Susan Barker – författare

'Outstandingly weird and memorable' GUARDIAN'Deliciously creepy' NEW SCIENTIST Fear never dies… Featuring stories from Susan Barker, J K Chukwu, Bridget Collins, Mariana Enríquez, Michel Faber, Lewis Hancox, Emilia Hart, Ainslie Hogarth, Robert Lautner, Adorah Nworah, Irenosen Okojie, Lucy Rose, Lionel Shriver, James Smythe, Lavie Tidhar, Francine Toon, Evie Wyld and Louisa Young. These stories from eighteen master storytellers will curdle your blood, haunt your dreams and redefine terror.From a hungry young woman who is not what she seems, to a boy who has taken his mother's advice a little too seriously; from disfigured girls willing to pay any price to fit in, to an immigrant who cannot escape his tormentor in his new home country; from a new home with a sinister secret, to the discovery that a long-dead parent’s corpse is perfectly preserved decades later; this collection plumbs the depths of the psyche and dredges up some very modern horrors. READERS ARE OBSESSED 'Stunning' 'Well-plotted and horrifying' 'Visceral, creepy, gory… stays in your head long after reading them' 'It's so satisfying to turn to the next story in an anthology like this and be pretty confident it's going to be a banger… bravo' 'Spine-tingling… I was gripped and it kept me up at night as I just wanted to read one more story' 'Often unusual, always unique… a wildly eclectic cornucopia of horror'

'Outstandingly weird and memorable' GUARDIAN'Deliciously creepy' NEW SCIENTIST Fear never dies… Featuring stories from Susan Barker, J K Chukwu, Bridget Collins, Mariana Enríquez, Michel Faber, Lewis Hancox, Emilia Hart, Ainslie Hogarth, Robert Lautner, Adorah Nworah, Irenosen Okojie, Lucy Rose, Lionel Shriver, James Smythe, Lavie Tidhar, Francine Toon, Evie Wyld and Louisa Young. These stories from eighteen master storytellers will curdle your blood, haunt your dreams and redefine terror.From a hungry young woman who is not what she seems, to a boy who has taken his mother's advice a little too seriously; from disfigured girls willing to pay any price to fit in, to an immigrant who cannot escape his tormentor in his new home country; from a new home with a sinister secret, to the discovery that a long-dead parent’s corpse is perfectly preserved decades later; this collection plumbs the depths of the psyche and dredges up some very modern horrors. READERS ARE OBSESSED 'Stunning' 'Well-plotted and horrifying' 'Visceral, creepy, gory… stays in your head long after reading them' 'It's so satisfying to turn to the next story in an anthology like this and be pretty confident it's going to be a banger… bravo' 'Spine-tingling… I was gripped and it kept me up at night as I just wanted to read one more story' 'Often unusual, always unique… a wildly eclectic cornucopia of horror'

'Outstandingly weird and memorable' GUARDIAN'Deliciously creepy' NEW SCIENTIST Fear never dies… Featuring stories from Susan Barker, J K Chukwu, Bridget Collins, Mariana Enríquez, Michel Faber, Lewis Hancox, Emilia Hart, Ainslie Hogarth, Robert Lautner, Adorah Nworah, Irenosen Okojie, Lucy Rose, Lionel Shriver, James Smythe, Lavie Tidhar, Francine Toon, Evie Wyld and Louisa Young. These stories from eighteen master storytellers will curdle your blood, haunt your dreams and redefine terror.From a hungry young woman who is not what she seems, to a boy who has taken his mother's advice a little too seriously; from disfigured girls willing to pay any price to fit in, to an immigrant who cannot escape his tormentor in his new home country; from a new home with a sinister secret, to the discovery that a long-dead parent’s corpse is perfectly preserved decades later; this collection plumbs the depths of the psyche and dredges up some very modern horrors. READERS ARE OBSESSED 'Stunning' 'Well-plotted and horrifying' 'Visceral, creepy, gory… stays in your head long after reading them' 'It's so satisfying to turn to the next story in an anthology like this and be pretty confident it's going to be a banger… bravo' 'Spine-tingling… I was gripped and it kept me up at night as I just wanted to read one more story' 'Often unusual, always unique… a wildly eclectic cornucopia of horror'

The most mesmerising, unsettling novel of 2025, perfect for fans of David Mitchell, Julia Armfield, and Margaret Atwood.'Sinister, mysterious and gorgeously realised' KALIANE BRADLEY, author of The Ministry of Time'Old Soul will sneak into your dreams and haunt you' CLAIRE FULLER, author of Unsettled Ground---The woman never goes by the same name.She never stays in the same place too long.She never ages. She never dies.But those around her do.When two grieving strangers meet by chance in Osaka airport they uncover a disturbing connection. Jake's best friend and Mariko's twin brother each died, 6,000 miles apart, in brutal and unfathomable circumstances.Each encountered a mesmerising, dark-haired woman in the days before their deaths. A woman who came looking for Mariko - and then disappeared.Jake, who has carried his loss and guilt for a decade, finds himself compelled to follow the trail set by Mariko's revelations. It's a trail that weaves across continents and centuries, leading back to the many who have died - in strange and terrifying and eerily similar ways - and those they left behind: bewildered, disbelieved, yet resolutely sure of what they saw.And, at the centre of it all, there is the same beguiling woman. Her name may have changed, but her purpose has never wavered, and as Jake races to discover who, or what she is, she has already made her next choice.But will knowing her secret be enough to stop her?---'Snags the reader in its claw and mesmerizes from page one' Monique Roffey, author of The Mermaid of Black Conch'Like nothing else I've ever read ... The kind of story you tell around a campfire as the lights of civilization begin to flicker out around you' Kristen Roupenian, author of 'Cat Person''Beguiles, terrifies and utterly seduces you ... At once a thriller, a postmodern mystery and an existential horror tale' Megan Abbott, author of El Dorado Drive'Brilliant, horrifying ... So much fun, fantastically tense and wonderful' Evie Wyld, author of The Echoes'Clever, spooky ... Kept me guessing to the end' Chloe Benjamin, author of The Immortalists'A mesmerizing story, brilliantly told' Ian McGuire, author of The North Water'Smart, taut and twisty ... Deftly delivers the chills' Karen Joy Fowler, author of We Are All Completely Beside Ourselves

The most mesmerising, unsettling novel of 2025, perfect for fans of David Mitchell, Julia Armfield, and Margaret Atwood.'Sinister, mysterious and gorgeously realised' KALIANE BRADLEY, author of The Ministry of Time'Super-sophisticated horror' The Times---The woman never goes by the same name.She never stays in the same place too long.She never ages. She never dies.But those around her do.When two grieving strangers meet by chance in Osaka airport they uncover a disturbing connection. Jake's best friend and Mariko's twin brother each died, 6,000 miles apart, in brutal and unfathomable circumstances.Each encountered a mesmerising, dark-haired woman in the days before their deaths. A woman who came looking for Mariko - and then disappeared.Jake, who has carried his loss and guilt for a decade, finds himself compelled to follow the trail set by Mariko's revelations. It's a trail that weaves across continents and centuries, leading back to the many who have died - in strange and terrifying and eerily similar ways - and those they left behind: bewildered, disbelieved, yet resolutely sure of what they saw.And, at the centre of it all, there is the same beguiling woman. Her name may have changed, but her purpose has never wavered, and as Jake races to discover who, or what she is, she has already made her next choice.But will knowing her secret be enough to stop her?---'Snags the reader in its claw and mesmerizes from page one' Monique Roffey, author of The Mermaid of Black Conch'Like nothing else I've ever read ... The kind of story you tell around a campfire as the lights of civilization begin to flicker out around you' Kristen Roupenian, author of 'Cat Person''Beguiles, terrifies and utterly seduces you ... At once a thriller, a postmodern mystery and an existential horror tale' Megan Abbott, author of El Dorado Drive'Brilliant, horrifying ... So much fun, fantastically tense and wonderful' Evie Wyld, author of The Echoes'Clever, spooky ... Kept me guessing to the end' Chloe Benjamin, author of The Immortalists'A mesmerizing story, brilliantly told' Ian McGuire, author of The North Water'Smart, taut and twisty ... Deftly delivers the chills' Karen Joy Fowler, author of We Are All Completely Beside Ourselves

THE ACCLAIMED NOVEL BY THE AUTHOR OF OLD SOULA sweeping tale of love, fate and sacrifice told through five lives over a thousand years of historyA New York Times Editors' Choice and Notable Book of the Year.Shortlisted for the Kirkus Prize for Fiction'Reads as China's Midnight's Children. Utterly remarkable' Independent'A kaleidoscopically imaginative novel' The New Yorker'Multi-layered and masterful' GuardianI dream of us across the centuries ...Beijing, 2008, the Olympics are coming, but as taxi driver Wang circles the city's congested streets, he feels barely alive. His daily grind is suddenly interrupted when he finds a letter in the sunshade of his cab. He is being warned: Someone is watching him. Someone who claims to be his soulmate and to have known him for over a thousand years.Other letters follow, and Wang will re-live an astonishing five lives with his soulmate:- as spirit-brides in the Tang Dynasty;- young slaves during the Mongol invasion;- concubines plotting to kill the emperor;- assistants to a kidnapping in the Opium War;- and Red Guards during the Cultural revolution.As each past life unfolds, Wang feels the watcher. In the shadows. Growing closer ...__________________________________PRAISE FOR SUSAN BARKER:'[A] kaleidoscopically imaginative novel...Barker stitches together an unnervingly perceptive portrait of China and of the enduring influence that its past has on the present' THE NEW YORKER'A thrilling journey through a thousand years of obsession and betrayal, this is the most extraordinary work of imagination you'll read all year' ADAM JOHNSON, Winner of the PULITZER Prize for Fiction 'Erudite, intriguing and compulsively readable, Susan Barker, a born story-teller, has written one of the most remarkable novels of recent years' JOHN BOYNE'A brilliant, mind-expanding, and wildly original novel' CHRIS CLEAVE'A hallucinatory ride. Highly recommend' ANNA HOPE