Home Ground: New Writing Inspired by the 2017 Homeless World Cup in Glasgow

Many of the pieces in this anthology tackle homelessness as a theme, but homelessness is never the whole story. Instead these pieces are about individual people in their own unique circumstances, and all the joys, tragedies and hopes that propel their lives. It is a collection grounded in Glasgow, although many stories take us further afield, to Paris and Orkney and Southern Sudan. Streets that are familiar as old friends appear here in new guises, as the site of a new life, or of neglect and death, or of raucous fun, or of the memories that make us who we are. Our city has many facets. As do the buildings we live in, if we’re lucky enough to have a roof over our heads. Houses here are sometimes safe and warm, and sometimes full of risk. Some characters are chancing everything for their hopes and dreams, others are confronting the demons that lurk inside us and inside our families. Home ground emerges as a complicated idea. Even the manicured pitch of a professional football field may not be as solid as it looks.