Emma recommends... Gunk SIGNED EDITION - Saba Sams

Emma recommends... Grittily - sometimes grubbily - realistic and yet full of tenderness, beauty, and caring, Gunk is quietly powerful, full of momentous happenings without high drama or histrionics, and a gorgeously nuanced exploration of the many forms love and family can take.

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Jules has been divorced from her ex-husband Leon for ­five years, but she still works alongside him at Gunk, the grotty student nightclub he owns in central Brighton. She spends her nights serving shots and watching, from behind the bar, as Leon flirts with students on the dancefloor. But then Leon hires nineteen-year-old Nim to work the bar – and her arrival jolts Jules awake for the ­ first time in years.

When Nim discovers she’s pregnant, Jules agrees to help. As the months pass, and the relationship between the two women grows increasingly intimate and perplexing, it emerges that Nim has her own unexpected gifts to give. Now, alone in her small flat, Jules is holding a baby, just twenty-four hours old, who still smells of Nim. But no one knows where Nim is, or if she’s coming back. What could the future – for Jules, Nim, and this unnamed baby – possibly look like?

Raw, exhilarating, tender and wise, Gunk is an electrifying debut novel exploring love and desire, safety and destruction, chaos and control – and family in all its forms.