The Man on the Train (The Rhys Davies Short Story Competition Anthology)

Selected by Cynan Jones. Edited by Elaine Canning. With a foreword by Cynan Jones. Twelve compelling, original stories about friendship, family, fragility and love from the winners of the 2025 Rhys Davies Short Story Award. An unnamed man travels towards Aberystwyth after twenty years, wrestling with his own internal thought processes punctuated by childhood memories; a young woman adopts a fern baby while another befriends a giant African land snail; a group of men and one woman gather at Friday club to hear Eirwyn’ s wolf story; and a class of boys find themselves with their recently engaged teacher in Craig y Ddinas for a climbing expedition. A small unspoilt island is infiltrated by a ketchup-obsessed business man promising tourism income; and unemployed thirty-year-old Bonita challenges her neighbourhood’ s fixation with lemon trees. These are stories which transport the reader across place and time, illuminating environmental challenges, our relationship with the natural world and the impact of new, unexpected worlds. Stories by: Ralph Bolland; Alan Bryant; Miranda Davies; Jonathan Edwards; Sybilla Harvey; Natalie Ann Holborow; Sian Hughes; Kate Lockwood Jefford; Keza