Nightshift - A Novel

"Once again, we have arrived at our favorite topic: fraught female friendship. This time it's young women working nights at crappy jobs in 90s London. You'll rip through this, reading through the night, as fixated on the story as Ladner's characters are fixated on each other." ?Glamour
A riveting debut novel of complex female friendship and obsession, following one young woman's decision to abandon her normal life and join the otherworldly, nocturnal existence of London's nightshift workers.
RECOMMENDED BY GLAMOUR * NYLON * BUSTLE * THE MILLIONS * LIT HUB * DEBUTIFUL * CRIMEREADS
When twenty-three-year-old Meggie meets her distant and enigmatic new coworker Sabine, she recognizes in her the person she would like to be. Meggie is immediately drawn to worldly, beautiful, and uninhibited Sabine; and when Sabine announces she's switching to the nightshift, Meggie impulsively decides to follow her. Giving up her daytime existence, her reliable boyfriend, and the trappings of a normal life, Meggie finds a liberating sense of freedom as she indulges her growing preoccupation with Sabine and plunges into another existence, immersing herself in the transient and uncertain world of the nightshift worker.
While the city sleeps, she passes the hours at work clipping crime stories from the next day's newspapers. The liminal hours between night and day are spent haunting deserted bars and nightclubs with her eclectic coworkers and going on increasingly wild adventures with Sabine. Yet the closer she gets to Sabine, the more Sabine seems to push her away, leaving Meggie desperately trying to hold on to their intense friendship while doubting if she truly knows her friend at all.
A fresh twist on the coming of age story and a dark love letter to city life, Nightshift explores the thin line between self-invention and self-destruction, as Meggie's sleep deprivation, drinking, and fixation with Sabine gain a momentum all their own. Vividly set in late-nineties London and framed by Meggie's present-day reflections, Nightshift is a captivating and moving debut that asks profound questions about who we are and if we can truly escape ourselves.

About the author

As a child, Kiare Ladner wanted to live on a farm, run an orphanage, and be onstage. As an adult, she found herself working for academics, with prisoners, and on nightshifts. Her short stories have been published in anthologies and broadcast on BBC Radio 4. Nightshift is her first novel, written while studying for a Ph.D. She grew up in South Africa and lives in London.

Summary

A riveting debut novel of complex female friendship and obsession, following one young woman’s decision to abandon her normal life and join the otherworldly, nocturnal existence of London’s nightshift workers.
“A firecracker of a book—toxic, sexy, pacey and packed with humor. It's a long time since I read something so gloriously nihilistic, and I won’t be forgetting it anytime soon.” — Elizabeth Macneal, internationally bestselling author of The Doll Factory
RECOMMENDED BY NYLON * BUSTLE * THE MILLIONS * LIT HUB * DEBUTIFUL * CRIMEREADS
When twenty-three-year-old Meggie meets her distant and enigmatic new coworker Sabine, she recognizes in her the person she would like to be. Meggie is immediately drawn to worldly, beautiful, and uninhibited Sabine; and when Sabine announces she’s switching to the nightshift, Meggie impulsively decides to follow her. Giving up her daytime existence, her reliable boyfriend, and the trappings of a normal life, Meggie finds a liberating sense of freedom as she indulges her growing preoccupation with Sabine and plunges into another existence, immersing herself in the transient and uncertain world of the nightshift worker.
While the city sleeps, she passes the hours at work clipping crime stories from the next day’s newspapers. The liminal hours between night and day are spent haunting deserted bars and nightclubs with her eclectic coworkers and going on increasingly wild adventures with Sabine. Yet the closer she gets to Sabine, the more Sabine seems to push her away, leaving Meggie desperately trying to hold on to their intense friendship while doubting if she truly knows her friend at all.
A fresh twist on the coming of age story and a dark love letter to city life, Nightshift explores the thin line between self-invention and self-destruction, as Meggie’s sleep deprivation, drinking, and fixation with Sabine gain a momentum all their own. Vividly set in late-nineties London and framed by Meggie’s present-day reflections, Nightshift is a captivating and moving debut that asks profound questions about who we are and if we can truly escape ourselves.

Additional text

“Ladner’s gritty debut looks at the fringes of human functionality and underworld London, ultimately asking if we can escape ourselves by becoming someone else.”

Product details

• Authors: Kiare Ladner
• Publisher: Harper Collins Usa
• Languages: English
• Product format: Hardback
• Released: 28.02.2022
• EAN: 9780063138247
• ISBN: 978-0-06-313824-7
• No. of pages: 256
• Dimensions: 140 mm x 210 mm x 23 mm
• Subjects: Fiction > Narrative literature; WOMEN'S LITERATURE: LITERATURE/FICTION, FICTION: Literary, FICTION: Women, LITERATURE: WOMEN'S LITERATURE, FICTION: Coming of Age, FICTION: Psychological, FICTION: Horror / General