Bloody Awful in Different Ways (2026)

In the aftermath of yet another furious argument at Christmas 1983, seven-year-old Andrev learns that the man he thought was his father is not his father. A new kind of childhood begins, in which fathers come and go, arriving in red Volvos and sweeping his mother off her feet. They may be magicians or murderers, artists or thieves, appearing without warning and leaving just as suddenly, while his mother cannot control how they behave. Vivid, joyful, raw and tender, this novel follows Andrev as he grows up amid social change and explores how love begins and ends, and what he learns about men after having seven fathers in seven years.