Use the Words You Have

A literary romance like no other – Kimberly Campanello’s debut novel unfurls over a hot Breton summer as American student K embarks on a love affair with a local.

Barred from using English by their French programme, the other Americans’ identities flicker and fade. Yet for K this dissolution opens space for profound transformation.

Heady and poetic, erotic and intelligent, this is a coming-of-age tale that reveals how coming-of-age – at its pinnacle – means coming alive. Alive to touch and taste, pleasure and ecstasy. To the sea, the sun and eternity.

Advanced Praise for Use the Words You Have...

'I love what this novel does with language... Read it like you'd eat a melting ice cream.'—Daisy Hildyard

‘A moving meditation on the capacity of language and love to shape us… saturated in sun and salt water, drenched in heat and longing.’—Jessica Andrews

‘Eroticism here is as much about discovering another’s body as it is about discovering the body through language. It’s Rimbaud, it’s Hélène Cixous, even a touch of Claudia Durastanti. But Campanello is entirely her own here.’—Jason Allen-Paisant

‘Composed in a delicate, aching space between nostalgia and desire, between the past and eternity, Use the Words You Have shimmers like light on a sea recollected across decades.’—Rob Doyle

‘It’s been a complete pleasure to read this… The restraint, clarity and precision of the writing is faultless.’—Joanna Walsh

© 2025 Somesuch Editions (Ebook): 9781999789275

Release date

Ebook: 23 June 2025