Constitutional

Constitutional is Helen Simpson fourth collection of short stories and shows some fine developments in one of the Short Story forms more accomplished practitioners

Helen Simpson

A masterful contemporary exponent of the genre. Simpson now deserves to be compared with Flannery O'Connor and Alice Munro

Robert McCrum, Observer

She is a virtuoso... Briskly melancholic, dazzlingly pertinent short stories about women's lives and how they survive

Sunday Times

Simpson's use of language is remarkable: she handles prose with the risky precision of a trapeze artist, swooping and tumbling through empty air, seeming certain at moments to succumb to whimsy or sentimentality but at the last moment recovering her grasp on the deftly constructed framework of her narratives. It's a virtuoso performance; its effect on the reader both consoling and exhilarating

Jane Shilling, Sunday Telegraph

Subtle, emotional, humorous, painful and acute... It's a small masterpiece

Independent

The brilliance of the conceits and the complex economy that shapes the best of these tales, match and surpass any of Helen Simpson's earlier writing

Stevie Davies, Guardian

Together with the biting humour, there is aching sadness and real tenderness, making this collection up there with the best of this genre

Michelle Stanistreet, Sunday Express