Cosmos — Lucia Odoom

Out this month from Daunt Books, translated from the Danish by Hunter Simpson. Odoom is Danish-Ghanaian, a music critic at Politiken, granddaughter of a man who left Ghana for Denmark in the sixties. Her debut is built entirely from WhatsApp messages: Cosmos, a bottle collector sleeping in Copenhagen parks, writing to his sister, his aunt and his pastor back in Woe. No replies are included — he is working the world out for himself as much as describing it. He meets Elizabeth in an African hair salon. Then he disappears. A novella about needing to be of use to people you cannot reach.