Published in 2018 with a foreword by Julia Bell, the fifteenth issue featured the following contributors:

Arhondia

Lou Kramskoy

Cheryl Powell

Megan Bradbury

David Martin

Jane Roberts

Amal Adam

Ian Critchley

Ailsa Cox

Kate Ellis

Jay Barnett

Laurane Marchive

Rachel Stevenson

Mykola Moss

Jonathan Kemp

Josey Rebelle

1. E. McAuliffe

Nigel Auchterlounie

Ingrid Jendrzejewski

Sogol Sur

Tim Goldstone

Nat Loftus

Leone Ross

Len Lukowski

Vicky Grut

Valentine Carter

Judy Birkbeck

Sarah Dale

“The novels and stories of the future need to tell us how to live now, not how we lived then. And the new emerging voices reflect much more fragmented, jagged experiences.” So writes Julia Bell in her foreword to this fifteenth issue of The Mechanics’ Institute Review.

How do we live now? These 28 stories take us to – and over – life’s front lines, from atavistic violence to Odyssean victory, transcendent transdom to self-realising robots, rush-hour revelations to human hibernation. Chase dragons, flee demons in mist-mountained Wales. Share lives entwined and extinguished in firebombed Hamburg. Know face-palming patronage and chance-denying prejudice. Touch the grotesque in a pagan game of dare, excise a growth in a bathtub. Witness obsession, abduction and a toaster’s primal power.

Crossing genres, styles and boundaries, this collection of new writing from throughout the UK includes work by acclaimed authors Megan Bradbury (Everyone Is Watching), Jonathan Kemp (London Triptych) and Leone Ross (Come Let Us Sing Anyway), and short-story exponent Ailsa Cox.

Read these stories to learn how we are living and what is worth fighting for – which includes the short story itself.

MIR15 was edited by Francesca Alberry, Sandra Brown-Springer, Peter Coles, John Forde, Melanie Jones, Nadia Jones, Hilary Key, Lauren Miller, Hannah Parry, Amy St Johnston and Sue Tyley
Purchase a copy.