I Am Heathcliff

16 modern fiction superstars shine a startling light on the romance and pain of the infamous literary pair Heathcliff and Cathy.

Short stories to stir the heart and awaken vital conversation about love.

Sixteen stories inspired by Wuthering Heights.

In ‘Terminus’ a young woman hides in an empty Brighton hotel; in ‘Thicker Than Blood’ a man sits in a hot tub stalking his newly-married love on social media; and in ‘A bird half-eaten’ an amateur boxer prepares for a match.

A woman recalls the ‘Heathcliffs I Have Known’ and the physical danger she has borne at their hands; in ‘Anima’ a child and a fox are unified in one startling moment of violence; and in ‘One Letter Different’ two teenagers walk the moors and face up to their respective buried secrets.

Curated by Kate Mosse and commissioned for Emily Brontë’s bicentenary year in 2018, these fresh, modern stories pulse with the raw beauty and pain of love and are as timely as they are illuminating.

The full list of contributors is:
Leila Aboulela, Hanan Al-Shaykh, Joanna Cannon, Alison Case, Juno Dawson, Louise Doughty, Sophie Hannah, Anna James, Erin Kelly, Dorothy Koomson, Grace McCleen, Lisa McInerney, Laurie Penny, Nikesh Shukla, Michael Stewart and Louisa Young.

Reviews

‘Inspired by Wuthering Heights, these tales of toxic relationships, an entirely disturbing episode of stalking and necrophilia, blighted lives and bleak landscapes reveal that contemporary responses to Emily Bronte’s endlessly controversial classic can be equally stark, cruel and shocking’ Daily Mail

‘Visceral writing that lays bare the savagery of Heathcliff’ Financial Times

‘Tales of toxic relationships, a hungry, howling, anorexic ghost, drug addled lovers and blighted lives and landscapes … But there are surprises in store, too. Crime writer Sophie Hannah delivers a high school musical murder mystery while Louisa Young’s Heathcliffs I Have Known is a furious, funny, riotous rant on the role of this supposedly romantic hero’ Sunday Express S Magazine

‘In the wonderful, wistful One Letter Different by Joanna Cannon, two teenagers head to the moors in silent, secretive communion’ Daily Mail

‘Louisa Young’s furious, funny, righteous rant redresses the ‘romantic’ hero myth as she recites the violent misdemeanours of bad boyfriends in Heathcliffs I Have Known’ Daily Mail

About the author

Kate Mosse is an international bestselling author with sales of more than five million copies in 38 languages. Her fiction includes the novels Labyrinth (2005), Sepulchre (2007), The Winter Ghosts (2009), Citadel (2012), and The Taxidermist’s Daughter (2014), as well as an acclaimed collection of short stories,The Mistletoe Bride & Other Haunting Tales (2013).

Kate is the Co-Founder and Chair of the Board of the Baileys Women’s Prize for Fiction (previously the Orange Prize) and in June 2013, was awarded an OBE in the Queen’s Birthday Honours List for services to literature. She lives in Sussex.