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HAPPY LAUNCH DAY!!! “Sherry and Sparkly” – Maureen Cullen & Patricia M Osborne

This is one that you won’t want to miss, as we say Happy Publication Day to Patricia and Maureen, with their Poetry Conversation ‘Sherry & Sparkly’ becoming officially available Today!

‘Sherry & Sparkly’ is officially released TODAY, and signed copies are already available direct from the poets, and would make a fantastic Christmas Pressie.

Proceeds from the sale of this book direct from Patricia and Maureen are to be donated to Cancer Research

You Can Order Signed Copies HERE

Maureen and Patricia grew up hundreds of miles from each other in different countries of the UK but share common experiences of childhood in the fifties and sixties when ice laced the inside of bedroom windows and corporal punishment was common in schools. They survived to become brides, mothers, career women and technophobes. Sometimes joyous, sometimes painful, these poems are a conversation about love, hope and identity.

Sherry & Sparkly is a Poetry Conversation between two fantastic poets – one you really want to listen in to.

Proceeds from the sale of this book direct from Patricia and Maureen is to be donated to Cancer Research

You Can Order Signed Copies HERE

About Maureen Cullen

MAUREEN CULLEN was born in West Dunbartonshire and now lives in Argyll and Bute. She is a retired social worker who specialised in fostering and adoption. In 2015, she gained an MA in Creative Writing from Lancaster University where she studied poetry and short fiction. She has been shortlisted in various competitions, including The Fish Short Story Prize and The Bristol Short Story Prize. In 2016, she was published by Nine Arches Press, along with three other poets, in Primers 1. She has poetry published in a range of magazines, including Shooter and The Interpreter’s House. Her current project is a collection of linked short stories based in a fictional town in the West of Scotland.

About Patricia M Osborne

Patricia M Osborne is married with grown-up children and grandchildren and lives in West Sussex. In 2019 she graduated with an MA in Creative Writing. She is a published novelist, poet and short story writer. Her short stories and poems have been published in various literary magazines and anthologies and the final instalment of her House of Grace family saga trilogy was published March 2021. Taxus Baccata and The Montefiore Bride (Poetry pamphlets) were published by The Hedgehog Poetry Press 2020.

She has a successful blog at Whitewingsbooks.com where she features other writers and poets. When Patricia isn’t working on her own writing, she enjoys sharing her knowledge, acting as a mentor to fellow writers.

You can contact Patricia via the following medias: –

Facebook:              Patricia M Osborne, Writer @triciaosbornewriter

Website:                 Whitewingsbooks.com

Twitter:                   Patricia M Osborne @PMOsborneWriter

Product details

  • Paperback : 32 pages
  • ISBN-13 : 978-1-913499-61-7
  • Product Dimensions : 14.81 x 0.18 x 21.01 cm
  • You Can Order Signed Copies HERE

 

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Lisa Lopresti Book Launch – Thursday 16th December

Well, top excitement here in Hogland, UK as we are astonishingly pleased to announce that Thursday the 16th of December sees the official launch of Lisa Lopresti’s wonderfilled debut collection, ‘ Bird Song and Nectar in the Silences.’

This is a stunning wee collection from a fantastic poet and the event to launch looks likely to be equally exceptional.

Full details are below, but Lisa will be joined by guest poets, Helen Sheppard, Pauline Sewards and Agata Palmer and there will be both an open mic and a bar – so it should be quite the event.

If you can’t make it on the night, you don’t have to miss out on a signed copy as they are available direct from Lisa HERE

Poetry Evening, Book Launch and Open Mic

Zion, Bishopsworth Road, Bedminster Down,  Bristol

 

An evening of Poetry and an Open Mic in a lovely venue. Guest poets, Helen Sheppard, Pauline Sewards and Agata Palmer, including Bristol Stanza members. Lisa Lopresti has her debut pamphlet launch of ‘ Bird Song and Nectar in the Silences’ with Hedgehog Poetry Press. Doors Open at 7.10pm and the event starts at 7.30pm with a bar available and nibbles provided. Please put your name down on the door for the open mic.

There will be some terrific gift bagged poetry books and bundles available from the evenings stall, so bring some retro money to grab a beautiful bargain, just in time for Christmas.

In light of recent events, the venue is hospitality but precautions will be made to include hand sanitizer, distancing tables and chairs as far as possible, providing individual finger foods and good ventilation, so wear your favourite woollies!

I would love to see so many people’s familiar faces and new ones too. Hope to see you there. – Lisa

Signed copies and ebook available from Lisa https://lisalopresti.bigcartel.com/ 

“Lisa Lopresti is a well-known and much loved Bristol poet. She frequently performed live before the Lockdowns and is a firm favourite of the BBC Radio Upload show with Adam Crowther. Her debut pamphlet is very welcome and is shows that her poems work just as well on the page as with her voice. Reading the pamphlet reminds me of going into a shop full of colourful, gauzy scarves with a variety of patterns. The poems are sensual, they sing with positivity although the pandemic is a presence in most of the work. Lisa’s particular skill is to present images which are beautiful but also surprising, with many references to the natural world. ‘You Never Cry Alone’ is packed with delightful, visual imagery almost to the point of exaggeration and builds up to a poignant ending. She also has a wry and witty take on the world for example ‘Virulence of Corvids’ can be read as a subtle analogy for the virus. The poems often take a surprising twist – Take the Stars – a poem about domestic contentment turns into a criticism of social media. The poems are detailed enough to feel grounded in personal experience but still keep a universal quality. They feel fresh. There are musical with subtle rhyme and word echoes. The title and the poem ‘Rose Bombs’ refer to work by the Iranian musician Maya Youssef and the collection for fills its strapline of being poetry for ‘ how we are and how we will be’.”

– Pauline Sewards – Poet, Spirograph (Burning Eye)

Order Signed Copies direct from Lisa Lopresti  HERE

 

About Lisa Lopresti

Lisa Lopresti (she/her) is a working class British poet from the English ship shape, statue toppling City of Bristol.  Her poetry has been regularly broadcast on BBC Radio Bristol with poems published, in magazines and anthologies such as ‘Acumen’, ‘Lyrically Justified V3’ for underrepresented voices and in ‘Voices Along the Road’ Charity Anthology for child refugees. An active poet at ‘Open Mics’ and a feature poet at several venues, Lisa has found this both terrifying and exhilarating. She likes to convey poems to portray, this life.

 

Product details

  • Paperback : 22 pages
  • ISBN-13 : 978-1-913499-49-5
  • Product Dimensions : 14.81 x 0.36 x 21.01 cm
  • Order Signed Copies direct from Lisa Lopresti  HERE
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Pre-Order “Reading The Landscape” – Carol McKay

Now Carol McKay is a special poet, a fantastic writer and I have to say that I am still astonished that we are getting to publish this fantastic collection of her work.

‘Reading The Landscape’ is launching in February, but you should be able to pre-order a signed copy direct from Carol using the link below.

Official Release Date: 16th February 2022

Order Signed Copies Direct From Carol McKay HERE

Brought together for the first time, these are poems about ancestry and addiction, about landscape and introspection, about walking in the natural world and reflecting on our own inner mindscapes. Sometimes meditative, sometimes tongue-in-cheek, they range from industrial Scotland to rural Cumbria and across the North Atlantic, taking the reader through geological and human concepts of time right up to the present moment.

 

Order Signed Copies Direct From Carol McKay HERE

‘I loved how accessible, they are, and how true. So much goes on beneath their shimmering surfaces. From a shell-littered west coast beach to overheard stories on a Kincardine bus, Carol McKay’s poetry is vividly and poignantly in touch with the things that matter – family, community, a sense of place and of history. These big-hearted, keen-eyed poems understand just how precarious life can be, and how thrilling.’

      • Chris Powici, author of This Weight of Light: poems, Red Squirrel Press, 2015.

‘Craft without ever seeming in any way laboured, tight but not overwrought. I love Carol’s use of the short line; the images she finds right outside her door and on long walks.’

      • Donal McLaughlin, author of beheading the virgin mary and other stories, Dalkey Archive.

About Carol McKay

Carol McKay’s poetry and short fiction have been published widely over the last twenty years in literary journals such as Gutter, Chapman, Mslexia and Wasafiri.

She won the Robert Louis Stevenson Fellowship in 2010, a Magnetic North ‘Space/Time’ residency in 2018, and was shortlisted for the Dinesh Allirajah Prize for Short Fiction in 2019.

Carol taught creative writing through The Open University between 2004 and 2018 and her website is www.carolmckay.co.uk

 

Product details

  • Paperback : 26 pages
  • ISBN-13 : 978-1-913499-62-4
  • Product Dimensions : 14.81 x 0.36 x 21.01 cm
  • Order Signed Copies Direct From Carol McKay HERE

 

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HAPPY LAUNCH DAY!!! “Bloom and Bones” – Rae Howells & Jean James

We are delighted to say that today is the Official Launch Day of Rae Howells and Jean James’ stunning poetry conversation, ‘Bloom & Bones.’

If you are yet to read this, now is a fantastic time to treat yourself – signed copies are still available – but be quick.

Be very quick…

You Can Order Signed Copies HERE

Bloom & Bones is a collaboration between Swansea poets Rae Howells and Jean James with colour at its heart.

In words rather than paint, the poets capture the shades of very different stories. From Georgia O’Keeffe to a murderer on the run, from a lonely woman in an insane asylum to goldfinches visiting an expectant mother, and from a plague of ladybirds to a meteoroid tracking through space, these poems take the reader on a rainbow journey through time and place.

The pamphlet is inspired by the bestselling book The Secret Lives of Colour, and works through the ten family colours set out in its pages, beginning with white, through yellow, orange, pink, red, purple, blue, green, and brown, concluding with a dark full stop at black.

You Can Order Signed Copies HERE

About Rae Howells

RAE HOWELLS is a poet, journalist, media academic and lavender farmer. She has colour-grapheme synaesthesia, which means she perceives words and numbers in colour, an effect that often influences her poetry. She has won both the Rialto and Welsh International poetry competitions and her work has featured in a wide range of journals, including Magma, Poetry Wales, The Rialto, New Welsh Review, Acumen, Envoi, Poetry Ireland, Black Bough, Marble and The Cardiff Review, as well as in the Poetry Business anthology, The Result is What You See Today. She can be heard reading her work at www.iambapoet.com/rae-howells and you can read more of her poetry and journalism at raehowells.co.uk. She lives in Swansea with her husband and two daughters.

About Jean James

JEAN JAMES was born in Portadown, Northern Ireland, but now lives in Swansea.  Having retired from full-time teaching, she undertook a Creative Writing MA at Swansea University, with a particular focus on nature writing and poetry.  Jean has been published in both Abridged and the Welsh Arts Review. She won The British Haiku Society haibun competition in 2013 and came first and runner-up in the BHS tanka competition in 2015. She came third in the Welsh Poetry Competition in 2018. A selection of her short poems was published by Snapshot Press in the form of an echapbook in 2019.

Product details

  • Paperback : 32 pages
  • ISBN-13 : 978-1-913499-46-4
  • Product Dimensions : 14.81 x 0.18 x 21.01 cm
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Book of the Week #50: “Sandmen : A Space Odyssey” – Diana Devlin & Irene Cunningham

Well blimey, the 2022 Book of the Week tally is up to 50 and this week we are celebrating with another fantastic Poetry Conversation, this time from the divine Diana Devlin and frankly awesome  Irene Cunningham.

They, like Nigel Kent and Sarah Thomson, set the template for what our conversation series became, when their brilliant ‘Sandmen : A Space Odyssey’ hit the shelves a couple of years ago.

This is a wicked wee conversation and one I am sure that you will love.

 

The first half of this poetic conversation offers the people’s voice – how Hoi Polloi survive under a Tory government. The voices ramble into ridiculous scenarios concerning the fate of the planet Earth and its inhabitants. They switch to the sublime with musical meanderings as if even music would disappear…not transfer into a new world. Like any rollicking conversation, this ventures up alleyways and down theatrical stairs. Part call to arms, part wistful reverie dressed in disillusionment, this is a bizarre and at times alarming conversation born of the entangled dreams and nightmares of two quite different poets. All life is in here, from Morris dancers to urine sipping celebrities, dreamers to zombies, their strange tales told with affection and more than a touch of eccentricity.

– Diana Devlin & Irene Cunningham, 2019

About Diana Devlin

Diana Devlin is a Scottish-Italian poet who has worked as a translator, lexicographer and teacher and now writes full time. Her poetry has been widely published online, in anthologies and in print. She runs a writing group in Dumbarton and is working on her first collection. When she is not writing, she spends her time reading or working in her art journal, although the only thing she has in common with Picasso is the shape of her nose. Her home near Loch Lomond is full of music, books and cats, just how she likes it.

About Irene Cunningham

Irene Cunningham has had many poems published in lit mags, including London Review of Books (as Maggie York), New Welsh Review, New Writing Scotland, Stand, Iron, Writing Women, Northwords Now, Poetry Scotland and others. Recent publications: Picaroon, South Bank Poetry, I am not a Silent Poet, Riggwelter The Lake, Shoreline of Infinity, Blue Nib and Laldy! She has published three collections of poetry, available at Amazon. She lives at Loch Lomond, is passionate for art and photography and is a constant digital doodler. One of her poems published this year has been nominated for The Pushcart Prize. http://ireneintheworld.wixsite.com/writer

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Product details

  • Paperback : 24 pages
  • ISBN-10 : 1916480640
  • ISBN-13 : 978-1916480643
  • Product Dimensions : 14.81 x 0.15 x 21.01 cm
  • Order from Amazon HERE
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Pre-Order “In The Jitterfritz of Neon” – Damien B Donnelly and Eilín de Paor

Ah, what to say about the divine combination that is Damien B Donnelly and Eilín de Paor, apart from that they have collaborated on what already I believe to be one of the Poetry Conversations of 2022.

But don’t take my word for it, you really need to make sure that you get a hold of one of the Limited Number of signed editions, the pair will be selling as soon as the books have been smuggled over the border.

Official Release Date: 20th January 2022

You Can Pre-Order Signed Copies HERE

Life, if you’re lucky, is long and memories stack up like books on a nightstand. There are the meaningful ones, the love and loss ones, the serious and important ones, but also the wild ones – nights out that started without a plan and ended up an adventure, hours’ long conversations that evolved into debates, theses, setting the world to rights, encounters with strangers that led to unexpected friendships, sad nights that felt like endings. This collection is about those nights out and their memories, penned across pages during a pandemic that kept us all from even thinking about going out.

You Can Order Signed Copies HERE

“Jiving off each other’s wistful reminiscences of glittering nights out, Damien B. Donnelly and Eilín de Paor shimmer, shift and shimmy throughout the sassy and sumptuous ‘In the Jitterfritz of Neon’. This book is alive with vivid and vibrant imagery, richly nuanced lyricism, sharply crafted syntax and playful narratives. Capped off with decadent humour and hard-won worldly wisdom, it is a delight of nocturnal exploits, stylish city scenes, romantic dalliances, high-spirited camaraderie and aches for the freedoms we once shared.”

    • Anne Casey, Poet

“Damien B. Donnelly and Eilín de Paor’s dazzling collection of twenty poems shimmers and magnetizes with sensual, nostalgic, celebratory evocations of wild nights in Dublin, Amsterdam and New York. The poems complement each other in a beautiful dance, revelling in sensory experiences, friendship, desire and hope.”

    • Nathanael O’Reilly, Poet, author of (Un)belonging, Preparations for Departure and Distance

 “‘In the Jitterfritz of Neon’ serves up a heady mix of poetic cocktails, taking you on a ghost world odyssey of epic wild nights out. A chatty mix of adventure and self-discovery, it swirls glorious recollections of those precious shared times out that shape us and imbue places with meaning.”

    • Rhona Greene, Writer

“The live feed between Damien B. Donnelly & Eilín de Paor’s sensual and deeply personal poems, is electrifying. The twinned hearts of these poems invoke duende as they beat their daring, striking rhythms.”

    • Eleanor Hooker, Poet

About Damien B Donnelly and Eilín de Paor

Damien B. Donnelly is the author of the poetry pamphlet Eat the Storms and a Stickleback micro collection Considering Canvases with Boys, both published by The Hedgehog Poetry Press. His work has appeared in many publications both online and in print. He is the host and producer of Eat the Storms, the poetry podcast and has lived in Paris, London and Amsterdam. He is now back in his native homeland of Ireland.

Eilín de Paor lives in Dublin and works in health and social care. Working towards her first collection, her poems have been published by Ink, Sweat and Tears, The Bangor Literary Journal, The Stony Thursday Book, Vox Galvia, Abridged, Dreich, An Capall Dorcha and The Crank Mag. She can be found on Twitter at: @edepaor

Product details

  • Paperback : 30 pages
  • ISBN-13 : 978-1-913499-32-7
  • Product Dimensions : 14.81 x 0.18 x 21.01 cm
  • You Can Order Signed Copies HERE
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Pre-Order “Patient Watching” – Judith Wozniak

Ah, now here is a stunning wee collection from a fantastic poet. Judith Wozniak has created something special here in ‘Patient Watching’ that we all should read.

Official Release Date: 7th January 2022

Pre-order Copies HERE

These poems look at the life of a GP from a doctor’s point of view.

They include a sequence of poems seen through the lens of the doctor described in John Berger’s book ‘A Fortunate Man’ and from the author’s own experiences from medical student to family doctor.

Pre-order Copies HERE

 

 

“Judith Wozniak’s many years of empathetic observation as a GP provide the lens through which she views John Berger’s seminal work describing the life of a country doctor. Add to that her considerable skill as a poet in shaping this moving narrative into a formal sonnet sequence – creating a heroic crown for a heroic man. Elsewhere in this debut pamphlet, she relates her own experiences in medical practice in poems that are vital and compassionate, but never sentimental. The power of her work is to show us ourselves at our most vulnerable, but to find in those moments something redemptive and hopeful. ”

– Tamar Yoseloff

 

“Judith Wozniak skilfully portrays the working life of a doctor, and how that life operates outside the hospital and its consulting rooms. In these poems we are taken deep within the community and inside patients’ homes. What the doctor witnesses can be harrowing. A woman tries to escape domestic violence; a vulnerable child navigates a day in school ‘clinging to loose scuffed shoes with your toes’; family members are pushed to their limits caring for relatives, but there is life-affirming stuff here too. True bonds are formed between doctor and patient, as ‘secrets and fears’ are disclosed. The doctor may watch ‘from the edge of things’ but will, without question, put the patient first and continue to ‘think of them in the quiet of the night.’ ”

– Rebecca Goss

About Judith Wozniak

Judith Wozniak spent most of her working life as a General Practitioner. In the later stages of her career she taught trainee GPs. She began writing after retirement and attended courses at Arvon and The Poetry School. It was the Routes into Poetry course at the Poetry School with poet and inspirational teacher Tamar Yoseloff that led her to study for an MA in Writing Poetry at the Poetry School and Newcastle University.

 

Product details

  • Paperback : 32 pages
  • ISBN-13 : 978-1-913499-76-1
  • Product Dimensions : 14.81 x 0.36 x 21.01 cm

 

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HAPPY LAUNCH DAY! – “Bird Song and Nectar in the Silences” – Lisa Lopresti

Happy Official Book Release Day to Lisa Lopresti, creator of the wonderfilled ‘Bird Song and Nectar in the Silences’.

This is the most awesome Christmas Gift, so do…

Order Signed Copies direct from Lisa Lopresti  HERE

“Lisa Lopresti is a well-known and much loved Bristol poet. She frequently performed live before the Lockdowns and is a firm favourite of the BBC Radio Upload show with Adam Crowther. Her debut pamphlet is very welcome and is shows that her poems work just as well on the page as with her voice. Reading the pamphlet reminds me of going into a shop full of colourful, gauzy scarves with a variety of patterns. The poems are sensual, they sing with positivity although the pandemic is a presence in most of the work. Lisa’s particular skill is to present images which are beautiful but also surprising, with many references to the natural world. ‘You Never Cry Alone’ is packed with delightful, visual imagery almost to the point of exaggeration and builds up to a poignant ending. She also has a wry and witty take on the world for example ‘Virulence of Corvids’ can be read as a subtle analogy for the virus. The poems often take a surprising twist – Take the Stars – a poem about domestic contentment turns into a criticism of social media. The poems are detailed enough to feel grounded in personal experience but still keep a universal quality. They feel fresh. There are musical with subtle rhyme and word echoes. The title and the poem ‘Rose Bombs’ refer to work by the Iranian musician Maya Youssef and the collection for fills its strapline of being poetry for ‘ how we are and how we will be’.”

– Pauline Sewards – Poet, Spirograph (Burning Eye)

Order Signed Copies direct from Lisa Lopresti  HERE

 

About Lisa Lopresti

Lisa Lopresti (she/her) is a working class British poet from the English ship shape, statue toppling City of Bristol.  Her poetry has been regularly broadcast on BBC Radio Bristol with poems published, in magazines and anthologies such as ‘Acumen’, ‘Lyrically Justified V3’ for underrepresented voices and in ‘Voices Along the Road’ Charity Anthology for child refugees. An active poet at ‘Open Mics’ and a feature poet at several venues, Lisa has found this both terrifying and exhilarating. She likes to convey poems to portray, this life.

 

Product details

  • Paperback : 22 pages
  • ISBN-13 : 978-1-913499-49-5
  • Product Dimensions : 14.81 x 0.36 x 21.01 cm
  • Order Signed Copies direct from Lisa Lopresti  HERE

 

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Pre-Order “The Still and Fleeting Fire” – Amina Alyal & Oz Hardwick

Ah, now this one is a special one, and as it is to be released just before Christmas on the 21st of December, I’m pleased to say that a signed copy could make somebody a rather special present.

You Can Order Signed Copies HERE

2021 marks the 700th anniversary of the death of Dante Alighieri. These 21 prose poems were written in a three-way conversation with Dante, who brought his experience of Purgatory to bear as he led us through this era in which we, too, find ourselves trudging an upward spiral with only hope to sustain us. As in his celebrated journey, we encountered trials and obstacles to overcome and lessons to learn, and his guidance was invaluable. We hoped that he would show us Paradise but, like his Roman predecessor, he could only take us so far, leaving us with Virgil’s valediction: You have seen the temporary fire and the eternal fire; you have reached the place past which my powers cannot see. The next step is ours to choose.

You Can Order Signed Copies HERE

“The pandemic is our purgatory in these prose poems, strewn with the detritus of death and life, torment and beauty. Is there a way forward? As we learn from Dante at the very heart of his poem, the next step is ours to choose.”

– Laurie Shepard, Associate Professor of Italian, Boston College

“Amina Alyal and Oz Hardwick bring Dante’s themes and images brilliantly to bear on our Covid era, in prose poems whose imaginative flights are superbly controlled – and philosophically purposed. Essential reading in this Dante 700th anniversary year.”

– Paul Munden, poet and Editor of Divining Dante

“A thick soup of allegories that become possible oxymorons in that non-linear sea that is our experience in this life. Amina Alyal and Oz Hardwick have managed to rework Dante’s poetic material, with its immense specific weight, and to translate it into a very personal style: rich, vivid and figurative. Despite the thread of a bobbin run by the devil, despite the thin finger that urges us into the labyrinth, and despite the roads blocked by fallen stars and fallen angels, there is a very strong need to dress our bodies with a True – albeit not real – skin that shows us the way.”

– Santy Masciarò, Dante Society London

About Amina Alyal

AMINA ALYAL has published poetry collections The Ordinariness of Parrots (Stairwell Books 2015) and Season of Myths (Wordspace at Indigo Dreams 2016), and has appeared in a number of journals and magazines, including The House in the Forest (Hedgehog Poetry Press 2020). She teaches Creative Writing and English at Leeds Trinity University and has also published scholarly research, specialising in Renaissance and Victorian literature.  She was editor of Dream Catcher Magazine in 2020.

About Oz Hardwick

OZ HARDWICK has published nine full poetry collections and chapbooks, most recently Wolf Planet (Hedgehog, 2020), as well as countless individual poems in journals and anthologies. He has performed and held residencies in the UK, US, Europe and Australia. He teaches Creative Writing at Leeds Trinity University and has also published widely on medieval art and literature, and on medievalism.

Amina and Oz are members of the group The Forgotten Works with musician Karl Baxter, performing music and poetry shows at a number of festivals, including online, since 2018.

Product details

  • Paperback : 28 pages
  • ISBN-13 : 978-1-913499-48-8
  • Product Dimensions : 14.81 x 0.18 x 21.01 cm
  • You Can Order Signed Copies HERE

 

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Counting Down To A Hoggy Christmas -“Some Hope” – Valerie Bence

Valerie Bence 'Some Hope'
Valerie Bence ‘Some Hope’

At a time when we all needed it, Valerie Bence came forward with ‘Some Hope’ and going into 2022 I’m not sure that I can give you any better recommendation for a Christmas gift than that.

A fine and wonderful poet.

Order a copy Here

“In this short collection I’ve tried to find hope in unexpected places, even where it’s not immediately apparent.

Ancient people braving the alps to find jade, my Mum’s recent failing health and death, a bird of prey searching for food and Rembrandt’s early portrait in his empty studio, summing up all his hope and artistic ambition on a small 9” x 12” wooden panel.

Hope is everywhere, even if it’s hard to cling onto right now.”

– Valerie Bence, 2021

 

About Valerie Bence

An ex-librarian and researcher, Valerie finished a doctorate in her mid-fifties. Wondering if she had an imagination, she moved from academic to creative writing, completing a Poetry MA at Manchester Met University’s Writing School in 2017. A year’s mentoring with an independent press followed. She works mainly with artworks but writes ekphrastic poems in its broadest sense, encompassing truth, memory, place and time.

 

 

Product details

  • Paperback : 18 pages
  • ISBN-13 : 978-1-913499-47-1
  • Product dimensions : 14.81 x 0.43 x 0.5 cm
  • Official Release Date: 12th July  2021