A woman grows increasingly frustrated by the emails she receives from her deceased husband… A taxidermist dreams of bringing one of his clients into his workshop after preserving her grandfather’s hamster… A grieving nurse is troubled by her daughter’s fascination with The Iron Lady… In her stirring and disquieting debut collection of stories, Sarah Schofield explores emotions that seethe beneath the surface of ourselves and live in the spaces that language can’t reach, elevating manifestations of loneliness, grief and disconnection into direct sight. The characters we meet in Safely Gathered In harness objects around them, both manmade and of the natural world, to deal with secrets and loss; from the child acting out a family betrayal from the comfort of her dolls house, to the sister making wind-up toys from the dead birds she finds on her doorstep. Venturing into the surreal and experimenting with tropes of science-fiction, these stories consider the effects of consumerism on our most intimate moments, grasp into the depths of nostalgia, and cast a fresh light into the gaps we navigate each day between reality and longing. "This is a deliciously wry Black Mirror-esque collection that provokes and disturbs. A bold and brilliant debut." – Lucie McKnight Hardy, author of Water Shall Refuse Them "Schofield's collection comprises finely inventive stories, astute in their side angle swipes on reality. A memorable and distinctive debut." – Kiare Ladner, author of Nightshift "Sarah Schofield is a writer with tremendous rage and inventiveness, who takes the short story to new places" – Naomi Booth, author of Exit Management "Sharp, insightful and haunting, these stories are not safe reading. An astounding debut." – Angela Readman, author of Something Like Breathing "An enchanting, vital collection. Strange, incisive and compelling." – Irenosen Okojie, author of Nudibranch

Is this the day I die? Li Quan asks himself this question daily, knowing that he might be killed for practicing his faith. American businessman Ben Fielding has no idea what his brilliant former college roommate is facing in China. He expects his old friend has fulfilled his dream of becoming a university professor. But when they are reunited in China after twenty years, both men are shocked at what they discover about each other. Thrown together in an hour of encroaching darkness, both must make choices that will determine not only the destinies of two men, but two families, two nations, and two worlds.