Freeman's Arrival: The Best New Writing on Arrival

By John Freeman, Haruki Murakami, David Mitchell and Dave Eggers

We live today in constant motion, travelling distances rapidly, small ones daily, arriving in new states. In this inaugural edition of Freeman's, a new biannual of unpublished writing, former Granta editor and NBCC president John Freeman brings together the best new fiction, nonfiction, and poetry about that electrifying moment when we arrive.

Strange encounters abound. David Mitchell meets a ghost in Hiroshima Prefecture; Lydia Davis recounts her travels in the exotic territory of the Norwegian language; and in a Dave Eggers story, an elderly gentleman cannot remember why he brought a fork to a wedding.

End points often turn out to be new beginnings. Louise Erdrich visits a Native American cemetery that celebrates the next journey, and in a Haruki Murakami story, an ageing actor arrives back in his true self after performing a role, discovering he has changed, becoming a new person.

Featuring startling new fiction by Laura van den Berg, Helen Simpson, and Tahmima Anam, as well as stirring essays by Aleksandar Hemon, Barry Lopez, and Garnette Cadogan, Freeman's announces the arrival of an essential map to the best new writing in the world.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Atlantic Books
• Release date: Oct 15, 2015
• ISBN: 9781611859621

John Freeman

John Freeman is a highly experienced professional photographer and the author of several books on photography, including Collins Digital SLR Handbook and Need to Know? Digital SLR Photography. John has a regular column in What Digital Camera? and Digital Camera magazines, and his work can be viewed at his frequent exhibitions and on his website.

Reviews for Freeman's Arrival

[lisapeet · Rating: 5 out of 5 stars]

I read this as an e-galley, which means I missed out on all the lovely journal experience—the handsome cover, the way pieces look on the page of those nice perfect-bound volumes. But I liked the content very much, and would definitely consider getting hold of the next in the series. There's a bit of a Granta v2.0 sensibility in a good way—strong, eclectic global writing—but, other than a series of short pieces at the beginning, there are fewer "name" writers and more new(ish) talent. And very global representation, much less of Granta's Brit-centricity.I like a lot of the choices he made in terms of tempo, up to and including ending it with a longish, dryish piece by Lydia Davis on teaching herself Norwegian by reading a 400-plus page experimental Norwegian novel from start to finish. That piece is really kind of marvelous, very meta, because the more she goes on about getting pulled into the minutiae of the language the more the reader gets pulled into the minutiae of her process... it's one of those essays that shouldn't work but does. At least it did for me—it'll probably put off people looking for a more breezy, popular kind of essay. Maybe that's why he put it at the end, so you can just put the journal down if it's not for you and not miss the rest. But I thought it was a slow starter but neat. And the rest of the journal is a lot of fun.Also: new-to-me essayist Garnette Cadogan. I will definitely be looking for more from him.