Ali Smith

A collection of brand-new short stories written by prize-winning, bestselling writers and inspired by Kafka - published to commemorate the centenary of his death Franz Kafka is widely regarded as one of the great geniuses of twentieth-century literature. What happens when some of the most original literary minds of today take an idea, a mood or a line from his work and use it to spark something new? From a future society who ask their AI servants to construct a giant tower to reach God; to a flat hunt that descends into a comically absurd bureaucratic nightmare; to a population experiencing a wave of unbearable, contagious panic attacks, these ten specially commissioned stories are by turns mind-bending, funny, unsettling and haunting. Inspired by the visionary imagination of a writer working one hundred years ago, they speak powerfully to the strangeness of being alive today.

Ali Smith's Supersonic 70s collects together some of Ali Smith's best writing of the last ten years and also includes a brand new story.

Dopo il successo di Hotel World («Un romanzo particolarissimo, di cui non privarsi», La Repubblica) minimum fax porta in libreria i racconti di Ali Smith, una delle migliori voci della narrativa anglosassone di oggi. Un ammiratore più o meno segreto che ci manda dei fiori, gli uccelli morti che il gatto ci lascia sulla soglia di casa, la nostra casa improvvisamente infestata da strani insetti neri, la vicina di letto di una nostra zia ricoverata in ospedale, la signora anziana che aiutiamo con le buste della spesa: ogni evento della vita quotidiana contiene il seme di mille possibili storie che aspettano di venire alla luce. Ogni persona è una miniera di storie e ogni storia ne contiene un'altra e così via, in un gioco di scatole cinesi dalle possibilità infinite. Nei racconti che compongono questa raccolta, Ali Smith va alla ricerca dei tesori nascosti nelle cose di ogni giorno e nella vita di ognuno di noi regalandoci dodici gioielli di leggerezza e profondità.

The incomparable Ali Smith melds the tale and the essay into a magical hybrid form, a song of praise to the power of stories in our lives In February 2012, the novelist Ali Smith delivered the Weidenfeld lectures on European comparative literature at St. Anne’s College, Oxford. Her lectures took the shape of this set of discursive stories. Refusing to be tied down to either fiction or the essay form, Artful is narrated by a character who is haunted—literally—by a former lover, the writer of a series of lectures about art and literature. A hypnotic dialogue unfolds, a duet between and a meditation on art and storytelling, a book about love, grief, memory, and revitalization. Smith’s heady powers as a fiction writer harmonize with her keen perceptions as a reader and critic to form a living thing that reminds us that life and art are never separate. Artful is a book about the things art can do, the things art is full of, and the quicksilver nature of all artfulness. It glances off artists and writers from Michelangelo through Dickens, then all the way past postmodernity, exploring every form, from ancient cave painting to 1960s cinema musicals. This kaleidoscope opens up new, inventive, elastic insights—on the relation of aesthetic form to the human mind, the ways we build our minds from stories, the bridges art builds between us. Artful is a celebration of literature’s worth in and to the world and a meaningful contribution to that worth in itself. There has never been a book quite like it.

Autumn. Season of mists and mellow fruitfulness. That's what it felt like for Keats in 1819. How about Autumn 2016? Daniel is a century old. Elisabeth, born in 1984, has her eye on the future. The United Kingdom is in pieces, divided by a historic once-in-a-generation summer. Love is won, love is lost. Hope is hand in hand with hopelessness. The seasons roll round, as ever. Ali Smith's new novel is a meditation on a world growing ever more bordered and exclusive, on what richness and worth are, on what harvest means. This first in a seasonal quartet casts an eye over our own time. Who are we? What are we made of? Shakespearian jeu d'esprit, Keatsian melancholy, the sheer bright energy of 1960s Pop art: the centuries cast their eyes over our own history-making. Here's where we're living. Here's time at its most contemporaneous and its most cyclic. From the imagination of the peerless Ali Smith comes a shape-shifting series, wide-ranging in timescale and light-footed through histories, and a story about ageing and time and love and stories themselves. Here comes Autumn.

Elisabeth, ricercatrice trentenne presso l’università di Londra, torna nella cittadina di provincia dove abita la madre per stare accanto a un vecchio vicino di casa, Daniel, centouno anni, che trascorre in uno stato di sonno profondo quelli che sono forse i suoi ultimi giorni di vita; malgrado la differenza di età i due sono stati a lungo legati da un’amicizia strettissima, che si è bruscamente interrotta anni prima e di cui Elisabeth, al capezzale di Daniel, cerca di riannodare i fili. Fuori da quella stanza c’è poi un paese traumatizzato dal voto sulla Brexit, percorso dalla paura e dall’intolleranza; ma anche una donna di mezza età, la madre di Elisabeth, che grazie a una comparsata in un reality show trova l’amore dove non avrebbe mai immaginato di cercarlo.Primo romanzo di una tetralogia ispirata alle quattro stagioni, Autunno è costruito come un caleidoscopio di aneddoti, visioni, ricordi che ci fanno entrare in maniera sempre più intensa nella vita dei suoi personaggi. Lucidissimo nel ritrarre una società in crisi, e al tempo stesso carico di compassione e di speranza, è una meditazione sull’incontro con il diverso e sul potere trasformativo della creatività umana; un romanzo dalla voce ammaliante, ricca di echi letterari ma anche capace di parlare in maniera diretta alla nostra inquieta contemporaneità.

Durante una cena in un'elegante casa di Greenwich un amico di un amico dei padroni di casa si alza da tavola e non torna più. Si scopre che si è chiuso nella stanza degli ospiti e non ha la minima intenzione di uscire. Perché ha preso questa decisione? Cosa spera di ottenere? E soprattutto chi è Miles Garth? Gen, la padrona di casa, si mette alla ricerca di amici e parenti del suo ospite indesiderato che possano convincerlo a desistere dal suo proposito inspiegabile. Comincia così una carrellata di personaggi, ricordi, situazioni buffe o commoventi che prendono spunto dalla presenza/assenza di Miles, ma in realtà sono un'occasione per la scrittrice di esplorare vari aspetti della vita quotidiana nell'Inghilterra di oggi. Una scrittura divertente e divertita, una girandola di giochi di parole e rimandi che vanno da Shakespeare al punk passando per i musical e le canzoni dell'Eurofestival. Il nuovo splendido romanzo di Ali Smith cerca di rispondere a una domanda semplicissima: perché siamo qui?

Escritas com paixão, as obras de Ali Smith são únicas. Aclamadas, discutidas e premiadas, renderam um séquito de leitores à escocesa, sensação literária da contemporaneidade. Como ser as duas coisas não é diferente. Na Inglaterra, o livro vendeu 150 mil exemplares no primeiro ano feito raro para um romance literário. A versatilidade da arte é o tema por trás das trajetórias de amor e injustiça que aqui se espelham dissolvendo gêneros, formas, tempos, realidades e ficções. Com técnica análoga à pintura de afrescos, Smith cria uma original história de duplos, protagonizada por um pintor renascentista dos anos 1460 e uma neta dos anos 1960.

A celebration of companionship in all its timeless and contemporary, legendary and unpindownable, spellbinding and shapeshifting forms... It follows the unique achievement of her Seasonal cycle of novels - Autumn, Winter, Spring and Summer - written and published in as close as possible to real time, between 2016 and 2020, absorbing and refracting the times we are living through: the 'state-of-the-nation novels which understand that the nation is you, is me, is all of us' (New Statesman). 'Ali Smith is lighting us a path out of the nightmarish now' Observer

Libro d'esordio dell'autrice di "Like", "Voci fuori campo" e "Hotel world". Dodici racconti che declinano l'amore in una miriade di sfumature sentimentali e sensuali. Si trovano allora una teenager che perde la verginità durante un viaggio ad Amsterdam tra le braccia di una prostituta; la giovane donna che per amore della letteratura lascia al vento le pagine della sua biblioteca; i ricordi di un'ardente passione evocati da un timido fotografo; la descrizione di un'attrazione struggente, non corrisposta, che si consuma mentre scorrono sullo schermo fotogrammi dei film più celebri della storia del cinema.

A teenage girl finds unexpected sexual freedom on a trip to Amsterdam. A woman trapped at a dinner party comes up against an ugly obsession. The stories in Free Love are about desire, memory, sexual ambiguity and the imagination. In the harsh light of dislocation, the people in them still find connections, words blowing in the street, love in unexpected places. Ali Smith shows how things come together and how they break apart. She disconcerts and affirms with the lightest touch, to make us love and live differently.

Girl meets boy. It's a story as old as time. But what happens when an old story meets a brand new set of circumstances? Ali Smith's re-mix of Ovid's most joyful metamorphosis is a story about the kind of fluidity that can't be bottled and sold. It is about girls and boys, girls and girls, love and transformation, a story of puns and doubles, reversals and revelations. Funny and fresh, poetic and political, Girl Meets Boy is a myth of metamorphosis for the modern world.

O brave new world, that has such people in't. Once upon a time not very far from now, two children come home to find a line of wet red paint encircling the outside of their house. What does it mean? It’s a truism of our time that it’ll be the next generation who’ll sort out our increasingly toxic world. What would that actually be like? In a state turned hostile, a world of insiders and outsiders, what things of the past can sustain them and what shape can resistance take? And what’s a horse got to do with any of this? Gliff is a novel about how we make meaning and how we are made meaningless. With a nod to the traditions of dystopian fiction, a glance at the Kafkaesque, and a new take on the notion of classic, it's a moving and electrifying read, a vital and prescient tale of the versatility and variety deep-rooted in language, in nature and in human nature.

Glyph follows Ali Smith's 2024 novel Gliff and tells a story hidden in the first novel. Gliff is set in a near future rife with surveillance, where people can be labelled 'unverifiable' by the state. It follows siblings Briar and Rose as they attempt to survive in a world that strives to crush curiosity and meaning.

Het een als het ander is niet alleen een briljant met elkaar verweven tweeluik, maar speelt ook met de manier waarop wij lezen. Smith vertelt twee levensverhalen: dat van het Engelse tienermeisje George anno 2013, en van Renaissanceschilder Francesco anno 1460. George raakt gefascineerd door het werk van Francesco, terwijl de schilder George vanuit een andere dimensie observeert. De beide helften van de roman raken op onverwachte manieren met elkaar verstrengeld. Tegelijkertijd staan ze los van elkaar en kunnen, aldus de auteur, best in willekeurige volgorde worden gelezen. Of niet? Hoe bepalend is de ordening van een verhaal voor de betekenis die wij eraan hechten? Conform de instructies van de auteur wordt Het een als het ander op twee verschillende manieren uitgegeven. Bij één helft van de oplage is het eerste verhaal dat van George, bij de andere helft begint het boek met Francesco's verhaal. Op het eerste gezicht is er geen verschil te bekennen; lezers zullen de ene of de andere versie willekeurig aanschaffen.

Após um acidente fatal com o elevador utilizado para transportar bandejas de um andar a outro do Hotel Global, o fantasma da camareira Sara Wilb passa a vagar por uma cidade inglesa indefinida, tentando recordar sensações e detalhes do passado, em particular a duração exata da queda que a levara à morte. O episódio tragicômico e suas consequências costuram a narrativa com as histórias de outras quatro mulheres, que por motivos diversos transitam pelo hotel: Claire, a irmã caçula de Sara; Lise, a recepcionista; a moradora de rua Else; e Penny, redatora de um guia de hotéis. Dando a cada capítulo uma forma particular que abarca diferentes visões de mundo, a autora mergulha no fluxo de consciência de suas protagonistas, revelando fatos que parecem surgir do próprio ato de narrar. O limite poroso entre o isolamento e a convivência é um tema onipresente que se desdobra em episódios marcantes, como aquele em que o fantasma da camareira desce ao próprio túmulo para ouvir do cadáver suas lembranças de uma vida outrora compartilhada, memórias de um tempo em que eram uma só pessoa. A um tempo inventivo e comovente, o romance é uma meditação sobre os fios invisíveis que nos ligam, de igual forma, aos vivos e aos mortos, aos desconhecidos e às pessoas que mais amamos. Hotel mundo foi indicado a diversos prêmios importantes no ano de seu lançamento, entre eles o Booker Prize e o Orange Prize, e foi agraciado com o Scottish Arts Council Book of the Year Award 2002.

Five disparate voices inhabit Ali Smith's dreamlike, mesmerising Hotel World, set in the luxurious anonymity of the Global Hotel, in an unnamed northern English city. The disembodied yet interconnected characters include Sara, a 19-year-old chambermaid who has recently died at the hotel; her bereaved sister, Clare, who visits the scene of Sara's death; Penny, an advertising copywriter who is staying in the room opposite; Lise, the Global's depressed receptionist; and the homeless Else who begs on the street outside. Smith's ambitious prose explores all facets of language and its uses. Sara takes us through the moment of her exit from the world and beyond; in her desperate, fading grip on words and senses she gropes to impart the meaning of her death in what she terms "the lift for dishes"--then comes a flash of clarity: "That's the name for it, the name for it; that's it; dumb waiter dumb waiter dumb waiter." Blended with hers are other voices: Penny's bland journalese and Else's obsession with metaphysical poetry. Hotel World is not an easy read: disturbing and witty by turns, with its stream-of-consciousness narrators reminiscent of Virgina Woolf's The Waves, its deceptively rambling language is underpinned by a formal construction. Exploring the "big themes" of love, death and millennial capitalism, it takes as its starting point Muriel Spark's Momento Mori ("Remember you must die") and counteracts this axiom with a resolute "Remember you must live". Ali Smith's novel is a daring, compelling, and frankly spooky read. --Catherine Taylor

Passionate, compassionate, vitally inventive and scrupulously playful, Ali Smith’s novels are like nothing else. A true original, she is a one-of-a-kind literary sensation. Her novels consistently attract serious acclaim and discussion—and have won her a dedicated readership who are drawn again and again to the warmth, humanity and humor of her voice. How to be both is a novel all about art’s versatility. Borrowing from painting’s fresco technique to make an original literary double-take, it’s a fast-moving genre-bending conversation between forms, times, truths and fictions. There’s a Renaissance artist of the 1460s. There’s the child of a child of the 1960s. Two tales of love and injustice twist into a singular yarn where time gets timeless, structural gets playful, knowing gets mysterious, fictional gets real—and all life’s givens get given a second chance. A NOTE TO THE READER: Who says stories reach everybody in the same order? This novel can be read in two ways and this book provides you with both. In half of all printed editions of the novel the narrative EYES comes before CAMERA. In the other half of printed editions the narrative CAMERA precedes EYES. The narratives are exactly the same in both versions, just in a different order. The books are intentionally printed in two different ways, so that readers can randomly have different experiences reading the same text. So, depending on which edition you happen to receive, the book will be: EYES, CAMERA, or CAMERA, EYES. Enjoy the adventure.

Alla vigilia di Natale – un Natale insolitamente caldo e senza neve – Art, collaboratore dell’ufficio legale di una multinazionale e autore di un velleitario blog di nature writing, parte per la Cornovaglia, dove ha accettato di passare le feste nella villa della madre Sophia, imprenditrice di successo ormai in pensione. Avrebbe dovuto presentarle la sua compagna, che però l’ha appena lasciato dopo un litigio: Art ha quindi impulsivamente deciso di farsi accompagnare da Lux, una ragazza misteriosa e brillante conosciuta per caso il giorno prima. Nel corso della notte al gruppetto si aggiungerà, a sorpresa, Iris, la sorella che Sophia non vede da trent’anni, emarginata dalla famiglia per la sua attitudine ribelle e contestataria e la sua militanza politica. Nel corso di tre giorni, diverse generazioni, sensibilità, visioni del mondo si scontrano e si confrontano, facendo i conti col passato e provando in qualche modo a convivere.Alternando riferimenti alla drammatica attualità contemporanea (la Brexit, Donald Trump, i cambiamenti climatici) e luminosi tocchi di realismo magico, intessendo le pagine di allusioni letterarie (da Dickens a Shakespeare) e gustosi giochi verbali, Ali Smith crea un altro dei suoi magnifici arazzi narrativi: romanzi capaci di ritrarre la faticosa quotidianità del mondo che conosciamo con uno sguardo così generoso e anticonvenzionale da farcene innamorare di nuovo.

Jente møter gutt. En historie som fortelles på nytt og på nytt. I en av Ovids klassiske metamorfoser oppdras en jente som gutt, forelsker seg i en jente - og må forvandles til gutt for at de skal bli lykkelige sammen. I Ali Smiths moderne versjon møtes også to som forvandles ved å elske.

Le fait est, imaginez un homme sur un vélo d'appartement dans une chambre d'amis. C'est un homme presque normal, sauf qu'il y a comme des clapets de boîte aux lettres sur ses yeux et sa bouche. Regardez de plus près : ces endroits-là sont couverts de petits rectangles gris pareils aux traits de censure que les journaux et les magazines collaient sur les yeux des gens, à l'époque où on ne pouvait pas encore les masquer en pixélisant leur visage. Parfois on plaçait aussi ces traits, ces rectangles ou ces clapets sur certaines parties du corps que, par décence, on voulait cacher. La plupart du temps ils étaient là pour protéger l'identité de la personne. Mais en réalité le résultat faisait qu'on avait l'impression qu'il se passait un truc louche, voire pire. C'était la preuve de quelque chose qu'on ne pouvait révéler. Quand l'homme assis sur le vélo bouge la tête, les petits traits bougent avec lui comme les oeillères d'un cheval. Debout à ses côtés, si bien que tous deux sont à la même hauteur, se trouve un jeune garçon. Il est en train de retirer le rectangle gris des yeux de son aîné avec un grand couteau. Aïe, s'écrie l'homme. Je fais ce que je peux, rétorque le garçon. Il a une dizaine d'années, une longue frange et des cheveux assez longs. Il porte un jean à pattes d'éléphant brodé de jaune et de violet à la taille, ainsi qu'un T-shirt Snoopy rouge et bleu. Il réussit à arracher des yeux le machin gris, qui lui échappe des mains et s'envole de manière presque comique avant de heurter le sol dans un bruit métallique. Le T-shirt est la première chose que voit l'homme sur son vélo. Snoopy se tient droit, une cocarde sur la poitrine. La cocarde proclame le mot «héros». Au-dessus de lui est écrit en jaune, dans cette typographie propre à Snoopy : It's Hero Time. J'avais complètement oublié ce T-shirt, constate l'homme dès que le garçon lui a enlevé le truc de la bouche. Ouais, il est bien, celui-là. Tu te souviens du T-shirt orange Kiss a beagle ? demande le garçon. L'homme acquiesce. Dès que je le porte, c'est bizarre, les filles deviennent toutes gentilles avec moi. L'homme hoche la tête en riant. Puis il baisse les yeux au sol où ont atterri les deux rectangles gris. Il en prend un et le soupèse. Autour des yeux et des lèvres, sa peau est plus douce. Il lâche le rectangle, tend le bras et replie les doigts. Il observe les mains du garçon. J'avais oublié à quoi mes mains ressemblaient, dit-il. À quoi elles ressemblent, plutôt. Bon, ça y est, c'est bon. Je peux te montrer, maintenant ? demande le garçon. Tu veux savoir comment faire ? L'homme acquiesce encore. Bon, répète le garçon, OK. Il ramasse deux feuilles de papier blanc par terre. Il en donne une à l'homme. Puis il s'assied sur le lit et lui montre la seconde feuille.

When we meet Amy Shone, she is a young parent struggling to raise Kate, a precocious eight-year-old. Amy is an enigma-a brilliant scholar who has forgotten how to read. She is estranged from her wealthy English parents and lives a nomadic life in Scotland, dragging Kate from one school to the next, barely scraping by. And then there is Ash, a fiery Scottish actresss who cannot shake her demons-chief among them an unrequited passion for Amy that has obsessed her ever since they met as teenagers. Like is the story of two parallel lives that intersect briefly, then diverge. It is also a timeless evocation of adolescence and its agonizing anticipations, its contradictory yearnings for freedom and safety, its blind quest for mastery over pleasure and pain. Deftly constructed, passionately imagined, Like is a remarkably mature debut for a powerful young talent.

L’una e l’altra è un romanzo a specchio, composto da due lunghe novelle che si collegano e si richiamano a vicenda. Una è la storia di una ragazza che, nella Ferrara del Quattrocento, si finge maschio per portare avanti la carriera di pittore (Ali Smith la immagina come segreto alter ego di Francesco del Cossa, autore degli splendidi affreschi che adornano le pareti del Salone dei Mesi di Palazzo Schifanoia); l’altra è la storia di Georgia – detta George – una sedicenne di oggi che si trova a fare i conti con l’improvvisa morte della madre, attivista politica forse tenuta sotto sorveglianza, pochi mesi dopo una visita a quegli stessi affreschi. Fra suggestioni da romanzo storico e atmosfere quasi mystery, L’una e l’altra è una modernissima riflessione sull’identità di genere, sul rapporto fra arte e potere, sulle mille possibili declinazioni dell’atto del guardare (dalla contemplazione di un’opera d’arte all’entertainment allo spionaggio): un romanzo originalissimo, sfaccettato e affascinante che in Gran Bretagna ha segnato la definitiva consacrazione della sua autrice, facendo incetta di premi letterari e vendendo decine di migliaia di copie.

Other Stories and Other Stories is a stunning collection of short stories from Ali Smith. Individually lucid and luminous, these formally inventive and exquisite tales resonate subtly together. In examining the distances and connections between ourselves and others, and lightly and expertly inching us closer to the bone, storytelling itself has never seemed so necessary, so moving or so joyous. 'Beautifully written and quietly unsettling' Big Issue'Bold and sensitive. Smith's prose is a joy' Independent'A wonderful collection; deceptively easy on one level with its whirling library of ghost story, funny story, love story, scary story, and more. Like Russian dolls, separate yet invisibly linked, they unfold from and into one another' Herald 'Smith breathes life into her imagined words with a true understanding of the craft of the short-story writer. She dances surely and lightly over the form' Guardian 'Captures quiet epiphanies of the extraordinary in the mundane' Sunday Times'These stories fizz with life' The Times Literary Supplement

Otoño. Temporada de nieblas. Daniel tiene un siglo de edad. Elisabeth, nacida en 1984, tiene sus ojos puestos en el futuro. El Reino Unido está hecho pedazos, dividido por un verano histórico, único en una generación. El amor se gana, el amor se pierde. La esperanza va de la mano con la desesperanza. Las estaciones siguen su camino, como siempre. La nueva novela de Ali Smith es una meditación sobre un mundo cada vez más limitado y exclusivo, sobre la riqueza y el valor, sobre lo que significa la cosecha. Es la primera entrega de su cuarteto estacional: cuatro libros independientes, separados pero interconectados y cíclicos (como son las estaciones); y nos hace reflexionar sobre el propio tiempo. ¿Quiénes somos? ¿De qué estamos hechos? Esta es una novela sobre el envejecimiento y el tiempo y el amor y las historias mismas.

Tudo parece transcorrer na mais absoluta normalidade nas férias da família Smart. Michael, professor universitário, Eve, escritora de sucesso, e os dois filhos dela, Astrid, de doze anos, e Magnus, de dezessete, alugam uma casa na pacata Norfolk, onde pretendem passar o verão. Mas a tranquilidade familiar logo é abalada pela súbita presença de uma estranha: surgida do nada, Amber se imiscui na intimidade da família e começa a ganhar a confiança e a afeição de todos. Encantados, os Smart passam a lhe revelar o que não dizem nem mesmo entre (e para) si. Em pouco tempo, estarão enredados na intricada psicologia de seus mundos e conflitos interiores. A figura do estranho que, acolhido pela família, a transforma radicalmente é motivo conhecido da literatura e do cinema, como no clássico Teorema, de Pier Paolo Pasolini. Mas Ali Smith conta essa história de um modo surpreendente, dando voz e vida próprias a cada uma de suas personagens. Dona de uma técnica apurada e de grande familiaridade com os meandros do romance contemporâneo, Ali Smith não tenta pôr palavras na boca de suas personagens: deixa que falem por si, que cada uma vá, aos poucos e a seu modo, revelando sua riqueza interior, seus conflitos e seus temores. E deixa também a cargo do leitor a solução de um mistério que com certeza o intrigará por um bom tempo: quem é Amber?

A Biblioteques Públiques Ali Smith demostra que el llenguatge és una cosa viva i brillant i que la literatura ens ajuda a viure. Per què són tan poderosos els llibres? I què diu de nosaltres la desaparició de les biblioteques públiques arreu del món? Aquestes històries tracten sobre què fem amb els llibres i què fan els llibres amb nosaltres: com ens acompanyen en el viatge; com ens impacten, ens canvien, ens desafien, desterren el temps. Les biblioteques públiques són llocs d'alegria, llibertat, comunitat i descoberta. Amb enginy, diversió i fascinació per la llengua i el poder de les paraules, Smith ens recorda que hem d’estar atents al món que fem.

Seasonal Quartet is a series of four stand-alone novels, separate but interconnected (as the seasons are), wide-ranging in timescale and light-footed through histories, which, when taken together, give us something more—all four united by the passing of time, the timing of narrative, and the endless familiarity yet renewal that the cycle of the seasons is. Contents: #1 - Autumn A once-in-a-generation series, Ali Smith's Seasonal quartet is a tour-de-force about love, time, art, politics, and how we live now. 'Undoubtedly Smith at her best. Puckish, yet elegant; angry, but comforting' The Times Daniel is a century old. Elisabeth, born in 1984, has her eye on the future. The United Kingdom is in pieces, divided by a historic once-in-a-generation summer. Love is won, love is lost. Hope is hand in hand with hopelessness. The seasons roll round, as ever . . . #2 - Winter Winter? Bleak. Frosty wind, earth as iron, water as stone, so the old song goes. The shortest days, the longest nights. The trees are bare and shivering. The summer's leaves? Dead litter. The world shrinks; the sap sinks. But winter makes things visible. And if there's ice, there'll be fire. In Ali Smith's Winter, lifeforce matches up to the toughest of the seasons. In this second novel in her acclaimed Seasonal cycle, the follow-up to her sensational Autumn, Smith casts a merry eye over a bleak post-truth era with a story rooted in history, memory and warmth, its taproot deep in the evergreens: art, love, laughter. It's the season that teaches us survival. Here comes Winter. #3 - Spring What unites Katherine Mansfield, Charlie Chaplin, Shakespeare, Rilke, Beethoven, Brexit, the present, the past, the north, the south, the east, the west, a man mourning lost times, a woman trapped in modern times? Spring. The great connective. With an eye to the migrancy of story over time and riffing on Pericles, one of Shakespeare's most resistant and rollicking works, Ali Smith tell the impossible tale of an impossible time. In a time of walls and lockdown, Smith opens the door. The time we're living in is changing nature. Will it change the nature of story? Hope springs eternal. #4 - Summer In the present, Sacha knows the world’s in trouble. Her brother Robert just is trouble. Their mother and father are having trouble. Meanwhile, the world’s in meltdown­—and the real meltdown hasn’t even started yet. In the past, a lovely summer. A different brother and sister know they’re living on borrowed time. This is a story about people on the brink of change. They’re family, but they think they’re strangers. So: Where does family begin? And what do people who think they’ve got nothing in common have in common? Summer.

Spring will come. The leaves on its trees will open after blossom. Before it arrives, a hundred years of empire-making. The dawn breaks cold and still but, deep in the earth, things are growing.

In the present, Sacha knows the world's in trouble. Her brother Robert just is trouble. Their mother and father are having trouble. Meanwhile the world's in meltdown - and the real meltdown hasn't even started yet. In the past, a lovely summer. A different brother and sister know they're living on borrowed time. This is a story about people on the brink of change. They're family, but they think they're strangers. So: where does family begin? And what do people who think they've got nothing in common have in common? Summer.

Winner of the Whitbread Award for best novel and a finalist for the Man Booker Prize, The Accidental is the virtuoso new novel by the singularly gifted Ali Smith. Jonathan Safran Foer has called her writing “thrilling.” Jeanette Winterson has praised her for her “style, ideas, and punch.” Here, in a novel at once profound, playful, and exhilaratingly inventive, she transfixes us with a portrait of a family unraveled by a mysterious visitor. Amber—thirtysomething and barefoot—shows up at the door of the Norfolk cottage that the Smarts are renting for the summer. She talks her way in. She tells nothing but lies. She stays for dinner. Eve Smart, the author of a best-selling series of biographical reconstructions, thinks Amber is a student with whom her husband, Michael, is sleeping. Michael, an English professor, knows only that her car broke down. Daughter Astrid, age twelve, thinks she’s her mother’s friend. Son Magnus, age seventeen, thinks she’s an angel. As Amber insinuates herself into the family, the questions of who she is and how she’s come to be there drop away. Instead, dazzled by her seeming exoticism, the Smarts begin to examine the accidents of their lives through the searing lens of Amber’s perceptions. When Eve finally banishes her from the cottage, Amber disappears from their sight, but not—they discover when they return home to London—from their profoundly altered lives. Fearlessly intelligent and written with an irresistible blend of lyricism and whimsy, The Accidental is a tour de force of literary improvisation that explores the nature of truth, the role of chance, and the transformative power of storytelling.

The Ballad of Speedball Baby is the thrilling, extremely funny, and heart-wrenchingly vulnerable story of Ali Smith -- coming of age in '90s New York -- who commits to the messy, exhilarating life of a musician and must survive the slings and arrows society reserves for women who refuse to comply. As an only child reeling from the demolition of her parents' toxic marriage, the New York City underground music scene offers a young Ali a different family of misfits and talented outsiders to belong to. She becomes the bass player for edgy band Speedball Baby, a decision that will take her around the world -- from onstage at the legendary CBGBs to the red-light district of Amsterdam. She's often the only girl in a broken-down tour van, being strip-searched at the Croatian border, chased by lunatics, and navigating the seedy underbelly of a male-dominated music scene full of addiction, violence, and misogyny -- all while keeping her sharp wit and dark humor intact. Rimmed with heavy black eyeliner and smelling faintly of cheap booze, The Ballad of Speedball Baby is a pulse-quickening, unpredictable ride through the '90s music scene -- alternately terrifying, hilarious, and painfully evocative -- as well as a love letter to the power of female solidarity.

The First Person and other stories effortlessly appeals to our hearts, heads and funny bones. Always intellectually playful, but also very moving and funny, Smith explores the ways and whys of storytelling.

From the acclaimed, award-winning author comes a sparkling, surprising collection of the writing she loves best—and without which she would not have become a writer. The Book Lover is a treasure trove of what Ali Smith has loved over the course of her reading life, in her twenties, as a teenager, as a child. Full of pieces from amazing writers like Sylvia Plath, Muriel Spark, Grace Paley, and Margaret Atwood, it also has a wonderful selection of lesser-known authors like Joseph Roth, only just gaining proper status now, and Clarice Lispector, a Brazilian genius who's far too underpublished. From surprising figures like Beryl the Peril, Billie Holliday, and Lee Miller to unusual selections from the most prominent writers in history, The Book Lover is an intimate, personal anthology that gives readers a glimpse of how writers develop their craft—by reading other writers.

There but for the is the sparkling satirical novel by bestselling Ali Smith. 'There once was a man who, one night between the main course and the sweet at a dinner party, went upstairs and locked himself in one of the bedrooms of the house of the people who were giving the dinner party . . .' As time passes by and the consequences of this stranger's actions ripple outwards, touching the owners, the guests, the neighbours and the whole country, so Ali Smith draws us into a beautiful, strange place where everyone is so much more than they at first appear. There but for the was hailed as one of the best books of 2011 by Jeanette Winterson, A.S. Byatt, Patrick Ness, Sebastian Barry, Boyd Tonkin, Erica Wagner and Nick Barley. 'Dazzlingly inventive' A.S. Byatt 'Whimsically devastating. Playful, humorous, serious, profoundly clever and profoundly affecting' Guardian 'A real gem' Erica Wagner, The Times 'Eccentric, adventurous, intoxicating, dazzling. This is a novel with serious ambitions that remains huge fun to read' Literary Review 'If you liked Smith's earlier fiction, you will know that she enjoys setting up a situation before chucking in a literary Molotov cocktail then describing what happens' Sunday Express 'Wonderful, word-playful, compelling' Jeanette Winterson 'Smith can make anything happen, which is why she is one of our most exciting writers today' Daily Telegraph 'I take my hat off to Ali Smith. Her writing lifts the soul' Evening Standard

Ali Smith’s retelling of Sophocles’ tragedy, about a young Theban princess, who decides to bury her dishonoured brother Polynices, against King Creon’s express orders — with heart-breaking consequences.

From the critically acclaimed, award-winning author comes a collection of uniquely inventive stories that thread the labyrinth of coincidence, chance, and connections missed and made. What happens when you run into Death in a busy train station? (You know he’s Death because when he smiles, your cell phone goes dead.) What if your lover falls in love with a tree? Should you be jealous? From the woman pursued by a band of bagpipers in full regalia to the artist who’s built a seven-foot boat out of secondhand copies of The Great Gatsby, Smith’s characters are offbeat, charming, sexy, and as wonderfully complex as life itself.

En el presente, Sacha sabe que el mundo está en problemas. Su hermano Robert simplemente es un problema. Su madre y su padre están teniendo problemas. Mientras tanto, el mundo está colapsando, y la verdadera debacle aún no ha comenzado. En el pasado, un hermoso verano. Un hermano y una hermana diferentes saben que están viviendo en un tiempo prestado. Esta es una historia sobre personas al borde del cambio. Son familia, pero creen que son extraños. Entonces, ¿por dónde empieza la familia? ¿Y qué tienen en común las personas que piensan que no tienen nada en común? El Verano.

The dazzling second novel in Ali Smith’s essential Seasonal Quartet—from the Baileys Prize-winning, Man Booker-shortlisted author of Autumn and How to be Both. Winter? Bleak. Frosty wind, earth as iron, water as stone, so the old song goes. The shortest days, the longest nights. The trees are bare and shivering. The summer’s leaves? Dead litter. The world shrinks; the sap sinks. But winter makes things visible. And if there’s ice, there’ll be fire. In Ali Smith's Winter, lifeforce matches up to the toughest of the seasons. In this second novel in her acclaimed Seasonal cycle, the follow-up to her sensational Autumn, Smith's shape-shifting quartet of novels casts a merry eye over a bleak post-truth era with a story rooted in history, memory and warmth, its taproot deep in the evergreens: art, love, laughter. It’s the season that teaches us survival. Here comes Winter.

סתיו 2016 . אליזבת בת 32 . דניאל, החבר הכי טוב שלה, בן 101 . בריטניה שסועה אחרי משאל הברקזיט. כשאליזבת ודניאל הכירו היא היתה בת שמונה והוא כמעט בן שמונים. זה לא הפריע להם לדבר שעות על גבי שעות ולהפוך לחברים לכל החיים. עכשיו דניאל שקוע בשינה, ואליזבת נוסעת פעם בשבוע מבית אמה ונדי כדי לבקר במעון הסיעודי שבו הוא מאושפז ולקרוא באוזניו ספרים. היא נזכרת בשיחות שהיו להם בילדותה: על חיים ואמנות, דמיון ומציאות, אמת ושקר. היא נזכרת בציורים של פאולין בוטי, אמנית־פופ מרדנית ומחוננת שפעלה ומתה בשנות השישים. דניאל סיפר לה על הציורים האלה. גם דניאל, בחלומותיו, נזכר בבוטי ובאהבתו אליה. הוא נזכר גם באחותו, האנה, נערה מבריקה שלא הצליחה להימלט מגרמניה במועד כמו אחיה. בכתיבה שנונה, משחקית, מנצנצת בדיאלוגים מלאי ברק, אלי סמית משרטטת רשת של קשרי השראה, חברות ומשפחה בין דניאל, אליזבת, ושאר הדמויות בסיפור. כל אחת מהדמויות האלה מתמרדת בהתרסה ובהומור נגד מציאות חברתית ופוליטית שמנסה לדחוס אותה לתבנית של מוסכמות ודיכוי. אלי סמית, ילידת 1962 , היא סופרת סקוטית מוערכת. ספרה סתיו שהיה מועמד לפרס המאן בוקר הוא הראשון ברביעיית עונות השנה שלה.