Hailing from the north east, I am always interested in the writing talent from my neck of the woods, and this short story compendium is compelling and richly varied with some original tales and smooth writing throughout. Of course, how much each of the narratives will resonate with you will depend on each reader and their predispositions, but there is something here for everyone to enjoy.

I enjoyed this well written collection of stories, in particular how diverse yet unsettling they were, particularly "cuckoo" and "asylum decision" which were more rooted in reality than the other two. Although I appreciate not every story can have a conclusion where the ends are tied up nicely, I would have liked to read more of each one and their characters and felt unclear whether being a "sampler" meant they were a sample of a longer narrative or they were just a sample of the short stories which would be included in the final book. I really hope it's the former.
Thank you to netgalley and Bloomsbury publishing for an advance copy of this book

Test Signal is an anthology of new writing of short stories by writers from the North. This is only a sampler so this wasn't the whole book but a selection of stories from the book.

If there was an underlying theme, it wasn't apparent from the sample but I don't believe that dimishes this at Asylum Decision I think is the best story of the sampler and is told as an immigration officer turning down an application for asylum. This perfectly illustrates how the immigration system has become so cold and unfeeling. With all the stories, I found myself wanting to know more about what happened to each of the characters after the end of the stories which is the mark to me of a good short story.

I am afraid that not one of the stories was to my liking. The stories have potential but they need more work. I've enjoyed the touch of mystery/strangeness of Influencer and Good Morning Vietnam. Good Morning Vietnam in particular has a playful, rather interesting take on the fine line between science and the supranatural, but sadly it jumps so much from one thing to another to the point of confusion. I would really like to see this one being refined. Also interesting to see other forms being explored like the epistolary story Asylum Decision, but again, the content could be improved!

I received the sampler on NetGalley which included four stories: 'Good Morning Vietnam'; 'Asylum Decision' by Tawseef Khan; 'Cuckoo' by Désirée Reynolds; 'Influencer' by Lara Williams.

I understand that the idea of the book is to put together writing by promising northern writers but I really felt that a unifying theme was missing. I was expecting different exploration of what it meant to be from the north, or what culture means to each writer.

I think I was knocked off base by the first story 'Good Morning Vietnam' which isn't set in the UK and I found difficult to figure out what was going on. Maybe if the sampler had started with one of the other stories I wouldn't have been so off-kilter. My favourite story was 'Asylum Decision' which was told in a really innovative way - I will definitely be looking for more work from this author.

I thought the asylum seeker story was the strongest. The leak one was very very weird. I did not get the point of the ghost one and I can't remember the other one at all. There is no Northern link apart from the authors.

Maybe misread the blurb but definitely not for me. A short book of short stories, most of which I could not follow at all. Possibly not the target audience.

My first review on a sampler of a book. Not just a sampler of any book but an anthology of stories from Northern authors.

Coming in at 60 pages, this was a very quick read. It took me half an hour for was it.

There are four stories here, all about very different types of people. Three are about ethnic minorities and one is about an influencer with a mysterious leak.

I liked this anthology, some of the stories (the first and the last) didn’t make much sense to me and I feel they could have been a bit longer but the middle two were well formed and I liked those.

Would happily read the full book.

This sampler of an anthology of new writers from the North of England contains four pieces of writing, all very different, but telling gripping stories in different ways. I enjoyed the fact they all felt fresh in different ways, and as someone who lives in the North of England, it's nice to see an anthology that really focuses on showing the exciting contemporary writing and publishing going on here. I'll be very interested to see the rest of the collection and where else the pieces go, as it's hard to get a real sense of an anthology from only a few bits of writing, but I did enjoy these.