Introduction

Compression is both a hindrance and an opportunity: a short story is by definition not afforded the same expansiveness as a novel, but it develops different proportions to fit the space it has. It can be more grotesque, adopt a voice which over a longer span might become unbearable, show us only a sliver of a complex world with near-unfathomable rules. Almost anything can be tolerated for a little while. What I find wonderful about short stories is their intensity, their strangeness, and for me the best stories take advantage of these possibilities. One looks up 10, 20, 30 pages later jolted out of all complacency. I’m also particularly interested in what brevity does to narrative. Perhaps unfashionably, narrative is important to me and watching it play out in miniature produces distortions and elisions which I find enjoyable, as I am forced to use my own suspicions to make sense of what I wasn’t told. All fiction makes us complicit in co-creating characters and stories in our minds through reading characters on a page, but to become complicit in creating something utterly strange in one feverish go can be delightfully disorientating. The stories below span the deep past to the space-faring future but what unites them for me is their ability to revel in the uncanny, their commitment to a unique emotional flavour, their self-assurance. If you seek them out, I hope you enjoy them as much as I do.