‘With every book I read — even a terrible book — I become a marginally better writer. Or a marginally different writer anyway.’

‘Translation is the deepest kind of reading. For the most part, I've only translated writers whose influence I was seeking.’

“Quite recently, someone messaged us to say that they’d received a copy of Lunate vol. 3, ‘which was a surprise as I hadn’t ordered one.’”

‘Anytime that someone is writing about their life, or something that happened to them, or even just telling a story to someone, there are distortions happening. There’s necessarily going to be a very subjective view of things.’

‘It’s impossible for me to write about how I translated Jordi Cussà’s Cavalls salvatges without thinking of The Fall’s ‘How I Wrote Elastic Man’. At the end of the day, did I translate Cavalls salvatges? Did I write Wild Horses? Was it a combination of the two? Does anyone even give a shit?’

Lunate contributors and friends share their favourite books of 2022

Lunate contributors and friends share their favourite books of 2021

‘Don’t make the mistake of sending work out all the time, feverishly trying to be published and looking at other people getting published and feeling left behind. You should have your work out there, but you shouldn't do it based on some sort of numbers game.’

‘When you publish your novel, there’s a little death in it: which is to say it ceases being yours, and it starts being everyone else's. So you mourn it a little bit when you're finished, and you give it away.’

‘When I take a story I always warn the writer that it could be awaiting publication for a long time. Sometimes I do actively go looking for a story to fit with another and that’s obviously tricky.’

‘I like to think I’m funny. Irina’s voice was originally a lot more like mine. In the very, very draft stages she was much more self-deprecating, infused with anxiety, a surface-level self-loathing.’