Eight years ago in 2017, I was working for a bookshop called Desperate Literature in Madrid and living in a small room in the back of the shop. While I was working there, we started something called the Desperate Literature Short Fiction Prize – a prize that aimed to champion the short form and writers of boundary-pushing work, while also providing a network of opportunities for its writers, including prize money, publication, residency programmes and event opportunities, and consultations with editors and literary agents. Around the same time in London, the Brick Lane Short Story Prize started in a similar spirit, also publishing an annual collection of some amazing writers. This month we have joined forces to publish an anthology that brings together writing from the first five years of both prizes – 22 Fictions: New Writing from Desperate Literature and Brick Lane Bookshop. We hope it will introduce many people to some brilliant writers, while also telling the story of DIY publishing produced by independent bookshops during the last ten years.
Putting together the anthology with my co-editor Kate Ellis has made me think a lot about what I like to read and why. With the prize, I would always push for pieces that attempted something different, whether in creating their own artistic form, or in doing something with narrative that made me reframe my viewpoint as a reader. From 19th century Russia to the Streatham Ice Rink, here are some pieces that had that kind of effect on me.
A Personal Anthology 