Alphabetical Diaries

Sheila Heti kept a record of her thoughts over a ten-year period, then arranged the sentences from A to Z. In the vein of Joe Brainard’s I Remember and Edouard Levé’s Autoportrait, passionate and reflective, joyful and despairing, these are the alphabetical diaries.

‘Sheila Heti keeps transforming my idea of writing. Her Alphabetical Diaries isn’t just dirty and funny and poignant; it reproposes everything you thought about a self and the way time passes.’ 
— Adam Thirlwell, author of The Future Future

‘Alphabetical Diaries is a testament to Heti’s artistic power. She gently leads the reader into new dimensions of language previously undiscovered. Beautiful and uncompromising.’
— Marlowe Granados, author of Happy Hour

'A book that is in many ways is an ode to the sentence; from the muscle of single line to the power that comes with accrual. An immersive and hugely entertaining read.'
— Sinéad Gleeson author of Constellations

‘I am drawn to Sheila Heti’s writing like a moth to a flame and Alphabetical Diaries is amongst the most affecting, exquisite books I’ve ever encountered. It is, simply put, utterly and startlingly good. Heti writes so creaturely, so bodily, that it feels like a whole new genre is being formed as we read.’
— Kerri ní Dochartaigh author of Cacophony of Bone

‘I’ll read anything Sheila Heti writes.’
— Lauren Oyler, author of Fake Accounts

‘Like Iris Murdoch’s novels, Heti’s are philosophically intense, although Heti's work is pared down where Murdoch's was Rabelaisian.’
— Dwight Garner, New York Times

‘By fragmenting and then formulaically rearranging these personal records, Heti has reinvigorated them as more than a journal, brought them to life as a fascinating book which highlights the consistency and inconsistencies of us all, how our minds flit from subject to subject to elsewhere. It is a warm-hearted, individual, exploration of what it is to be alive, what it is to be human.’
— Rupert Loydall, Tears in the Fence

• Publication Date: February 2024

• ISBN: 9781804270776

• Imprint: Fitzcarraldo

• Format: Paperback

• Pages: 168