prose fiction
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I’m a bit slow on this one, others having blogged it already, but there’s free shipping on all UK orders until Christmas from Salt’s online shop! Not only will it make your present buying easier, but you’ll make Chris, Jen and the rest of the redoubtable Salt team — not to mention the authors — very
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Got back a couple of days ago from a week away near Manchester, which happened to coincide with the Manchester Literature Festival. There was a fair bit I’d have loved to have seen, but one I certainly couldn’t miss was the Northern Salt reading with my fellow Salt authors Elizabeth Baines, Robert Graham, Mark Illis
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It was a week for anthologies last week, what with the Forward book arriving in the post and the launch of The Golden Hour Book Vol ii at Blackwell’s on South Bridge (the old James Thin shop, for those who remember that much-lamented Edinburgh institution of yore). The GH book is a triumph, I have to
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Blackwell’s on Thursday was a good night. A really varied bunch of perfomers — poetry, fiction, non-fiction and folk music — in a great venue, despite the traffic noise. It was a good audience, too. Heartening to see a mix of kent faces and new. Good on the bookshop for putting on such a good
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Anyone who has read David Gaffney‘s hilarious, dark, moving and imaginative collection of micro fiction Sawn-Off Tales or who enjoyed his sawn-off operas on The Verb a while back will doubtless want to check out his Fringe show, I reckon. Click the flyer image to go to the Fringe web page for the show. ‘Office
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The West Lothian Writes event at Bathgate’s Regal Theatre a week past Friday was a really good evening, very ably compered by Ellie Stewart. There was a mix of poetry, prose and even film script (!), with several really good pieces of writing and several strong performances, as well as one or two that weren’t
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For any Facebook user interested in contemporary literary publishing — especially writers who hope to be published — Chris Hamilton-Emery’s notes should be essential reading. They are a blog in the strictest sense, a log of daily ups and downs that gives a fascinating insight into the struggle of juggling family life and the heavy
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That’s got to have been the best wee festival in the world we had the weekend before last. What a cracker LBF 08 was! Fiona Hyslop, the Scottish Government education secretary and a Lithgae resident, launched the festival and christened our new participants autograph book. She stayed around for Christopher Brookmyre‘s sell-out event. There was
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It’s really been a week for new audiences. Wednesday morning was filled with meetings about a Scots language poetry project in Bo’ness Academy. They lasted longer than I anticipated and ended up running into the afternoon but some extremely useful and exciting stuff came out of them. The project gets going in earnest on Monday;
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I love the work of Michael Symmons Roberts. He’s one of the finest writers in Britain at the moment and quite possibly the best religious poet we have. This year, he has published two books: his second novel, Breath, and his fifth collection of poems, The Half-Healed. Both fine books, of which I intend to
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Busy busy busy at the moment here. It’s good busy, though. I’ve proofed my proofs, sent ’em back and had author photos taken for the book (of which more in due course); I’m gearing up for Linlithgow Book Festival and this month’s various readings; and I’m working on a Scots language writing project in the
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The programme for Linlithgow Book Festival 2008 is beginning to take shape. It’s looking good, not least with our first Booker Prize-winning author on the festival in James Kelman. Keep an eye the website for further announcements in coming weeks.
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As veteran readers of this blog will know, contrary to The Sunday Herald‘s belief, Linlithgow already has a book festival. Last year’s inaugural festival was a one-day affair, but the two-year-old LBF has done with doukin its taes in the watter and is splashing into a whole weekend of bookish blether from Friday 2 November
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Another Book Festival excursion yesterday evening. This time, it was to hear James Lasdun and Michael Symmons Roberts read from and discuss their second and first novels respectively. Typical Book Festival weather is either warm and sunny, with festival-goers spread over the lawn of Charlotte Square, or tipping it down. Last night was the latter.
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In case you hadn’t noticed, the Booker longlist is out and the media have begun their febrile speculation as to who will win the prize. (They never do that with the Forward shortlist, now, do they?) The BBC upholds journalistic standards by reporting on the bookies’ odds rather more than the books, but The Guardian
Amy Jo Philip 