"The BBC International Short Story Award 2012", (Comma Press, 2012)

For one year only, the award goes international. I preferred the foreign entries. Gough's "The iHole" has a predictable ending but is entertaining enough. Hyland's piece has ineffectively long dialogues. Krys Lee's story has interesting spurts - "he walked through the forest of skyscrapers into the slums of Chongyecheon, where shopkeepers weaved through traffic on bicycles and peddlers sold domestic porn films that showed little more than a mosaic of faceless body parts. Later, behind the Chongyecheon, Lotte Department Store, two prostitutes in Technicolor halter tops dashed out of the window displays and began their sales pitch. While peering left and right for the indifferent police (there had been yet another theoretical crackdown)" (p.63). Adam Ross's and Deborah Levy's stories are minor. Miroslav Penkov's "East of the West" impressed me - its poetic element was a submerged church. I liked Chris Womersley's "A Lovely and Terrible Thing" until the end.