Polly Barton in conversation with Nell Osborne

We are very excited to welcome Polly Barton for an evening of conversation with Nell Osborne at Lala Books, to celebrate the Polly's debut novel What Am I, A Deer?

Polly Barton is a writer and literary translator from the Japanese. Her translations include Butter by Asako Yuzuki, Hunchback by Saou Ichikawa, Where the Wild Ladies Are by Aoko Matsuda and There’s No Such Thing as an Easy Job by Kikuko Tsumura. She has published two works of non-fiction, Fifty Sounds, for which she won the 2019 Fitzcarraldo Editions Essay Prize, and Porn: An Oral History.

Polly Barton’s formidable debut novel What Am I, A Deer? renders the paradoxes of modern life in all its complexity, in deliriously self-conscious prose that is at once propulsive, titillating and bitingly funny. Echoing with the sounds of Whitney Houston and The Cure, reaching for the sublime in dark, sweaty boxes, What Am I, A Deer? is an exhilarating exploration of authenticity, fantasy, romance and intoxication.

Nell Osborne is a poet, novelist and researcher of experimental women’s writing. Her debut novel, Ghost Driver (Moist Books, 2025), won the Queen Mary Small Press Fiction Prize in 2026.

Tickets include complimentary drinks. If you want to attend but are unable to afford this event right now, please email us at hello@lalabooks.london. We have a limited number of free tickets and books available under our community pay it forward scheme.