A. L. Kennedy's remarkable new collection of stories shows us exactly what becomes of the broken-hearted. She reveals the sadness, violence, hurt, and terror, but also the redemption of love, and she does so with enormous human compassion, wild leaps of humour, and the brilliantly original linguistic skill that distinguishes her as one of the world's finest writers.

Always attuned to the moment of epiphany, these twelve stories are profound, intimate observations of men and women whose lives ache with possibility. Each story is a dramatization of the instant in a life that exposes it all; love and the lack of love, hope and the lack of hope. These men and women are perfectly ordinary people whose marriages flounder; who sit on their own in a cinema watching a film with no soundtrack; who risk sex in a hotel with an anonymous stranger. They conceal tenderness and disappointment, vulnerability and longing, griefs and wonders.

Devastating and funny, intimate and profound, the stories in What Becomes are further proof that Kennedy is one of the most dazzling and inventive writers of her generation.

The author of six novels, three books of nonfiction, and five collections of short stories, A. L. Kennedy’s last novel, The Blue Book, was longlisted for the Orange Prize for Fiction, and her novel Day was the 2007 Costa Book of the Year. She has twice been selected as one of Granta’s Best of Young British Novelists and has won a host of other awards. She lives in London and is a part-time lecturer in creative writing at Warwick University.

A.L. Kennedy's profile page

. . . [a] harrowing collection . . . [A. L. Kennedy] can go from darkness to humor in a heartbeat.

New York Times