They say you can tell the gender of your unborn baby from the way your stomach sits, how your body changes, how big your nose grows. I found out I was carrying an adult woman when the interior decor of my uterus became comprised of orange linoleum tiling and ineffectual fans, velvet upholstered three-seaters and marble countertops.

Helena Pantsis’ surreal short story collection explores the plights of womanhood through the lens of mothers and the children of mothers. In 21 stories of the strange and the uncanny, Mother Salad unravels the image of the woman in shambles, identity fractured and exploring a world which has long abandoned the creature it so carefully constructed, betrayed by the very people she has been taught to trust.

‘Pantsis upends expectations on the narratives that society feeds us and how they manifest in our psyche over time. A searing and unique collection of startling originality.’ – Emily Tsokos Purtill