On the Bodies of Strangers

Shortlisted for the W&A Working Class Writers’ Prize 2022. A collection of short stories linked by the theme of tattoos. Our lives, our experiences and the people we encounter leave behind indelible marks.

On the Bodies of Strangers explores marked lives and marked flesh. The stories in this collection are linked by a single thread: the tattoos of their protagonists, traces of experiences and meaning etched onto their skin. These are stories about the chaos of ordinary lives, about people who are flawed, complicated, but always deeply human.

From domestic abuse to unexpected friendship, mixing horror and hope, intimacies and lies, On the Bodies of Strangers explores the many ways we mark each other and ourselves as we deal with the complexities of human behaviour.