How to Gut a Fish

LONGLISTED FOR THE EDGE HILL PRIZE 2022

'Unsettling, unpredictable, and brilliant' Roddy Doyle

'In sumptuous and evocative prose, Sheila Armstrong writes stories that are unnerving and unsettling. Stories which make you go, wait, wait, what was that? ' Claire Fuller, author of Unsettled Ground

On a boat offshore, a fisherman guts a mackerel as he anxiously awaits a midnight rendezvous.

Villagers, one by one, disappear into a sinkhole beneath a yew tree.

A nameless girl is taped, bound and put on display in a countryside market.

A man returning home following the death of his mother finds something disturbing among her personal effects.

A dazzling and disquieting collection of stories, how to gut a fish places the bizarre beside the everyday and then elegantly and expertly blurs the lines. An exciting new Irish writer whose sharp and lyrical prose unsettles and astounds in equal measure, Sheila Armstrong's exquisitely provocative stories carve their way into your mind and take hold.

'Dark, devilishly well written and full of atmosphere, How to Gut a Fish is one of the most original and affecting short story collections I've read in years' Jan Carson, author of The Fire Starters