New Times,
New Thinking.

Yara Rodrigues Fowler: “I wanted to disorient the Anglophone reader”

The author of the Goldsmiths Prize-shortlisted novel “there are more things” on revolutionary politics, Margery Kempe and cannibalising colonisers.

By Ellys Woodhouse

Yara Rodrigues Fowler is a British-Brazilian author and activist, born and raised in south London. In 2019 she was shortlisted for the Sunday Times young writer of the year award for her debut novel, Stubborn Archivist (Fleet), and she was named by the Financial Times as one of “the planet’s 30 most exciting young people”.

Her second novel, there are more things, is shortlisted for the 2022 Goldsmiths Prize. When Catarina moves into a rented flat in Mile End, east London, she finds little in common with her new roommate, Melissa, besides their Brazilian heritage but their friendship blooms as they experience the political turmoil of 2016. The story, written in vivid prose, spans continents and generations to ignite feelings of radical hope and give a glimpse at the possibility of a better future.

Subscribe to The New Statesman today for only £1 per week
Content from our partners
Securonomics? Don’t forget UK agriculture
The future of exams
Skills are the key to economic growth