"An extraordinary writer... seductive, brilliant, and precious, her talent glitters."
Toni Morrison

“... combine[s] the coolly interrogative gaze of the outsider with an insider’s intimate warmth.”
J.M. Coetzee

The appearance of Zoë Wicomb’s first set of short stories, You Can’t Get Lost in Capetown, precipitated the founding of a fan club that has come to include Toni Morrison, J.M. Coetzee, Bharati Mukherjee, Gayatri Chakravorty Spivak, and the New York Times, the London Times, the Wall Street Journal, TLS and the New Yorker.

The One That Got Away straddles dual worlds. An array of characters inhabits a complexly interconnected, twenty-first century universe. The author explores a range of human relationships: marriage, friendship, family ties, and relations with those who serve us. Wicomb’s fluid, shifting technique questions conventional certainties and makes for exhilarating reading, full of ironic twists, ambiguities, and moments of startling insight.

Zoë Wicomb was born in South Africa and now lives in Glasgow. She is currently a professor in the department of English studies at Strathclyde University and Visiting Professor at Stellenbosch University, South Africa. In addition to two collections of short stories, she has published two novels, David’s Story and Playing in the Light. She has recently been one of the judges on the IMPAC literary award.