Mr Outside. This item is unavailable.Mr Outside

Shortlisted for the Society of Authors 2026 Encore Award

During a time of restricted movement, the narrator of Mr Outside visits his reclusive father Thomas who is packing up to move into a care home. As father and son grapple with the task, long-buried conflicts resurface. Thomas, a poet and former radical priest, slips between affection and fear, while the narrator struggles to find the words he’s been holding back. Yet amidst confusion and grief, moments of humour and connection emerge, as both men discover new ways to understand each other and let go.

Told through a striking combination of text and image, Klaces’ distilled novel explores the stories we tell about our lives, the limits of intimacy, and the fragile line between reality and delusion. Based on the life of his own father, Mr Outside is poignant, profound, and unexpectedly funny; a tender meditation on endings, the limits of understanding, and the act of letting go.

Caleb Klaces is the author of the novel Fatherhood, which won a Northern Writers Award and was longlisted for the Republic of Consciousness Prize, and the poetry collections Away From Me and Bottled Air, which won an Eric Gregory Award and the Melita Hume Prize. He grew up in Birmingham.