24th April Newsletter
What’s On At Veranda
Welcome to this week’s newsletter. A sunny week on Seymour Place – and our green bench has come into its own as a place to watch the world go by. Joining us on the bench are customers with a minute to spare, a friend from the neighbourhood taking a smoke break, and our favourite delivery guys (and occasionally, gals) enjoying a rare pause in their hectic day. These are the moments in which small talk flourish – and at Veranda, we do love our small talk, subscribing to the view offered by Bidisha in the Guardian this week that “Through small talk, we patch and mend a world, word by word.”
Shop News
Youth is actually NOT wasted on the young. They are so good at it!!! - Lena Dunham
- Mary Shelley – just 18 when she wrote Frankenstein, an astounding achievement in itself – but her real life was a jaw-dropping tale that just seemed to write itself
- WH Auden – an accomplished poet at 18, with his first book published by Faber when he was 23, Auden displayed a moral engagement way beyond his years
- Zadie Smith – exploded onto the scene with White Teeth at 21 and consistently displays a healthy disdain for the fame she’s achieved. In an early interview, she said “If you love a young writer, maybe the best thing you can do is give them a little bit of space.” Prescient advice indeed.
You know, this used to be just fields…
Now Booking
An evening with Artem Chapeye, author of The Ukraine and The Weathering
We’re very much looking forward to welcoming Ukrainian writer Artem Chapeye to the shop on the 18th May, on his first visit to the UK. Born and raised in Kolomyia, western Ukraine, Artem has spent his adult life in Kyiv – enlisting in the Ukrainian Army soon after the Russian invasion in 2022.
Artem’s work ranges from reportage to near-future dystopia, and has been shortlisted for numerous prizes including the BBC Ukraine Book of the Year Award, and the EBRD Literature Prize for translated fiction. Consistently well-reviewed in outlets including The Telegraph and the Guardian, Artem’s writing has been described as “Intensely humanising and thoroughly heartbreaking.”
Artem will be interviewed on the night by Uilleam Blacker, an East European literature specialist from UCL, and former judge for the International Booker Prize. We’re grateful to our friends at indie publisher, Seven Stories Press for making this event possible, and hope you can join us for drinks and conversation.
Our Recommended Reads
Strangers by Belle Burden
Emily’s pick this week: I don’t believe in guilty pleasures, but if I did, this book would certainly be classified as that. Who doesn’t like to be nosy and find out all the sordid secrets of other people’s relationships? Belle Burden goes there with this bare-all memoir about her husband unexpectedly walking out on their family one day. The reader gets a glimpse into the lives of the super wealthy New York elite and the rules everyone is supposed to live by. A compelling and fast-paced read, a good one for beside the pool.
What Am I, A Deer? by Polly Barton
Alison is recommending literary translator Polly Barton’s intriguingly-titled debut novel this week. An unnamed wannabe literary translator moves to Germany for a non-literary translation job at a video game company, and following a micro-flirtation on a tram, develops a year-long obsessive crush on a guy known only to her as “umbrella man”. This is coming-of-age territory: she’s finding herself through work (and karaoke!) while losing herself in limerence and down rabbit-holes of self-consciousness and shame. A sharply-written, original novel, surprisingly funny – and weird in all the right ways.
What we’re loving this week…
Be the first to hear
Sign up to the newsletter to get this delivered to your inbox weekly
