About Helen Oyeyemi: Helen Olajumoke Oyeyemi is a British novelist. In 2013 she was included in the Granta Best Of Young British Novelists list.
First you try to find a reason, try to understand what you've done so wrong so you can be sure not to do it anymore. After that you look for signs of a Jekyll and Hyde situation, the good and the bad in a person sifted into separate compartments by s...
I think her favorite thing about our . . . collaboration was her actor and musician friends rubbing shoulders with my academic colleagues, she liked the atmosphere of challenge, the way anything that came under discussion could be claimed or rejected...
And I think I decided not to love Charlie because I thought I had to be rescued. For practical reasons but also as a proof of love. It's better that Charlie and I didn't make an automatic transaction, love exchanged for rescue. All you can do after t...
All through dinner Arturo and I held hands under the table like a couple of kids, and that made the dinner quite wonderful, even though Mrs. Fletcher kept staring at Olivia as though committing her to memory. It got so bad that Olivia turned to her h...
No, this is pretty much the same version I read," I said, because it felt too damn late to back down. I imagine that from time to time some similar situation has led governments to declare war." pg.57
Because he says he can't stand you and you act like you can't stand him, and whenever a man and a woman behave like that toward each other, it usually means something's going on.
It was one of those ones they call screwball comedies, where people mislead and ill-treat each other in the most shocking and baffling way possible, then forgive and forget about it because they happen to like the look of each other. Only they call i...
Imagine having a mother who worries that you read too much. The question is, what is it that's supposed to happen to people who read too much? How can you tell when someone's crossed the line.
School is one long illness with symptoms that switch every five minutes so you think it's getting better or worse. But really it's the same thing for years and years.
It was snowing when I got off the bus at Flax Hill. Not quite regular snowfall, not exactly a blizzard. This is how it was: The snow came down heavily, settled for about a minute, then the wind moved it - more rolled it, really - onto another target....
I drew a chair up beside her and sang. All I do is dream of you the whole night through . . . It was a horrible rendition, and I quite enjoyed attempting it, setting the notes free from the song as each one went farther and farther astray.
I don't think my writing has much to do with my age. For me, my biography is more about what I was reading at what age. It's more of an intellectual thing of wanting to be free to write and think without being too bound by categorisation. I don't thi...
I do love Shirley Jackson, but I don't deserve to be named in connection with her. I remember reading 'The Haunting of Hill House' and having goosebumps for hours. The way she builds narrative pressure in that book is just amazing. I think you could ...
Finally, he smiled, and although his smile was bumpy because some of his teeth were jagged and broken, it was a warming, infectious smile that was reflected in his eyes. It made her smile widely in return. She felt as if the room had been lit up. He ...
So she quit working to make sense of things— we don’t realise it, but it’s hard work we do almost every waking moment, building out thoughts and memories and actions around time, things that happened yesterday, and things that are happening rig...
What do you want, Mary Foxe? My husband?" “I believe in him," she said slowly. I wondered if she’d ever told him that, and if so, what he had to say about it. Someone you made up turns around and tells you they believe in you— what response cou...
… there’s a difference between having no one because you’ve chosen it and having no one because everyone has been taken away.
She encouraged herself to see her very small presence in the world as a good thing, a power, something that a hero might possess.
And without further argument he unsheathed the sword and cleaved Miss Foxe's head from her neck. He knew what was supposed to happen. He knew that this awkward, whispering creature before him should now transform into a princess - dazzlingly beautifu...
I’m never sad when a friend goes far away, because whichever city or country that friend goes to, they turn the place friendly. They turn a suspicious-looking name on the map into a place where a welcome can be found. Maybe the friend will talk abo...
