Following a degree in English literature and Russian language at the University of Sheffield, Sam Oates was recently drafted in to London to work as a publishing assistant, or an assistant publisher, at Peter Owen. He was born in Hong Kong around the time the Berlin Wall came down, raised in South Africa during Nelson Mandela’s presidency, but came of age in his provincial home of Cheltenham, where, owing to the literary predilections of the town—a pretty famous literature festival—he got a taste for reading, admiring authors from afar, and writing a few things of his own.