We Pretty Pieces of Flesh
by Colwill Brown
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Pub Date 20 Feb 2025 | Archive Date 22 Mar 2025
Random House UK, Vintage | Chatto & Windus
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Description
A gut-punch novel of girlhood in early noughties Yorkshire from a blazing new voice
'Blistering, brilliant, savage and smart' EIMEAR McBRIDE
'Unforgettable...a wondrous, luminous novel' NANA KWAME ADJEI-BRENYAH
'Brilliant and original on every level... she is a writer like nobody else' ELIZABETH McCRACKEN
Ask anyone non-Northern, they’ll only know Donny as punch line of a joke or place they changed trains once ont way to London.
But Doncaster’s also the home of Rach, Shaz and Kel, bezzies since childhood and Donny lasses through and through. They share everything, from blagging their way into nightclubs to trips to the Family Planning clinic when they are late. Never mind that Rach is skeptical of Shaz’s bolder plots; or that Shaz, who comes from a rougher end of town, feels left behind when the others begin charting a course to uni; or that Kel sometimes feels split in two trying to keep the peace — their friendship is as indestructible as they are. But as they grow up and away from one another, a long-festering secret threatens to rip the trio apart.
We Pretty Pieces of Flesh takes you by the hand and leads you through Doncaster’s schoolyards, alleyways and nightclubs, laying bare the intimate treacheries of adolescence and the ways we betray ourselves when we don’t trust our friends. Like The Glorious Heresies and Shuggie Bain, it tracks hard-edged lives and makes them sing, turning one overlooked place into the very centre of the world.
'A novel brimming with rough poetry, heart and mischief' FERDIA LENNON
Available Editions
EDITION | Other Format |
ISBN | 9781784745578 |
PRICE | £16.99 (GBP) |
PAGES | 336 |
Links
Available on NetGalley
Featured Reviews
A future coming of age classic? I think so, yeah.
‘We Pretty Pieces of Flesh’ follows three friends, Shaz, Rach and Kel, at different points throughout their lives from their pre-teen years to their early thirties. We see them form their trio for the first time, and follow through the eyes of each in turn as they grapple with adolescent jealousies, queerness, eating disorders, sexual assault and drifting apart. The novel explores class and living in poverty in post-Brexit England through incredibly powerful and moving prose, while simultaneously being a genuinely funny and relatable story of growing up. It’s perfectly balanced, and a really brilliant debut novel.
I can see this being a massive hit and when it’s released in February and completely deservedly so.
Thank you to Colwill Brown and NetGalley for my ARC!
I am absolutely gobsmacked that this is a debut. This book has all the confidence (and use of dialect) as Irvine Welsh’s Trainspotting, combined with a genuine representation of the weight and expectation placed on women in the 90s, especially those from a northern working-class background.
My fiancé was raised near Lakeside in Doncaster, and this is the first ARC that he was actively asking me for updates on and getting excited hearing even a slight representation of his childhood. He’s actively excited to pick it up and read it when it releases. Absolutely loved it!
What an immense debut title and such a feat to write it all in a Yorkshire dialect. I did get a little confused every now and again with the sharp change in scene/time/POV but it all worked towards the overall novel.
As a Yorkshire girl born & bred this hit real close to home actually. Whilst I didn't have this exact experience growing up I do know a lot of people that did and the way the author describes the events even got me reminiscing on everything I did as a teenager. It's kind of crazy this is her first ever book honestly.
The dialect I can imagine might be a bit difficult for people not from Yorkshire but I found it incredibly easy to get on with and I think had it been written out of dialect it wouldn't have hit so emotionally for me. I really did have an emotional reaction to the events and the characters and the vibe of the entire thing.
So cool to read about Yorkshire!!