Description

‘Brilliantly unsettling and unsettlingly brilliant’ Ellery Lloyd, New York Times bestselling author of The Club

Addictively strange and disturbing, Flowers From the Void is a collection of delectably uncanny tales. A reaper readies herself for her next gruesome assignment and a bereaved African witch prepares for a showdown with a rigidly traditional white Salem coven while an outcast teenage boy is lured into a pact with a schoolfriend that will cost him far more than he ever imagined.

Hauntingly macabre and piercingly insightful about loss and loneliness, these gothic short stories lead us into a labyrinth of other possible worlds, each one darker than the last and yet all fearfully close to our own. Living dolls serve as imperfect replacements for the deceased, a girl without a shadow finds her soulmate and spurned lovers’ bodies begin falling to pieces. In this scintillating debut collection Gianni Washington explores the limit of intimacy and empathy with the vivid intensity of your worst nightmare.

Publisher Review

Brilliantly unsettling and unsettlingly brilliant, Flowers from the Void is the debut of a writer to watch. There is enough invention in each one of these short stories to power a novel, the macabre inventiveness of Gianni Washington’s imagination only matched by the elegance of her style and her ability to create sympathy for the most monstrous of protagonists. These are stories you will want to devour in a hurry but which will linger with you for a very long time indeed. — Ellery Lloyd, New York Times bestselling author of The Club These wonderfully creepy short stories peel back layers of surface reality with such insight and skill that we find ourselves moving beyond time and space into an underground realm where deeper and darker truths can be revealed. — Ayesha Manazir Siddiqi, author of The Centre A grisly, smart, heart-wrenching collection that holds a mirror up to ourselves; I can’t wait to see what Washington does next. — Nadia Attia, the author of Verge A superb collection. Washington brings us to a place both utterly strange and unsettlingly familiar. Beautifully written, beautifully crafted, each one of these stories is a whole world you might lose yourself in. Washington’s words vibrate and sing with chilling delight, as we’re introduced to a gallery of lost souls – the lost, the lonely, the damned. Absolute proof, if proof were needed, that writing can be a magical act. I loved this. — Will Maclean, author of The Apparition Phase A terrific gothic delight, spending time in Gianni Washington’s beautifully warped imagination is just the tonic needed — Irenosen Okojie, author of Nudibranch Crafted from lithe and supple prose, these sinuous stories are as unpredictable as they are inventive. This is a magical collection that displays an accomplished and versatile talent and alarming breadth of imagination. — Lucie McKnight Hardy, author of Dead Relatives The cursed landscape of Washington’s outlook permeates every sentence … a writer to be reckoned with and a mind to be feared — Leila Latif * SFX magazine *