Life & CultureThe Summer 2023 IssuePage turners: 10 emerging authors pick their favourite new booksWe asked some of our favourite writers to select an emerging author that excites them the most. Full disclosure: some of them were so good we had to mention them twice, while others were not so new at all...ShareLink copied ✔️September 4, 2023Life & CultureThe Summer 2023 IssueTextDazed DigitalIllustrationEster Mejibovski Taken from the summer 2023 issue of Dazed. You can buy a copy of our latest issue here. SHEENA PATEL Born in north-west London, Sheena is part of the 4 BROWN GIRLS WHO WRITE collective and was selected as one of The Observer’s best debut novelists for I’m A Fan, published last year on Rough Trade Books “I am choosing two writers to spotlight, Tanaka Fuego and Sharan Hunjan. I’ve been lucky enough to share a stage with both of them. Tanaka is a beautiful performer; his warm presence, loud laugh and exacting poetry really bewitch an audience, and he is very charismatic on stage. His poetry is musical, vulnerable and visual, and makes you feel all sorts of things inside of your rib cage. He makes you feel like him. “Barbershop”, for Schön on YouTube, is an incredible example of this magic. He’s currently producing a series of events, the first being GUDSOIL at Shoreditch House on June 28. Sharan Hunjan put out a pamphlet in 2020 called ‘Hatch’ and in it, she plays linguistic games and experiments with graphic wordplay. She is a small person but on stage can fill up a room: she becomes a force, using her words to jab and prod you, creating connections between English, Punjabi, capitalism and motherhood. What she does best is stretch the English language and play with it. She’s due to publish her first collection, Open Mouths, in 2024 with Rough Trade Books – [it’s] about motherhood and the mouth as the point of entry and I cannot wait to see what she has to offer.” ANIEFIOK EKPOUDOM Aniefiok AKA ‘Neef’ is a journalist, author and broadcaster exploring British life today. He has worked with the likes of Netflix, Google, the BBC and adidas, and his first book, Where We Come From: Rap, Home and Hope in Modern Britain, is out via Faber & Faber in January 2024 “Last year I read Tice Cin’s debut novel, Keeping the House, a beautiful, evocative and tender portrayal of Turkish-Cypriot family and community in north London. It follows a range of characters as they navigate the aches and joys of their city. From familial love and loss to the drug trade and PTSD, there is richness and a soulfulness in her writing. What struck me was the way Tice was so seamlessly able to break conventional narrative structure. The boldness to do so was rewarded with a novel that gradually unspools, bringing you into the centre of these written lives. I’m really excited about Tice’s career and what she will write next.” Image sourced on Twitter/X TAYLOR DIOR RUMBLE Escaping the dissociative dating app scene in search of real-world romance, Taylor’s first novel, The Situationship, will launch via #Merky Books this summer “Liv Little’s debut, Rosewater, is a beautiful queer love story set in south London. It has all the right ingredients for a modern classic: it’s tender, raw, refreshing and comforting all at the same time. Outside of the wonderful romance, I admired the way Liv depicted the harsh realities of being a creative in London. From being kicked out of her flat in the very first chapter to [finding] her safe spaces under threat due to rampant gentrification, struggling poet and protagonist Elsie really goes through it. But it’s so heartwarming watching her overcome it all with the help of her community and the love she cultivates along the way. I could also be biased because any book set in South London automatically has me beaming. I love seeing my home reflected in the way I know it to be.” CLAIRE MARIE HEALY Claire Marie Healy is a London-based writer and contributing books editor at A24. Her first book, Girlhood, was released via Tate in July “I heard tell that this writer was working on the maddest novel ever in their adopted city of Prague some years back. The result is the post-apocalyptic landscape of The Doloriad, Missouri Williams’ hypnotic novel woven from survivalist philosophy and body horror. Recently I’ve been drawn to writing that is extremely distinct from my own: it’s a palate-cleanser to confront subjects that you find ugly or kind of horrible, especially in fiction, and it also has the side-effect of making you braver to follow whatever your own weird interests are in a very samey British publishing landscape. I also want to mention that Williams’ debut resulted in the best New York Times review addendum ever: ‘An earlier version of this review referred incorrectly to a male character in The Doloriad. He has no legs, but he does have hands.’” The Doloriad by Missouri Williams CALEB AZUMAH NELSON Caleb is a British-Ghanaian author and photographer whose latest novel, Small Worlds, was published by Viking in May. His debut, Open Water, won the Costa first novel award in 2021 “In Where We Come From, Aniefiok Ekpoudom has written the book I’ve been waiting to read. I’ve always been a fan of his writing (his long read in The Guardian on footballers from south London is brilliant) but it’s clear he thrives in the book-length space. Charting the history of migration of communities to south London, the west Midlands and south Wales – and the sonic expressions which emerge from these places – the writing is intimate and illuminating. I know I’ll be reading it for years to come.” CHARLIE FOX Exploring grotesque distortions of the human figure and identity in film and art, author and gore enthusiast Charlie’s debut novel This Young Monster came out via Fitzcarraldo Editions. He was written for ArtReview, 032 and New York Times “OK, the British writer, director and actress Julia Davis has been on TV since the late 1990s, won a slew of awards and gets blown kisses in interviews by Phoebe Waller-Bridge and PTA (remember her cameo as an evil party guest in Phantom Thread?) so she’s not exactly ‘undiscovered’ but her comedies are so magnificently evil and hilarious no existing level of praise will do. She’s like Almodovar or bloody Todd Solondz; she cuddles up to the most extreme part of human perversity and whispers filthy jokes in its ear while caressing its nipples. Her shows like Nighty Night, Hundaby (a 19th-century gothic costume drama comedy!) and her podcast Dear Joan and Jericha in which she plays a cosy yet demonic agony aunt alongside Vicki Pepperdine are non-stop nightmares of bad sex, disease, and baroque psychopathology where everyone who isn’t warped and horrible is a pathetic husk, all of it rendered in magical language. E.g. Princess Anne’s clit is ‘like a donkey penis’; ‘we all believed my wife’s womb to be little more than a useless dungeon’; ‘he lost his short battle to cancer when he was snatched by Satan’s claws.’ She should be studied in schools, provided everybody could stay in character and burn the fucking school down afterwards.” RACHEL CONNOLLY Rachel is a writer from Belfast whose debut coming-of-age novel, Lazy City, will launch in late 2023 via Canongate. She has written for The Financial Times, The New York Times Magazine and The Guardian “I was so excited to hear that Jess White is currently working on a novel. I have followed and loved her work for a while. She writes funny, eloquent essays on everything from why Brendan Fraser will always be everyone’s favourite heartthrob (this one spoke to me on a profound level) to the best- dressed mafia wives on screen. She also writes a weekly Substack where she reads and reviews (honestly, a rare quality these days) a huge quantity and variety of fiction. And she doesn’t chase trends or book-world marketing hype. She covers contemporary novels, forgotten Victorian writers, lots of work in translation, and really anything else you can think of. The depth and breadth of her reading comes through in her fiction, although not in a pretentious way. Her recent short story ‘The Rialto’ in the London Magazine was a dreamy, unsettling account of a woman unravelling over a series of hotel stays. It reminded me a little of Nicole Flattery’s wonderful stories. I can’t wait to see where she takes her novel!” YOMI ADEGOKE Canning Town-born, Croydon-raised Yomi launched Slay in Your Lane, a 2018 book and podcast series offering life and career guidance for young Black women. Her latest book, The List, came out in July “For several years now, Aniefiok ‘Neef’ Ekpoudom has been at the forefront of documenting Black British music and culture as a journalist, for outlets such as The Guardian, Vice and The Evening Standard. Next year sees him turn his hand to something more longform, in the shape of a long-awaited book. Where We Come From is a compelling social history that charts grime and UK rap’s journey from inner-city London to the charts. It is a landmark work from a meticulous mind, painstakingly researched and thorough. No stone is left unturned; contributions to the genres’ rise that are often sidelined take centre stage. And though the conversation so often begins and ends with London, the breadth of influences from outside of the capital are explored. But the book’s emotional core is what truly captivates. It is deeply moving and poignant in places, and it’s in these moments that Neef’s writing particularly shines. An exciting work from an exciting voice, Where We Come From will undoubtedly shape conversations about not just UK rap and grime but British music for years to come.” Yomi Adegoke, author of 'The List' and 'Slay in Your LaneMollana Burke K PATRICK White Review prize-shortlisted writer K’s first novel Mrs S, out now via Europa Editions, feels its way through queer attraction in an English boarding school “It’s hard to answer the question of Britishness, maybe now more than ever. As a trans person I don’t really feel like answering the question at all but I know I’m trapped, too, that I can’t not answer, I have to own up to it. And reading here is so good right now. Plenty of incredible writers are applying all sorts of pressure to the meaning of this ‘place’. I love it. Rosie’s Disobedient Press are fucking brilliant and about to launch the pamphlet of Hussein Mitha, ‘vegetal soul’. They are making it all new and I borrow their words: ‘Being a vegetal outsider in the city is a condition of diaspora. Diaspora is a vegetal term, because it means a splitting of the seed.’ The poetry of Oluwaseun Olayiwola, too, who in ‘Simulacrum’ writes a line that’s stuck with me: ‘There wasn’t love but there was what love becomes.’ Finally, William Keohnane, and his pamphlet ‘Son’ on Lifeboat Press – a delicate and moving consideration of how we find the name we want.” JASON OKUNDAYE Tracing the stories of seven men, author and public speaker Jason’s first book Revolutionary Acts: Black Gay Men in Britain will be published by Faber & Faber in March 2024 “Earlier this year I had the pleasure of reading a proof copy of Yomi Adegoke’s The List and I truly believe it will be one of the defining debut novels of the decade. In language, setting and characterisation it is distinctly Black British, but it is a phenomenal, nuanced skewering of ‘internet justice’, making it a must-read for all. It successfully captures present conversations around systemic harassment, abuse and assault, particularly in the media and the very human conflictions which emerge when grey areas are presented in areas of justice that we believe to be black-and-white. Yet while it is serious in moments it is never pious. It is provocative but sensitive, and it is gripping and entertaining, leaving you guessing right down to the very last page. I am very excited for this debut novel to be out in the world, for the inevitable furious debates it will spark, and for the upcoming television adaptation.” Join Dazed Club and be part of our world! You get exclusive access to events, parties, festivals and our editors, as well as a free subscription to Dazed for a year. Join for £5/month today. Expand your creative community and connect with 15,000 creatives from around the world.READ MOREMary Finn’s message from the Freedom Flotilla: ‘Don’t give up’Are you in a party-gap relationship?For Jay Guapõ, every day in New York is a movieDakota Warren’s new novel is a tale of sapphic obsessionP.E Moskowitz on how capitalism is driving us all insaneVanmoofDJ Fuckoff’s guide to living, creating and belonging in BerlinCould scheduling sex reignite your dead libido?The Global Sumud Flotilla’s mission has only just begunIs inconvenience the cost of community?We asked young US students what activism looks like in the Trump eraAnti-slop: what if social media actually delivered on its promises?How to date when... they’re your ex