Lanny

It's an experimental prose poem, but it's so carefully structured. Dead Papa Toothwort seems a weird indulgence, the snippets of conversation he overheads curling on the page as we eavesdrop on the small village. “Pretty in a smudgy kind of way / all pumped up and shiny like a greased pig / cheers for that Ma, stout gives me the runs / jaunty little bit of topiary / godless, ferret-handling maniac / Mark smelt of rivers, we don't welcome hobbyists Malcolm.”

But Toothwort is necessary to frame the story Max Porter wants to tell. It's a fairy tale for the modern era. (And just as short) Lanny is a precocious child, his parents letting him exist in his sun-dappled world, free to let his imagination wander or they are negligent, bordering on irresponsible and even worse, opportunistic.