Perfect
By Sally Emerson
Category Short Stories, Supernatural, Thriller, Literary Fiction
About Perfect
In this wondrous collection of short stories, bestselling
author Sally Emerson introduces the eerie and supernatural into her keen-eyed portraits of everyday
life. A clerk working in a public register office begins
to receive death certificates dated in the future, but
can she alter fate and save their victims? A woman
unable to have children discovers a way of cloning her husband, but is their cloned son destined to repeat the mistakes of his father? A suburban mother is prescribed a health supplement with rather amorous side-effects; can she resist its sway and keep her hands off her neighbours?
Emerson’s beguiling tales of quotidian life invaded by forces beyond our control are both uncanny and charming, and ultimately uplifting as she celebrates
reality and unreality in its many forms. Fantastical, humorous and unfailingly honest in its depiction of humanity, Perfect will stay with the reader long after
they leave the magic of its pages.
Published: June 2022 Pages: 264 ISBN: 978-1-73986-450-7
Size: 5’’ x 8’’ / 12.7cm x20cm Price: £8.99 Format: Paperback
Available from Amazon, Barnes & Noble, Books A Million, Bookshop.org, Waterstones and all good book sellers
About Sally Emerson
Sally Emerson is the award-winning author of novels including Heat, Separation and Second Sight and an anthologist of poetry and prose. She is a Travel Writer for The Sunday Times and previously was editor of the literary magazine Books and Bookmen. She began her career there as an editorial assistant in a basement in London’s Victoria Street. At Oxford she edited Isis and continued her reviewing work and wrote for The Times. She won prizes including a Catherine Pakenham Award, the Vogue Talent Contest and the Radio Times Young Journalist of the Year.
Praise for Sally Emerson
‘Really creepy and good. Hard-edged suspense and pared down prose, like a feminist Roald Dahl.’ Amanda Craig, Author
‘So exquisitely drawn, Sally Emerson’s stories are full of gripping twists. They’re uncanny, and quite unlike anything else you’ll read. Jane Thynne, Author
“An unmissable spring book. This wonderous collection of short stories from best-selling author Sally Emerson injects just the right dose of the supernatural into the everyday. In one, a public registrar receives death certificates dated in the future, and in another, an infertile couple discover a way to clone themselves.’ Tatler Magazine
‘Sally Emerson’s wonderful stories begin in calmly bourgeois settings, but soon reveal Gothic shadows of menace and desire. Characters give birth to clones or foresee the fates of strangers. In serene houses and tranquil gardens, a boy and girl find themselves trapped in a Brothers Grimm fairy tale, and a medievalist is haunted by figures from Renaissance artworks. Love, sex and stormy weather threaten or imprison the unwary.’ John Walsh, Author
Emerson’s writing is at times quite profound. One protagonist, a grandmother, is so happy with her lot that “death held no dominion anymore”. Another is a lecturer in Homeric epic, and Emerson quotes extensively from the Iliad to illustrate the caprice of divine interference in the mortal world. The plotlines are consistently compelling and, despite the sorcery, the characters and their motivations remain at all times plausible, however implausible the situations. What really elevates these stories is Sally Emerson’s ability, in concise, flowing and polished prose, to conjure up the pains and passions of love, whether waning or blooming. Love is the common thread here – sometimes found, sometimes lost, ever attendant.
