Send Nudes by Saba Sams

A simple, sharp and chaotic collection of stories, exploring family, friendship, belonging and sexual tension

Book Review by Heather McDaid | 01 Feb 2022
  • Send Nudes
Book title: Send Nudes
Author: Saba Sams

Stories circling the complexities and contradictions of girlhood are not hard to come by. We tread fiction’s line between innocence and being forced to grow up too quickly, being our own person vs being the person the world contorts you into, forcing readers to consider real-life tendrils they draw from. In Send Nudes, we dive into these complexities without apology.

Each of Sams' ten stories is packed with a feeling. They are simple but often chaotic, exploring sexual tension, belonging, friendship and connections to family in such an assured way. There’s an ease to these stories, present and affecting, that makes them almost a pain to move on from. Take the title story, where after a back and forth, photos are sent, conversations moved on from without a look over the shoulder – the world does not end, it merely continues in whichever path is chosen. It feels like a triumph for the protagonist, and then we are onto the next.

Send Nudes is a collection of such snapshots. Glimpses of a life. They welcome you into a feeling, a moment, and then walk through the door to the future, willing your imagination to follow and do the rest. Bus stop conversations, canine affinity, the buzz of festival life – the brilliance lies not in the big life-altering moments, but these fragments in which they’re captured. A punchy, sharp collection.


Bloomsbury, out now, £14.99