Lauren Elkin

Two sisters must find their way in a world designed to confine them. Marcelle is the elder sister, a woman whose ambitions focus on becoming the companion of a 'man of genius'. Marguerite is the younger sister, a girl whose sanity depends on breaking free of the oppressive expectations of society. Both end up focusing their attentions on the same disappointing man. BRIEF ENCOUNTERS: classic novellas and captivating stories, to be read in a single sitting or savoured over days

She's living a perfect life - so why does Laurence feel so torn? Weekends in the country, weekdays in Paris - Laurence's life features all the trappings of 1960s French bourgeoisie. She has money, a handsome husband, two daughters and a lover. She also has a successful career as an advertising copywriter, though her mind writes copy while she's at home, and dreams of domesticity in the office. All her life she has strived to meet the expectations of others. But when her 10-year-old daughter, Catherine, starts to vocalise her despair about the unfairness of the world, Laurence must finally grapple with a life that prizes image over truth. Slim but powerful, this is a classic story of womanhood and its oppressors, parents and their children, and the quest for personal truth - by the iconic feminist Simone de Beauvoir.

A dazzlingly original reassessment of the power and plurality of women's singing voices by the critically acclaimed author of Art Monsters and Scaffolding 'It took me ten years to go from shy young girl to punk rocker, if I'd had this book I'd have got there much quicker' Viv Albertine For millennia, women's raised voices have been heard as unruly, uncivilized, dangerous. Women singing were cast as sirens: mythical creatures who lured sailors to their death. In Vocal Break, Lauren Elkin seamlessly blends memoir, feminist manifesto and cultural history to explore a plurality of female singing voices - and how women have used them to defy convention, genre, capitalism, racism and sexism. Drawing on her own experiences training as a young soprano in the 1990s, Elkin reflects on the way power and identity shape our voices, focusing on the women who most excited her when she was learning to sing. A vocal break refers to the place where the voice shifts from lower to higher registers and this is a book about what kind of meanings, and sounds, can be made there. Immersing readers in an eclectic soundscape, from musicals and pop music to art punk, what follows is a full-throated tour of women's voices, including Édith Piaf, Maria Callas, Cyndi Lauper, Kathleen Hanna, Tori Amos, PJ Harvey, Beyoncé, FKA Twigs and Billie Eilish. Reflecting on what makes women's singing so powerful - to the point where others feel the need to control or manipulate it - Vocal Break is a joyous call to arms, a siren call: Girls to the front: NOW.

‘Scaffolding is like a perfect French movie of a novel…elegant, original and often very funny’ Kevin Barry, New Statesman Books of the YearTwo couples inhabit the same apartment in Paris, almost fifty years apart…2019. When David takes a job in London, Anna is left alone in their Paris apartment. It’s August and the city is deserted but when Clémentine moves into the building, Anna finds herself drawn inextricably into the younger woman’s world…1972. Florence is finishing her degree in psychology and contemplating pregnancy. But Henry isn’t sure he’s ready for fatherhood and both have distractions outside their marriage…As the two couples face the challenges of marriage and fidelity, the characters and their ghosts bump into and weave around each other, not knowing that they once all inhabited the same space.‘Intelligent, sexy and brilliantly observed’ Stylist‘Atmospheric and evocative’ Observer

She’s living a perfect life – so why does Laurence feel so torn? Weekends in the country, weekdays in Paris – Laurence’s life features all the trappings of 1960s French bourgeoisie. She has money, a handsome husband, two daughters and a lover. She also has a successful career as an advertising copywriter, though her mind writes copy while she’s at home, and dreams of domesticity in the office. All her life she has strived to meet the expectations of others. But when her 10-year-old daughter, Catherine, starts to vocalise her despair about the unfairness of the world, Laurence must finally grapple with a life that prizes image over truth. Slim but powerful, this is a classic story of womanhood and its oppressors, parents and their children, and the quest for personal truth – by the iconic feminist Simone de Beauvoir. TRANSLATED BY LAUREN ELKIN

A dazzlingly original reassessment of women's stories, bodies and art - and how we think about them. For decades, feminist artists have confronted the problem of how to tell the truth about their experiences as bodies. Queer bodies, sick bodies, racialised bodies, female bodies, what is their language, what are the materials we need to transcribe it? Exploring the ways in which feminist artists have taken up this challenge, Art Monsters is a landmark intervention in how we think about art and the body. Weaving daring links between disparate artists and writers – from Julia Margaret Cameron’s photography to Kara Walker’s silhouettes, Vanessa Bell’s portraits to Eva Hesse’s rope sculptures – Lauren Elkin shows that their work offers a potent celebration of beauty and excess, sentiment and touch, the personal and the political.