My articles

  All sorts of creatues stalk the pages of  Florida , Lauren Groff's short story collection from 2016. Spider, snakes and crocodiles lurk in the heady heat of her adopted state. But it is the black panther in the ‘The Midnight Zone’ we remember most vividly. It's story about motherhood, survival and imagination that is as tense as it is beautiful: Groff's considerable powers at full tilt.

  A lot of satirical writing emerged from life under totalitarianism in Russia and eastern Europe, but this story - about a St Petersburg official whose nose decides it wants to lead a life independent of the face it was once attached to - is among the best of the best.

  Described as 'one of the great stories ever written about a writer', Mavis Gallant's masterpiece takes you into the life of a French novelist called Henri Grippes who many feel is past his best as an artist. Often short stories are big on plot, but this is a deepy human, close up look at a character.

  Nigerian author Ekwensi could spin one hell of a yarn, few more memorable than Fussy Joe, the musician who has a taste for beautiful young women and causing trouble but for whom karma is never far away. Small but perfectly formed, ‘Glittering City’ will also take you on a memorable ride through 1960s Lagos.

  Two women look down on the Clifton Suspension Bridge from Bristol's camera obscura and witness something ominous - though quite what, it is left to the reader to decide. A story full of menace, it shows Dunmore - one of Britain's best modern short story writers - at the peak of her best.

  A couple, on holiday to try and overcome the pain of their daughter's death, get caught up in a sinister series of events. As you might expect, ‘Don't Look Now’ is filled with the slow-burning tension that Daphne Du Maurier was so good at creating.