiar. Here are worlds where the improbable becomes possible: a mother finds herself living on a library shelf, a diner finds words sliding from his menu into nothingness, a psychiatrist cracks up in front of his patient, and there’s a stain on the wall that won’t stop spreading. These extraordinary stories take us to the psychological hinterlands that make us who we are.”

‘These are real short stories from a real writer: full of the telling detail, the betraying detail, the immaculately-rendered thought… The title work alone is a visceral, unforgettable, punch-drunk joy. Read this book.’  A L Kennedy, award-winning novelist and short story writer.

‘Lucid, vivid, quirky, these interlinking stories teem with the stuff of life – always making the reader ask questions about family, loss, love – what is said, and what is not. The voices in this tender collection come bristling to life, fizzing and full. Fabulous.’  Jackie Kay, poet, novelist, short story writer, and Scotland’s Makar

 ‘This coruscating collection beautifully showcases Shelley Day’s twisting and turning talent. In one volume, we are immersed repeatedly into her magical worlds, emerging reeling yet ready for the next dip.’  Angela Jackson, award-winning novelist and script writer.

 

Me, reading at the Edinburgh launch at the Scottish Poetry Library. My, it was chilly in there that day.

 

You know how, at the end of a year, Facebook does a video-thing that brings various bits of your life together onto the screen? Well, I never usually pay any attention to those cos, let’s face it, we don’t always post on FB about the most meaningful things that have happened to us – esp. if they’re painful experiences, they tend to stay very hidden and at most only hinted at. FB tends instead to be a space where we manufacture the images and stories about ourselves and our lives that we want to project onto the world. Anyhow. You know all that. But this year, FB put me together a thing and it included an image of a massive great big wall painted with the cover image from my new book. I had to take a screen shot of that, and it’s copied and pasted below! I don’t know if it’s a calculated thing on the part of FB – could be, given what we now know about the sophistications of their probings and sharings – but that cover was designed by my son Nico (@OrnamentalConifer) who’s a graphic artist in California, and he regularly paints walls as part of his job … Anyway, I did make me wonder …

On 1st January 2019, my day was made when one of my reviewers Annie Doyle totally got what I was trying to do with my book! I’m so grateful when readers like my work, and even more so when they share their thoughts with others. It’s often said – and I think it’s true – that what really makes a book is when individual readers read it and like it and tell their mates and that’s the best way, the very best way, for word to get around. So thank you Annie! And all good things to you for 2019!

Now here’s me reading at the Paris launch, March 2019: 

Thank you Phyllis Cohen for inviting me to Berkeley Books of Paris, rue Casimir Delavigne 75006

My besties from Cambridge, England, came for the ride! Good times were had.