Roy is skilled at creating character. Protagonists’ behaviour is motivated and realistic, and excellent interactions take place, particularly in stories of male friendship. Roy delivers characters who brush past, avoid, stalk, and crash into one another. A community nurse referred to in passing in one story surfaces later in a starring role. A man still in love with his ex-girlfriend buys a motorbike from a widow whose husband ‘dropped off the twig before he got a chance to ride it’. A later story, the honest and touching ‘Carwash’, shows the man’s grieving son who never rode with his dad on the Yamaha. Roy is interested in universal topics like race, religion, death, and love.

Some stories stand out. ‘The Driver’is a confident tale of three idiotic boys on an out-of-control escapade. ‘Vulture Days’rings true. ‘Godwin’s Law’ starts with standard pies and chips at a football match but takes an unexpected turn to reinforce a key theme of City – we barely know the people closest to us. The collection gathers pace in the second half. Unfortunately, the book is slow to start. Weak early stories like ‘Three Dates’ and ‘Uriah’s Son’ are unlikely to engage young-adult readers. Not everyone’s story is memorable, but City is very readable.