Butter: Novellas, Stories and Fragments

A dazzling collection of short fiction from Pulitzer and National Book Award Finalist, Gayl Jones

'A literary giant, and one of my absolute favourite writers' Tayari Jones, author of AN AMERICAN MARRIAGE

'Gayl Jones is a literary legend' - Yara Rodrigues Fowler, author of THERE ARE MORE THINGS

'Her prose is intricate, mesmerizing, and endlessly inventive and subversive' Deesha Philyaw, author of THE SECRET LIVES OF CHURCH LADIES

Gayl Jones's long career began with her blistering 1975 debut, Corregidora, which was edited by Toni Morrison, and she is increasingly recognised as one of the great literary writers of the twentieth century. In this new collection of short fiction, Jones's unique talents are displayed in a range of settings and styles, from the hyper-realist to the mystical, in novella-length stories, intricate multi-part narratives and in compelling fragments.

Endlessly inventive, challenging and surprising, Jones writes about our diverse world. Her characters are spies, photographers, baristas, cartoonists and revolutionaries; her settings are historical and contemporary, in Europe and the Americas. With sharp observation, wit and poignancy, Jones explores complex identities and unorthodox longings.

'Jones's writing powerfully blends narrative and lyricism . . . Her imagination seems to thrive on outstripping one's expectations' Margo Jefferson

'Every Jones publication is a major event, but this one is particularly precious . . . Jones's settings, which span time and geography, vary as much as the identities of her protagonists, which include women and men, Black, brown, and Indigenous people, artists and spies. The common threads are creativity and devastating insight' Oprah Daily, 'The Books We Can't Wait to Read in 2023'