'I remain deeply troubled by June Caldwell's debut collection of short stories' TLS, Books of the Year. 'If Dubliners was a realist masterpiece, Room Little Darker is its hyper-realist counterpart, applying Joyce's stated rubric of scrupulous meanness to the city's contemporary inhabitants, and a future that's approaching all too fast' Frankie Gaffney, Irish Times. 'Caldwell climbs headfirst and bare-arsed into the helter-skelter flames and extracts a menagerie of perversion, malevolence and deviance she is only too happy to unleash upon her unsuspecting readership ... Often amusing, always tough, living and breathing [the] lyrical directness and wildly leaping humour [are] an everpresent gift to the reader' Alan McMonagle, Irish Times. 'Caldwell brings an ultraviolet gaze to bear on the grubbiness of human hurt and the cruelty of desire' Elske Rahill, Irish Times. 'A glitteringly dark collection of short stories, one of the best in recent years' Irish Times. 'Pure class short stories with a bang of dark off them' Blindboy Boatclub. 'A number of Irish debut short story collections were published this year; standouts were June Caldwell's Room Little Darker and Elske Rahill's eagerly anticipated In White Ink' Irish Times. 'A dark debut story collection of jet-black gems' Irish Times. 'A supercharged gothic debut from an Irish writer to watch' Guardian. 'The most important Irish short story collection since Dubliners' Spiked. 'Fiercely inventive' Irish Times. 'A work more attentive to - and understanding of - the terrible derangements of simply being alive I have not read in a long time' Ian Samson, Guardian.