{"title":"Books by Camilla Grudova","description":null,"products":[{"product_id":"9781838956349","title":"Children of Paradise","description":"\u003cb\u003e\u003ci\u003e\"Grudova is Angela Carter's natural inheritor. Her style is effortlessly spare and wonderfully seductive. Read her! Love her! She is sincerely strange.\" —Nicola Barker, author,\u003c\/i\u003e Darkmans\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e Following Grudova's critically acclaimed collection\u003ci\u003e The Doll's Alphabet\u003c\/i\u003e, this surreal, discomforting debut novel charts the fates of a ragtag group of cinema workers who are spat out by corporate takeover. \u003c\/b\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e When Holly applies for a job at the Paradise - one of the city's oldest cinemas, squashed into the ground floor of a block of flats - she thinks it will be like any other shift work. She cleans toilets, sweeps popcorn, avoids the belligerent old owner, Iris, and is ignored by her aloof but tight-knit colleagues who seem as much a part of the building as its fraying carpets and endless dirt. Dreadful, lonely weeks pass while she longs for their approval, a silent voyeur.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e So when she finally gains the trust of this cryptic band of oddballs, Holly transforms from silent drudge to rebellious insider and gradually she too becomes part of the Paradise - unearthing its secrets, learning its history and haunting its corridors after hours with the other ushers. It is no surprise when violence strikes, tempers change and the group, eyes still affixed to the screen, starts to rapidly go awry...","brand":"Gardners","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":43071171068082,"sku":"9781838956349","price":8.99,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0612\/7193\/3106\/files\/9781838956349_46885aaf-7170-4a4c-ba5f-d7d972dad30d.jpg?v=1786028408"},{"product_id":"9781838956387","title":"The Coiled Serpent","description":"\u003cp\u003e\u003cb\u003eLONGLISTED FOR THE DYLAN THOMAS PRIZE 2024\u003c\/b\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003eGUARDIAN BOOK OF THE YEAR 2023\u003c\/b\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003eTELEGRAPH BOOK OF THE YEAR 2023 \u003cbr\u003e\u003c\/b\u003e\u003cbr\u003eA little girl throws up Gloria-Jean's teeth after an explosion at the custard factory; Pax, Alexander, and Angelo are hypnotically enthralled by a book that promises them enlightenment if they keep their semen inside their bodies; Victoria is sent to a cursed hotel for ailing girls when her period mysteriously stops. In a damp, putrid spa, the exploitative drudgery of work sparks revolt; in a Margate museum, the new Director curates a venomous garden for public consumption.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eIn Grudova's unforgettably surreal style, these stories expose the absurdities behind contemporary ideas of\u003cbr\u003ework, Britishness and art-making, to conjure a singular, startling strangeness that proves the deft skill of a writer\u003cbr\u003eat the top of her game.\u003c\/p\u003e","brand":"Gardners","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":56307519455605,"sku":"9781838956387","price":9.99,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0612\/7193\/3106\/files\/9781838956387_42f8b771-1b3c-4807-aa39-86a4a484c5c3.jpg?v=1786028409"},{"product_id":"9781910695371","title":"The Doll's Alphabet","description":"\u003cp\u003eSurreal, ambitious and exquisitely conceived, \u003cem\u003eThe Doll's Alphabet\u003c\/em\u003e is a collection of stories in the tradition of Angela Carter and Margaret Atwood. Dolls, sewing machines, tinned foods, mirrors, malfunctioning bodies – many images recur in stories that are in turn child-like and naive, grotesque and very dark. In ‘Unstitching’, a feminist revolution takes place. In ‘Waxy’, a factory worker fights to keep hold of her Man in a society where it is frowned upon to be Manless. In ‘Agata's Machine’, two schoolgirls conjure a Pierrot and an angel in a dank attic room. In ‘Notes from a Spider’, a half-man, half-spider finds love in a great European city. By constantly reinventing ways to engage with her obsessions and motifs, Camilla Grudova has come up with a method for storytelling that is highly imaginative, incredibly original, and absolutely discomfiting.\u003c\/p\u003e","brand":"Gardners","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":56309045068149,"sku":"9781910695371","price":12.99,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0612\/7193\/3106\/files\/9781910695371_2a68ee0d-c0ca-4535-8c28-063c6b5dcc60.jpg?v=1786028973"},{"product_id":"9781068355547","title":"Magic \u0026 Mechanics","description":"\u003cp\u003e \u003cstrong\u003e PRE-ORDER NOW - Published: 12\/03\/2026 \u003c\/strong\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e \u003cbr\u003e  \u003cbr\u003eBinding: Paperback \/ softback","brand":"Gardners","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":56368636887413,"sku":"9781068355547","price":10.99,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0612\/7193\/3106\/files\/9781068355547_c428e62b-ae16-4eb8-a1ec-0864b872646a.jpg?v=1786017155"}],"url":"https:\/\/backstory.london\/collections\/author-camilla-grudova.oembed","provider":"Backstory","version":"1.0","type":"link"}