❤️❤️❤️

I'm on my way to a Chanukah event. It should be a celebration but instead our community is once again mourning. I will be thinking of everyone in Australia and those around the world in the Jewish Community who know this fear and loss. We stand with you.

Thanks to @benpester.bsky.social , author of THE EXPANSION PROJECT (Granta 2025), for this reading from @guillermostitch.bsky.social's THE COAST OF EVERYTHING.

We're watching the wholesale burning of every scrap of dignity afforded to trans people in the UK, their rights, their medical services, their employment, their place within society, their bodily functions. It is a disgrace, and a disgusting stain on the government and media of this country.

wrote an article for @thebookseller.com outlining to the industry why small presses are the lifeforce & future of book production. Pls share esp w people who may not know what small press publishers do! www.thebookseller.com/comment/dont...

So pleased to see @benpester.bsky.social's The Expansion Project has been shortlisted for the Nero Debut Novel Award. Richly deserved.

After selecting a shortlist of six stories from thousands of entries, we are thrilled to announce Renesha Dhanraj as the winner of The London Magazine Short Story Prize 2025, for her story, ‘Black Cake’. Read more here: thelondonmagazine.org/renesha-dhan...

In honour of the eighteenth of November, here's my recent @irishtimes.com interview with Solvej Balle about seven books on the subject of being stuck in today's date. www.irishtimes.com/culture/book...

Ah wow - really loved reading this review of The Expansion Project. I know these things are not for the author really but you have to say thanks when someone is writing at this level about your work. Incredible. So grateful.

We are delighted to share the shortlist of six stories for The London Magazine Short Story Prize 2025! Congratulations to all shortlisted writers, and a huge thank you to our judges Gurnaik Johal, Ben Pester and CAA’s Erika Price. Winners will be announced next week.

So pleased to see Nicola Barker's TonyInterruptor ('Strange & clever'), @benpester.bsky.social's The Expansion Project ('That rare thing, unique') & @catherinelacey.bsky.social's The Möbius Book ('Thrilling') included in this 'Greatest Books of 2025' list. www.telegraph.co.uk/books/author...

‘A dark & lucid novel, offering not a satire of office life but a horrific riff on our inability to be fully present – at work or at home.’ The Expansion Project by @benpester.bsky.social review31.co.uk/article/view...

Very much looking forward to this. It's a solid shortlist with some exceptional novels. Of course, I hope @benpester.bsky.social's The Expansion Project takes the prize tonight. But whichever way it goes, I'm so pleased Ben was shortlisted for what is my favourite book prize.

I’ll be defying the national rail advice and travelling well North of Preston on Thursday. Cannot wait to see Rose and to talk about questionable reality, office nightmares, and more besides.

Yes to fiction that has a recovery period. Very grateful for this reading!

'What I think is innovative in a novel is the drawing out of unexpected emotional reactions.' @benpester.bsky.social talks to the @newstatesman1913.bsky.social's Barney Horner about his brilliant Goldsmiths Prize shortlisted novel, The Expansion Project. www.newstatesman.com/culture/book...

My huge face in the New Statesman today www.newstatesman.com/culture/book... @grantabooks.bsky.social @goldsmithsprize.bsky.social @newstatesman1913.bsky.social

This is me having a good time

@benpester.bsky.social, Sarah Hall, @cdrose.bsky.social & @ericawgnr.bsky.social on stage last night @southbankcentre.bsky.social. Colwill Brown, @yrsadaleyward.bsky.social & Charlie Porter contributed in virtual form. Thanks to everyone for a stimulating evening of readings and discussion.

really can’t wait for this

Indie publishing is *vital*. If you are a reader and a lover of books, this is a cause that deserves your strong support. This is the pipeline for some of the best writing around.

From the archive, 2022: fiction by Ben Pester. ‘We have this space and we have permission to summon each other into it. Sibspace.’ granta.com/the-durhams-...

This is an actual dream to be honest - I’m so grateful to the judges and so in admiration of the rest of the list.

Manchester / Stockport friends - come to this I promise to be entertaining and i also much more easily promise that Nell Osborne and Sam Mills are the absolute business. come down. Have fun. cannot wait

What a list to be on! Very happy about this. @grantabooks.bsky.social @jasonarthur.bsky.social

Yes @benpester.bsky.social truly amazing and well deserved news❤️

‘The Expansion Project has echoes of texts such as Kazuo Ishiguro’s Never Let Me Go (for the institutional sci-fi) & the plays of Sarah Kane (for the howling emptiness bumping up against the mundane). But @benpester.bsky.social’s fiction is its own beast.' The Expansion Project

Hahaha! My weirdness is now fully in the LRB my friends.

Just started on this and it rocks. Brighton friends you should check this out.

I will be at this and if you are there too you will see me having a v good evening

- you clean up that banksy? - sure did, your honour, leaving a perfect, permanent outline, imbuing the work with real fuckin gravitas while making its point better than the artist did himself just like you asked

Great list of books from librarians here.

Occasional reminder that my book ‘Darker With the Lights On’ is available from @transitbooks.bsky.social. My stories have been praised by Helen Garner, Claire-Louise Bennett, Max Porter, Elizabeth McCracken, Kevin Barry, Wendy Erskine & Eimear McBride, among others. www.transitbooks.org/books/darker

Professor Nick Maynard: "Let me tell you about Zainab, a 7 month old girl.. we had run out of formula feed.. she died whilst I was there.. 4 days before she died a group of US doctors had brought in formula feed.. they had every bottle deliberately removed by the Israeli border guards"

The long-awaited second novel by Guillermo Stitch, coming this Bloomsday. Available now for preorder at  https://thecoastofeverything.com and https://saggingmeniscus.com/catalog/the_coast_of_everything. "A timeless, extraordinary work.”—Nuala O’Connor

Just trying to make sense

'I want stories that commit to the idea – no matter how weird things get – like a kind of bird that might not obviously be able to fly, but then it does, and of course, when it lands, we are breathless.' – Ben Pester Enter here: thelondonmagazine.org/short-story-...

Dave Tynan’s collection of powerful and compelling short stories, ‘We Used to Dance Here’ has just been published @grantabooks.bsky.social. Essential reading.

‘A debut novel with echoes of Kafka, Flaubert & the office sitcom… Both poignant & disconcerting… Beautifully observed… A fever dream of a novel – disconcerting, strange & unexpectedly touching’ Terrific review of @benpester.bsky.social's The Expansion Project in @thespectator1828.bsky.social.

Dream dream dream @foylesforbooks.bsky.social @grantabooks.bsky.social @jasonarthur.bsky.social

Dreaming

Perhaps, one day, schoolkids will study this squalid little chapter in British terror-panic history. When they do, I hope these two headlines from today are printed side by side, with clear annotation of which individual faced more outrage and condemnation.

This is from Anthony Cummins who reviewed my story collection and I’m so glad that I haven’t let him down.

Hi - uh - I’m new? Where do I go?

This song helped me write a book. I’ll be grateful forever.

‘Donnie Darko has a fifth act so startling it carries that glancing flash of meaning that can only come with poetry. You feel raw almost, and heat-high by the end.' Let’s Eat Grandma, ‘Donnie Darko’ - Ben Pester’s Expansion Project Playlist buff.ly/BAVIVNi

Outlandish in the Observer today