If there’s ever a part of human endeavour where people work extremely hard, achieve an extraordinary amount, but, in the main, unless there’s a miracle (and we all know they’re …
Virtual Baby (Libbie Chellew)
There was a bottle half-full with formula on the floor in front of the Vulcan, a pile of unfolded washing on the other end of the couch and a full …
September on Gasworks Bridge (Todd Turner)
It has been a long day to say the least. Wind, rain, shadows, stone. So I take a walk. Standing on Gasworks Bridge, I watch the river run east, run …
Riding the Rails of the New Weird: China Mieville’s Railsea
Review by Robert Goodman You might have to track Railsea down in the Young Adult section of the bookshop – do not be fooled. It just means someone is being …
The Exclusivity of Cupcakes: How I Cooked My Way through Heartbreak (Erin Holmwood)
Kissing don’t last: cookery do — George Meredith On the day Max broke my heart, I baked a cake. While I greased and lined the spring-form cake pan I thought to …
PROVOKING UNEASE: an interview with Omar Musa
Omar Musa is one of those rare writers who, by hook or by crook, manages to carve a path as a poet and performer and rely on little else. Verity …
Leaving My Place on the River (Todd Turner)
Standing at the window, looking out onto the river for the last time, I turn my thoughts to a field where I stood as a child. The wind is blowing. …
Dancers in Violet (Tristan Foster)
First time I left her home, I looked up and a stiff fruit-bat was dangling from the electrical wire. Next time I left her home, the bat was in the …
Wit and Challenge and Play: Suniti Namjoshi’s The Fabulous Feminist
Review by Robyn Cadwallader A blue donkey, a lesbian cow, a saint who meets Grendel and his mother, a one-eyed monkey, an oyster child — they all tell their arresting …
THE SYSTEMIC AND THE INSIDIOUS: gender (in)equality at Verity La
If there is one part of human life that is completely and utterly unfathomable it’s gender. You would have thought that a 44-year-old resolutely gay man with three degrees under …