WHAT IT MEANS WHEN A MAN FALLS FROM THE SKY

230pp., paperback, Reprint, London, (2017) 2018. R215

Winner of the 2017 Kirkus Prize and the New York Public Library Young Lions Award.

Lesley Nneka Arimah's debut collection of short stories.

“Completely captivating…Arimah explores the depth of the human experience through eccentric protagonists, unexpected plots, and exceptional storytelling. It’s a global perspective of what Blackness looks like and how the experience of Black women is inherently alike, whether you’re in Nigeria or Chicago.” Ebony

“Strange and wonderful… a witty, oblique and mischievous storyteller, Arimah can compress a family history into a few pages and invent utopian parables, magical tales and nightmare scenarios while moving deftly between comic distancing and insightful psychological realism ... her science fiction parables, with their ecological and feminist concerns, recall those of Margaret Atwood. But it would be wrong not to hail Arimah’s exhilarating originality: She is conducting adventures in narrative on her own terms, keeping her streak of light, that bright ember, burning fiercely, undimmed.” New York Times Book Review

“With her luminous debut collection, Lesley Nneka Arimah marks her richly deserved place in contemporary fiction. At the center of each impeccably written story, Arimah offers up a new kind of yearning - for love, for peace, for comfort, for home. Never have needful things been so gorgeously displayed.” Roxane Gay, author of Bad Feminist and Difficult Women

Lesley Nneka Arimah was born in the UK and grew up in Nigeria and the United States. Her work has received grants and awards from Commonwealth Writers, the Elizabeth George Foundation, The MacDowell Colony, Breadloaf and she is the recipient of an O'Henry Award. She lives in Minneapolis.