Paradise

Faber Stories, a landmark series of individual volumes, presents masters of the short story form at work in a range of genres and styles. 'The taboo-breaking, the fabulous prose - there's no one like Edna.' Anne Enright 'Surprising and beautiful and courageous .. A beacon.' Megan Nolan 'Brilliant and brave.' Ann Patchett 'Glittering energy.' Colm Tóibín An unnamed protagonist is on holiday with her new, much-married lover, in the company of the monstrously rich. 'How long would she last? It would be uppermost in all their minds.' Each day, while the others are out at sea, she is taught to swim. Eventually, she will be expected to perform. The pressure mounts; it is only a matter of time before she snaps. Edna O'Brien crafts a quietly horrifying scene of eroticism and insecurity, and makes one woman's near-fatal discomfort stand for society's larger trap. Bringing together past, present and future in our ninetieth year, Faber Stories is a celebratory compendium of collectable work.

Edna O'Brien wrote more than twenty celebrated works of fiction, including her classic The Country Girls Trilogy, as well as plays and four works of non-fiction, which have been translated internationally into over 30 territories. Her final novel was the acclaimed Girl, which was awarded the Kerry Group Prize for Fiction in 2020. She was the recipient of many awards, including the Irish PEN Lifetime Achievement Award, the American National Arts Gold Medal, the Frank O'Connor Prize, the PEN/Nabokov Award For Achievement in International Literature, and the David Cohen Prize for Literature, as well as being appointed an honorary Dame of the Order of the British Empire in 2018. In 2021, O'Brien was also awarded the French Ordre des Arts et des Lettres. Born and raised in the west of Ireland, she lived in London for many years before her death on 27th July 2024.