If you wanted to pick a strong contender for the author of the most exciting new fiction in the UK, it would have to be Benjamin Myers. An outsider to the traditional literary scene, his electrifying books include Beastings, Pig Iron and The Gallows Pole – all three put out by a small Northern indie publisher and all of which won major prizes. Joining them, and demonstrating the same blazing talent is his new novel, Cuddy. And if you think an experimental novel about a medieval Northern saint might not be for you, think again: Cuddy is a tender, fierce, beautiful and absolutely original book that weaves stories from four historical periods into a breathtaking whole.
Benjamin comes from Durham, where ‘Cuddy’ – or St Cuthbert, to give him his proper name – is still a revered local saint.
‘I grew up two or three miles outside the city, so I was always aware of the figure of Saint Cuthbert and about five years ago I realised I wanted to write something about Durham Cathedral, this amazing building I grew up seeing from a distance,’ he says. ‘And I wanted to write about Lindisfarne, and it was how to put the two together. And Cuthbert was obvious. I started writing what became book four first and went backwards, did lots
