Send Nudes: By the winner of the BBC National Short Story Award 2022

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What do you know about it, small fry? says Blue. She calls the man over. You fancy buying us a drink? she says, when he arrives.

SELECTED FOR STYLIST'S BOOKS YOU CAN'T MISS IN 2022 - 'A MUST READ' 'An exhilarating debut' GUARDIAN Saba Sams has won the 17th BBC National Short Story Award for "Blue 4eva", a story about sexual identity, agency, power and class, taken from her debut collection Send Nudes (Bloomsbury). I remember having to reel myself in quite a lot, having to resist making my characters too jaded, too weak, or too mean. It was an experiment in suspending judgement, in recognising that there’s always a reason for the way a person behaves.I make the assumption that the stories are well received because they have drawn attention from a new, and different, reading demographic. I’m guessing that this would be predominantly young, and probably female……The protagonist in every single story is young, and female. My favorite aspect is that every women we meet puts herself first, no matter the situation she's in. Whether it's difficult family situation, a new boyfriend and his sweet dog, or shooting a nude photo - these (disaster) women are in control. Speirs added: “We loved the freshness and the spirit in the writing of ’Blue 4eva’ – Saba Sams not only brilliantly captures the nuances of blended family dynamics, the jealousies and stresses, the efforts and the rejections, but she gives her young women credible and laudable agency and energy.

The dress is made of velour in a muted gold colour. Stella puts it on in her bedroom, and Blue tightens the spaghetti straps by tying them in knots on Stella’s shoulders. On Blue, the dress would have been shin-length, but on Stella it trails the floor, and she has to lift it every time she takes a step. Everyone laughs at that, apart from Jasmine. Stella laughs so hard she nearly falls off her chair. When the laughter dies down, Jasmine’s looking right at her. At the villa, Stella sits on the veranda with the adults while Jasmine and Blue shower and get ready to go out. It’s almost like before Blue arrived: Claire leafing through a book, Frank loading a new film into his camera. He puts the previous canister carefully into his bag, and lets out a long, low whistle.In fact, Stella’s school made a point not to set homework on the computer. When Stella found out about the holiday, it was the first time she used the desktop for anything other than video games. She looked up the island and sat for hours, hovering her mouse over the images. She didn’t go downstairs again all evening, and Jasmine left without saying goodbye. The water looked so clear Stella could see the shadows of the boats on the sand at the bottom of the sea. She thought that when she swam in it, she’d be able to watch the fish drifting beneath her, an aquarium without the glass. In Tinderloin and Snakebite your protagonists find their animal companions to be more dependable than the humans they invest in. Is this a reflection of their age or are adult relationships just as unreliable? I was not expecting this book. I read it because of the cover, and found an amazing collection of short stories that really surprised me. The winner of 2022 BBC National Short Story Award was announced this week as London-based writer, Saba Sams. Following the announcement , we spoke to her about ‘Blue 4eva’– the winning story. The list is completed by three international writers: Ireland’s Sara Baume, Australia’s Robbie Arnott, and Nigeria’s Arinze Ifeakandu.

Light comes through the sun roof and shows a faint, dark moustache on Blue’s upper lip. Only a few weeks ago, Stella noticed her own in the zoom-in mirror that Frank has in the bathroom, and used his razor to shave it off. Jasmine blushes even more then. She has her eyes on her empty plate, and she looks to Stella like she might start to cry. Nico is smiling a little, amused.Sams was presented with the prize on 4th October by chair of judges Elizabeth Day at a ceremony at BBC Broadcasting House. The news was announced live on BBC Radio 4’s "Front Row". Stella’s mother married Jasmine’s father in February. Stella was twelve, Jasmine was eighteen. For their honeymoon, Claire and Frank went to Costa Rica. Stella and Jasmine weren’t invited. When they returned home, Frank announced that he’d booked three weeks in a villa on the smallest island in the Balearics, to make up for it. Jasmine was over from her mother’s. Claire had baked a lemon drizzle. Stella only knows such details because Frank has told her. Frank is obsessed with his photography equipment. The day before they caught their flight out here, Stella watched him line up his camera, lenses and film canisters in the rectangle of light coming in through his bedroom window before taking a photograph of them on his phone. Blue gives a twirl. Stella knows that most grown women in that outfit would look crazy, but Blue manages to pull it off.