Three fresh reviews for Lauren Beukes’ forthcoming debut collection SLIPPING: STORIES, ESSAYS, & OTHER WRITING.

PUBLISHERS WEEKLY praises the collection.

In this hard-hitting collection, South African author Beukes (Broken Monsters) mixes present-day realism with science fiction, and flash fiction with personal essays. These are not nice stories. The characters bleed and sometimes die; those who don’t have learned how to fight back. 

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Whether they’re set in modern-day Johannesburg or on a planet circling a distant star, these powerful, beautifully written stories are always about today and the darkness of the human soul.

Jennifer Muirhead at FEMLITICA lauds the book.

I enjoyed reading ZOO CITY by South African author and journalist Lauren Beukes so much that I jumped at the chance to read this new collection of her short stories and essays.

I don’t normally read essays, but I found those in this collection fascinating, in part because they show where some of the ideas for Beukes’ fiction stories come from. In All the Pretty Corpses she talks about the deeply personal inspiration for THE SHINING GIRLS, a novel I have so far avoided because I suspected I would find the subject matter upsetting. It is the story of a serial killer who murders women, but in her novel Beukes’ aim was to take the focus off the killer and make the story about the victims; their lives, hopes and what they could have been, emphasizing that they were people, not just corpses.

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SLIPPING is a diverse and fascinating collection of stories and essays. It contained some of the most thought provoking pieces I have read in a long time. It made me impressed with Lauren Beukes’ range as an author and I will definitely seek out more of her books.

Eddie Generous of UNNERVING MAGAZINE reviews SLIPPING.

Distinctly Lauren Beukes, SLIPPING is a collection that ranges from the far reaches of otherworldly science fiction to straight literary and off toward a world mashed of fixtures between the two. Mostly dark and often grim, this is a full-bodied experience of the vast talents.

Crisp writing and concise plots rein the stories leaning toward muted disaster. Beukes touches on many subjects familiar to her longer stories, but does so with flash bolts that seem to glimmer and convey the message that she is fully deserving of the attention of the reader.

SLIPPING, as a collective, definitely some of Lauren Beukes’ finest work and, for me, her most entertaining publication to date. She adapts such a variety of voices and vices that it is difficult to explain as singular piece. Dread, action, sexuality, unsexing, fables, skillfully quiet terror, humanities valued and weighed —stories woven together smoother than should be likely given the variety in artistic expulsion.

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SLIPPING is a powerhouse of rich, demanding and surprising short works. 

For more information about SLIPPING: STORIES, ESSAYS, & OTHER WRITING, visit the Tachyon page.

Cover art by Clara Bacou

Design by Elizabeth Story