I’ve only recently discovered Jo Lloyd’s work, but I’m so glad I have. I read her collection, The Earth, Thy Great Exchequer, Ready Lies in a few days earlier this year, moving easily from one story to the next, always hungry to read more. It’s unusual for me to read a short story collection sequentially like that, but I was completely drawn in and didn’t want to stop.
Jo Lloyd’s prose is elegant and often beautiful, and her characters feel deeply relatable to me. This story, which won the BBC National Short Story Competition in 2019, is strikingly original. It’s told from the perspective of villagers who hear about, but never see, the Ingrams, a privileged, but invisible family, who are said to live nearby. Only one woman, Martha, claims to have seen them, and she tells the others, in detail, about their personalities and the way they live.
The villagers’ scepticism is balanced against their growing wish to believe the family are real, and soon they’re intrigued, proud to have this special family nearby. Their children admire the Ingrams and pretend to be them. But as winter arrives and the villagers’ own struggles become more pronounced, their response to the Ingrams tips towards jealousy. While the villagers are hungry and cold, surviving on “husks and air”, the Ingrams are said to be “busy at their sports and pastimes” and to “enjoy jugged hare”.
Lloyd builds a remarkable sense of resentment in the villagers, which is all the stronger for being so frustrating. They can’t see the Ingrams. It’s not even clear whether they actually exist, but the sense of injustice the villagers are left with is very real.
The story feels myth-like and ethereal in some ways, and is set in a bygone era, but the emotions it arouses are entirely recognisable and relevant to the world we live in. I recommend that you read this story, if you haven’t already. It’s an astonishing achievement.
First published in The BBC National Short Story Competition 2021, and collected in The Earth, Thy Great Exchequer, Ready Lies, Swift Press, 2021
