The Josephs and Other Stories (Thumbprint Pocket Book) 2024 by Polly Tuckett NEUF

A quiet disturbance lies at the heart of these stories in Polly Tucketts debut collection, shadowing our protagonists as they live through the complexities of the modern world. Renfrew finds love and loss while restoring a house in Italy as the world around him sinks into a glorious pageant of decline and decay, Edith battles her demons and isolation in the Alpen snows, and the cold and passionless hotelier Hortensia filters the world through her love for her cat and the tragedy of her brothers suicide.

...They kept him in a silver drawer, like lockers at the gym. They pulled him out and she identified him. That had been that. She couldnt cry, not then and not since. She was a monster, voilà tout.

Polly Tuckett speaks with a fresh, contemporary voice steeped in the literary traditions of Flaubert, Maupassant and Proust. She is a Leicester-based writer of short fiction and poetry and her work has appeared in many print and online journals, including Areté and Brittle Star. Her stories have been shortlisted for the Bridport and Fish prizes. She is currently working on a cycle of character-themed poems in French.