Jane Rogers

In the Australian outback, a lone farmer prepares her homestead for the latest in a growing wave of bushfires. In Oxfordshire, an elderly man protests the cutting down of an ancient beech tree by chaining himself to its trunk. In the depths of space, two evacuees from a scorched and barren Earth consider whether to tell the rest of the crew that their old home may be starting to heal…

The stories in Jane Rogers' much-awaited second collection shine an unflinching light on the future health of the planet, and the prospects for its greediest tenants, us. With stories spanning hundreds of years – from the far side of the 22nd century all the way back to the darkest days of lockdown – they pose questions about personal responsibility that cannot be easily answered.

'A wise, compassionate and surprising collection which moves seamlessly through time and space, illuminating all the joys and tragedies of the current moment. Rogers reminds us of the extra-ordinary flexibility and vigour of the short story.' – Alice Jolly

‘Jane Rogers’ stories are delicate studies in what makes us human. Each story creates a pellucid space in a chaotic world; her characters grapple with life and engage in the age-old struggle to be decent human beings. Economical, bold and nuanced, this is a beautifully humane collection, and one to be savoured.’ – Lesley Glaister

‘Unputdownable’ SUNDAY TIMES.

In this version of London, there is a small, private clinic. Behind its layers of security, procedures are taking place on poor, robust teenagers from northern Estates in exchange for thousands of pounds – procedures that will bring the wealthy dead back to life in these young supple bodies for fourteen days.

It’s an opportunity for wrongs to be righted, for fathers to meet grandsons, for scientists to see their work completed. Old wine in new bottles.

But at what cost?

Published Nov 14

‘Brilliantly done – a sustained exploration of the polarities at the enduring heart of love.’ Stevie Davies, GUARDIAN.

The story of a marriage, and of two lives in science.

When Conrad fails to return from a conference, Eleanor wonders if it is because of the affair she is having? Or perhaps it is because his research into transgenic monkey hearts is stalling; perhaps he is sick of having the less successful career of the two of them? She is a leading expert in stem cell research. Their grown-up children suspect Eleanor of murdering their father; El secretly fears that what has driven Con away is his discovery of their daughter Cara's parentage.

While his family in Manchester, England, scrabble for clues and reasons, Conrad--alone, confused, and on the run from a crazed animal rights activist--loses himself in the cold foggy streets of Bologna. He revisits the stages of his long marriage to El, from the happiness of the year of Cara's birth to the grief and anger he now feels. Both partners are forced to re-examine their relationship, and, in the process, to move closer to an understanding of what it is that matters most to each of them.

Conrad and Eleanor is a radical, remarkably nuanced look at marriage.

‘Thrilling ambitious stories that cross continents and soar from cells to stars’ Maggie Gee.

Short story collection. Shortlisted for the Edgehill Prize 2012.

Winner of the Arthur C Clarke Award 2012.

Longlisted for the Man Booker Prize 2011.

‘Like The Handmaid’s Tale colliding with Children of Men’ HERALD SCOTLAND.

Women are dying in their millions.

Some blame scientists, some see the hand of God. As she watches her world collapsing, Jessie Lamb decides she wants to make her life count.

Would you let your daughter die if it would save the human race?

'The Testament of Jessie Lamb' is the story of one daughter’s heroism and one father’s love.

‘A startling and gripping exploration of love, grief, responsibility and power that moves effortlessly from the personal – the pain of a woman who has recently lost her father – to one of the most hotly debated and emotive issues of the moment, the plight of asylum seekers . . . A wonderfully humane and vividly written story that will keep you entranced until the last page.’ Alex Clark, ‘Must Read of the Month’, RED.

When Anne Harrington decides to return from her father's funeral by ship, she is advised against it. The journey from Nigeria back to England is too long, she is warned: better to return to her old routine as quickly as possible. But Anne is not quite alone: with her she has her father's diaries from his years in Africa.

In 1962 Anne's parents, Miriam and David, made the opposite journey, arriving in Nigeria to work on a mission in the east of the country. David's diary charts the dramatic events that lead to the collapse of their marriage, his ejection from the mission, and his subsequent role as an aid worker in the Biafran war.

For Anne, meanwhile, the voyage home is not turning out to be the haven of solitude she craves. Deep inside the ship a stowaway seeks her out and asks her to help his sick wife. Anne confides in the first mate and finds herself drawn into a shadowy and ambiguous world of seduction, lies and murder.

'Nikki is a triumphant creation . . . There is indeed a house-style: one of economy, accuracy and controlled passion. But the authorial voice has a chameleon quality; she speaks with tongues. And the tongue here is persuasive indeed.' Penelope Lively, INDEPENDENT.

Nikki Black, intent on punishing the mother who abandoned her at birth, goes to the island with only one aim in mind: revenge. But her plans are confounded by the discovery that she has a brother. Not just any old brother, but a brother strangely possessed by their mother; a brother with a terrifying violent streak; an apparent simpleton whose head is filled with the stories of past islanders, crofters, Vikings, little people. A brother whose dangerous love and strange way of seeing the world transform Nikki's life.

'This story of lost innocence is rich in itself and beautifully imagined from Rogers' researches. In air that 'waves and wrinkles with heat' we see Dawes' moral labours translated into physical terms – sweat, stickiness, pinched flesh. White buttocked convicts rut in the mud; a debonair surgeon plays Mozart in a tent thick with insects . . . Marvellously intelligent.' OBSERVER.

The year is 1788, the place New South Wales. Marine Lieutenant William Dawes has arrived in Australia to build an observatory, reform the convicts and understand the Aborigines. He is a good man who will be subject to many temptations.

In England, now, a child is born. His mother knows he has extraordinary powers; his father knows he is a helpless cripple. Revolted by the child, he finds refuge in the past – his own utopian attempts at educational reform, and the brave new world the colonists imposed on Australia.

'An engaging, serious and gleefully ironic novel, one that leaps headlong into the most ambitious and risky territories: faith, love and existential meaning.' NEW YORK TIMES BOOK REVIEW.

John Wroe, prophet of the apocalyptic Christian Israelite Church, made his headquarters in Lancashire in the 1820's. When God told him to comfort himself with seven virgins, his congregation gave him their daughters.

Each woman in Wroe's household, from brutalised Martha to saintly Joanna, has her own secret hopes of a new life – either in heaven or on earth – at a point in history when anything seems possible. And each has her own view of the prophet. Mr Wroe's Virgins tells the story of the nine months of their life together, until accusations of indecency, and the trial that follows, bring Wroe's household to a dramatic end.

This is the story of a woman on the run from her husband, her children, herself. Driving through the snowbound Yorkshire countryside, stopping at anonymous bed and breakfasts, prepared to do anything to duck memory, she begins to write stories. Not about her own life, but about other parents, other children: stories to keep her own life at bay . . .

What happens when, after 15 years of marriage, your husband meets and falls in love with the woman you would have become – had you not married him?

As 18 year old Carolyn Tanner lies in a hospital bed recovering from a road accident, she begins to imagine herself in a different life. In her fantasy, Carolyn returns to her parents' home, marries her childhood sweetheart and becomes a mother. In her real life, she joins a women's cooperative and becomes a landscape architect. In each life, Carolyn remains stubbornly individual, yet the facts of one life preclude the other, and each decision made closes the door to other possibilities.

Orph is a strange, silent and friendless young man. Emma meets him when she spends her gap-year working in the children's home where he lives; she offers him a room in her university household. Amongst the students' love affairs and political agitations, Orph follows his own lonely and menacing course towards the greatest misunderstanding of all.