Martin Hughes quietly launched Affirm Press in 2007 with the publication of the Slow Guides to Melbourne and Sydney. The Slow Guides aim to 'celebrate all that’s local, natural, traditional and sensory' about life in our cities. They explore different aspects of local lifestyle and character with attention to the finer details. And the response has been great, with the expansion of the series internationally in 2010, co-producing Slow London and Slow Dublin with Hardie Grant, another great local independent publishing house.

Affirm has followed the Slow Guides with an eclectic selection of titles from some great local authors, focusing on building a strong and dynamic publishing space for new and emerging writers. In 2009, they announced the Long Story Shorts initiative, a commitment to publish six individual collections of stories by new Australian writers. The first of which arrived in store this week: Bob Franklin's Under Stones.

Franklin's stories are taken from the everyday, but with a keen eye for the cool shadows that lurk just below the surface, swaying eerily into the surreal and back again, without losing their grounding in reality . In 'Hell Hath no Fury...' a man-boy whose partner wants him to grow up, finds the world around him become literally run by children. In 'Traitors Bay' a frightened young mother, battles with demons brought on by her alcoholic husband and his shady dealings. With clear and unnerving prose, Franklin creates a sense of unease, of the uncanny, that lingers long after you have turned the page.

Nineteen Seventysomething by Barry Divola, the next title in the series, is due out in March. And I'm already hearing some excellent advance reviews.

It looks like Affirm is onto something local and something good.