Sweet Tooth and Other Stories

Almost a novel-in-stories, this collection is a complex, warmly rendered portrait of gey men and women navigating—both internally and externally—relationships and feelings in Turkey from the 1980s through the aughts. An outstanding and stellar collection.

~Lisa Williams, poet and series editor of the University Press of Kentucky New Poetry and Prose Series

With clear, spare prose, these stories are told with both great immediacy and tenderness. A stellar debut.

~Scott Alexander Hess, author of A Season in Delhi

Sweet Tooth is that rare linked collection with the emotional heft of an epic novel. With great insight, compassion, and artistry, Serkan Görkemli traces his queer protagonists over three decades, across the small towns and big cities of Turkey, as they navigate the shifting landscapes of their country and their hearts, from childhood recognition to mature love. I savored its bittersweet offerings and was left craving for more.

~Nawaaz Ahmed, author of PEN/Faulkner finalist Radiant Fugitives

Serkan Görkemli's delicately crafted stories limn the lives of four Turkish queer characters, from the 1980s through the early 21st century, as they weave in and out of each other's orbits and the era's social and political upheavals. On their journeys from youth to adulthood, they collide with their culture's construct of masculinity but still manage to navigate identity, desire, and relationships. Görkemli's prose is sometimes spare, often funny, and always quietly shimmering. A beautiful collection.

~Paula Martinac, award-winning author of The Ada Decades and Testimony