Product Description
Catherine Smith is an award-winning poet whose books The Butcher’s Hands and Lip were both shortlisted for the prestigious Forward Prize. The stories in The Biting Point, her long-awaited first prose collection, are unpredictable, edgy and often surprisingly funny, charting the dark territory underlying seemingly ordinary lives. They explore the lies we tell each other, and ourselves, with unsettling results.
A woman falls apart as she prepares for her secret lover’s funeral… A child builds a magical sandcastle as her parents’ marriage crumbles… A young woman confesses to her part in a catastrophically cruel childhood stunt… A love-struck teenager’s driving lesson reveals a devastating gap between fantasy and reality…
Catherine Smith’s writing is always pin-sharp, unsentimental and insightful. Her stories delight in human possibility and complexity.
A woman falls apart as she prepares for her secret lover’s funeral… A child builds a magical sandcastle as her parents’ marriage crumbles… A young woman confesses to her part in a catastrophically cruel childhood stunt… A love-struck teenager’s driving lesson reveals a devastating gap between fantasy and reality…
Catherine Smith’s writing is always pin-sharp, unsentimental and insightful. Her stories delight in human possibility and complexity.
Synopsis
These short stories explore the gaps between what's said and what's thought - between public and private spaces, the inner and outer lives of characters at a point of crisis or transition. Secrets, lies, dreams and desires drive characters to inhabit new territories. They're tough, edgy, darkly humorous tales of contemporary lives struggling with eternal dilemmas. "The Biting Point" is Catherine's debut collection of short stories.
