Mr Jolly
Longlisted for the Edge Hill Short Story Prize 2017
Mr Jolly is the first collection of short stories by Michael Stewart, and contains some of the award-winning novelist’s most extraordinary writing to date. Each tale offers a unique, utterly compelling insight into the human condition, framed by a mind-bendingly original concept that no other writer working today could – or indeed would – have concocted.
Readers will meet a conformity-obsessed league of bald men, breaking into homes for an extended debate about the nature of freedom; discuss the nomenclature of the marshmallow with a man whose interest in them goes beyond the norm; and meet God, in perhaps the most frustratingly accurate depiction of the divine being in modern literature.
Last phone calls, alien abductions, murders and more are grounded in stories of struggling parents, baffled lovers and lost children (some of whom may live permanently on the number 606 bus).
Longlisted for the Edge Hill Short Story Prize 2017
Mr Jolly is the first collection of short stories by Michael Stewart, and contains some of the award-winning novelist’s most extraordinary writing to date. Each tale offers a unique, utterly compelling insight into the human condition, framed by a mind-bendingly original concept that no other writer working today could – or indeed would – have concocted.
Readers will meet a conformity-obsessed league of bald men, breaking into homes for an extended debate about the nature of freedom; discuss the nomenclature of the marshmallow with a man whose interest in them goes beyond the norm; and meet God, in perhaps the most frustratingly accurate depiction of the divine being in modern literature.
Last phone calls, alien abductions, murders and more are grounded in stories of struggling parents, baffled lovers and lost children (some of whom may live permanently on the number 606 bus).
Longlisted for the Edge Hill Short Story Prize 2017
Mr Jolly is the first collection of short stories by Michael Stewart, and contains some of the award-winning novelist’s most extraordinary writing to date. Each tale offers a unique, utterly compelling insight into the human condition, framed by a mind-bendingly original concept that no other writer working today could – or indeed would – have concocted.
Readers will meet a conformity-obsessed league of bald men, breaking into homes for an extended debate about the nature of freedom; discuss the nomenclature of the marshmallow with a man whose interest in them goes beyond the norm; and meet God, in perhaps the most frustratingly accurate depiction of the divine being in modern literature.
Last phone calls, alien abductions, murders and more are grounded in stories of struggling parents, baffled lovers and lost children (some of whom may live permanently on the number 606 bus).
About the Author
Michael Stewart was born in Salford in 1971, and now lives in Bradford. He is head of Creative Writing at the University of Huddersfield. He is the author of numerous novels, including King Crow, winner of the 2011 Not the Booker Prize, Café Assassin and Ill Will.
His first collection of short stories, Mr Jolly, was published by Valley Press in 2016, and was longlisted for the Edge Hill Prize 2017. His first collection of poetry, Couples, was published by Valley Press in 2013, and in an expanded edition for Valentine's Day 2020.
Vital Statistics
Imprint: Valley Press
Edition: First (February 2016)
Paperback ISBN: 9781908853608
Catalogue number: VP0072
Page count: 160
Trim size: 198x129mm
