‘There’s only control, control of ourselves and others. And you have to decide what part you play in that control.’
Cast your eye over the comfortable north London home of a family of high ideals, radical politics and compassionate feelings. Julia, Paul and their two daughters, Olivia and Sophie, look to a better society, one they can effect through ORGAN:EYES, the campaigning group they fundraise for and march with, supporting various good causes.
But is it all too good to be true? When the surface has been scratched and Paul’s identity comes under the scrutiny of the press, a journey into the heart of the family begins. Who are these characters really? Are any of them the ‘real’ them at all? Every Trick in the Book is a genre-deconstructing novel that explodes the police procedural and undercover-cop story with nouveau romanish glee. Hood overturns the stone of our surveillance society to show what really lies beneath.
In this exclusive, Iain Hood and Renard Press surreptitiously brought Dame Muriel Spark and Jean Cocteau together to discuss their roles in My Book of Revelations. And they almost do.
SPARK
Hello, Jean. Fancy meeting you here.
COCTEAU
How d’you mean, Muriel? It was arranged. Back in the Café Royal, they said. Eleven for half past.
SPARK
Did ‘they’? I heard nothing about it. I was just in for my customary early lunch, every Tuesday now for the last… oh, well, since I died. Now I am free of the fetters of a worldly life I like to keep a little part of myself for the city of my birth and formation. And who, pray tell, are these ‘they’?
COCTEAU
‘They’? ‘They’? Well, ken, I thoucht you knew. ‘They’ are, eh, let me see. I jotted it down somewhere… (Cocteau fumbles in a jacket pocket.)
SPARK
No I did not know. I do not know. I have a dreadful feeling we are back in the hands of some malign spirit.
COCTEAU
Aye? Aye. Sans doute. You may huv been ambushed, likesay. Someone has pulled the old embuschier on you! Ha! Well, they told me to be here, onywise. If you’ve been making a regularity of it, nae doubt they took their opporchancity.
SPARK
‘They’ sound perfectly awful.
COCTEAU
They want us talkin aboot being in this lad Hood’s book. Yet another wee outing for our continuing legacies.
SPARK
Oh, that.
COCTEAU
Oh dear, Muriel. That sounded ominous.
SPARK
Yes, well, I wasn’t born to be a character in books, I was born rather to put them in books.
COCTEAU
C’mon. It wis like a wee holiday, that. Get tae huv a drink at New Year’s in here. I hud a great time, me.
SPARK
Did you now? I suppose it was all right. But the ‘lad’, as you call him, he has to put all the this and the that into his writing. A trickster. A huckster. A perfect fraud. And he puts that farmboy talk into his books. I cannot abide that.
COCTEAU
Aw, c’mon, Muriel. It’s all in fun.
SPARK
No. No. I don’t think it is, you see. He’s up to something. Oh, I’m not saying I don’t like it. Have you read Robbe-Grillet? (Spark’s eyes flash with a look of French nouveau roman novelist Alain Robbe-Grillet’s expression.)
COCTEAU
After my time.
SPARK
Oh, I love Robbe-Grillet. So cold, analytical. We need analysis. You know, I sometimes think we have had enough of the emotions, of the psychologies of characters. I mean, who wants to know? And anyway, writing is about writing, not about people.
COCTEAU
You’re sure?
SPARK
Not particularly. (Spark laughs her gentle, old lady, seen-it-all laugh.)
COCTEAU
You love a bit ay a plot, don’t you, Muriel? Nasty things happening to nasty people. I love yer plots.
SPARK
Well, I don’t know. I just start writing and I think I better liven things up. (More gentle laughter.)
COCTEAU
So, there ye go. This lad Hood was probably thinking, dum de dum dum, OK, Edinburgh. Millennium. Fireworks, Y2K hoaxer. Right, then, better liven things up a bit.
SPARK
Have you read it, this My Book of Revelations?
COCTEAU
Aye. Huv you?
SPARK
I have. Since I died and it would be too frightening for the reading public for me to be publishing more books I’ve taken to reading everything. I’m very catholic in my taste.
COCTEAU
So, yur still writing, then?
SPARK
Well, I channel my spirit through other writers, you know. Influences and all that.
COCTEAU
So that’s what you were doin here, through Hood, was it, aye?
SPARK
Certainly NOT! How dare you! What do you take me for?
COCTEAU
It’s jist, you said…
SPARK
Oh, I’m just joking, of course. My influence flies everywhere. I cannot control it. I wouldn’t bother trying if I could. How’s it all going for you, your influence on… things?
COCTEAU
Hing on. I’ll check the shopping website. (Cocteau pulls a vintage iPhone 1 out of his pocket.) Let’s see…
SPARK
Oh, I have one of those! Your phone. Exactly the same as mine!
COCTEAU
Aye. Who knew it, eh? The afterlife. Nuthin like anyone tells you. Everything like being a decade and a hauf out of date wi yer tech.
SPARK
Oh, I like it. So much more relaxing to be lo-fi, you know?
COCTEAU
Aye, well, here we go. Right-oh. What am I sellin, here? The English subtitle version of La Belle et la Bête; English translation of Les Enfants Terrible, a biography, Letter to the Americans, another biography, Orphée, the film not the novel; another biography, another bloody biography…
SPARK
What? What’s wrong?
COCTEAU
None of my greatest works, my poetry… My life looks more pruriently interestin to the swines than my work.
SPARK
Check Wikipedia.
COCTEAU
Oh aye. Hing on. (He scrolls and hits links.)
SPARK
Well?
COCTEAU
Dum dee dum… Right. Jean Maurice Eugène Clément Cocteau born blah blah blah, French poet, playwright, novelist, designer, filmmaker, visual artist and critic blah blah blah… ane ay the foremost artists of the… influential figure in early twentieth-century art. Fair enough. Blah blah he is best known for his novels blah blah blah and films blah blah blah he was described as ‘one of the avant-garde’s most successful and influential filmmakers’! Why, this is outrageous! And look at this picture from 1923 they’re using. I look skelly! Look!
SPARK
You do not look skelly.
COCTEAU
I look bloody skelly, man! Look at me! I look skelly. Let’s look you up! (Cocteau starts frantically typing.)
SPARK
Oh, for God’s sake, Jean. Do not look me up. I really couldn’t care less.
COCTEAU
I’m looking you… AHA!!! Gorgeous photi, of COURSE!
SPARK
OMG!
COCTEAU
What’s this, OMG?
SPARK
I keep up with all linguistic trends, you know, but I only employ the most delightful. Anyway, OMG, that’s the bookish wistful toothache picture of me! Ha! How marvellously ridiculous! As though I ever wrote in that posture. I’d break my back! Between you and I, I think the photographer was trying to look down my top.
COCTEAU
And look what Wikipedia says about you. Poet… Poetry Society… poet… poetry… poet, poet, poet… poetic novels! Her grave describes her in one word… Spark died in 2006 and is buried in the cemetery of Sant’Andrea Apostolo in Oliveto with one word after her name, POETA!
SPARK
Well, what do you have at your grave?
COCTEAU
Well, I have this design of my own devising where one of my own line drawings of the suffering Christ approaching his cross and a little—
SPARK
You see, you overcomplicate things, Jean. Keep them simple in future.
COCTEAU
Whit wis that thing you had aw the oldies saying in Memento Mori, Muriel?
SPARK
Remember you must die, Jean.
COCTEAU
Oh aye, that was it.
SPARK
Ah, it’s no matter. The dead are as much members of the parish as the living, they’re just more… peaceful. Yes. Peaceful. Anyway, what have ‘they’ sent you for and what are we supposed to be saying about this chap Hood and his My Book of Revelations?
COCTEAU
Oh, aye, eh, what we think about being in his book.
SPARK
I suppose this Hood is an author like any other.
COCTEAU
An all authors are the gods over their ane books, int they?
SPARK
Yes, like The Book of Job, my most favoured text.
COCTEAU
Yur quite a capricious god yersel, urn’t ye? Over yer characters.
SPARK
Well, I do what I want with them. My Miss Jean Brodie, for example—
COCTEAU
She’s a fascist.
SPARK
Well, I don’t know. I don’t say that, you know. She was accused of that. She admired Mussolini, but then a lot of people did, you know, even the Italians…
COCTEAU
An egotist, then.
SPARK
Oh, absolutely. Well, she was made by Edinburgh, of course.
COCTEAU
Anyway, it’s us in the bloody book, not Brodie. How d’ye feel about being a character in a book? This Hood’s book?
SPARK
I don’t really know. What does it say about him in Wikipedia? I don’t know the man.
COCTEAU
Hmm… OK, let’s see… Iain Hook, Iain Wood, Eleventh Hour… Ian A. – Ian Alastair Hood… The page ‘Iain Hood‘ does not exist. You can create a draft and submit it for review, but consider checking the search results below to see whether the topic is already covered. Hmm…
SPARK
I think you and I have nothing to say about that, then.
The countdown to the millennium has begun, and people are losing their heads. A so-called Y2K expert gives a presentation to Scotland’s eccentric Tech Laird T.S. Mole’s entourage in Edinburgh, and soon long hours, days, weeks and months fill with seemingly chaotic and frantic work on the ‘bug problem’. Soon enough it’ll be just minutes and seconds to go to midnight. Is the world about to end, or will everyone just wake up the next day with the same old New Year’s Day hangover?
A book about what we know and don’t know, about how we communicate and fail to, My Book of Revelations moves from historical revelations to the personal, and climaxes in the bang and flare of fireworks, exploding myths and offering a glimpse of a scandal that will rock Scotland into the twenty-first century. As embers fall silently to earth, all that is left to say is: Are we working in the early days of a better nation?
‘This novel is driven by an inexhaustible stream of imagination and Hood’s fearless desire to leave narrative conventions behind and fly unfettered into a realm of pure ideas. There are definite echoes of Lanark… and a sense that the Glasgow-born Hood is joining in, and extending, a conversation that’s been going on in the more adventurous Scots literature for the past century.’ — Alastair Mabbott The Herald
Iain Hood was born in Glasgow and grew up in the seaside town of Ayr. He attended the University of Glasgow and Jordanhill College, and later worked in education in Glasgow and the west country. He attended the University of Manchester after moving to Cambridge, where he continues to live with his wife and daughter. His first novel, This Good Book, was published by Renard in 2021, and his second novel, Every Trick in the Book will be published in September 2022.
We caught up with Iain to talk about… well, all sorts, but not least This Good Book.
What inspired you to write This Good Book?
I wrote another book in which I based some scenes on memories of my student days in Glasgow in the 80s, and I drew a brief portrait of two twenty-year-olds walking through Glasgow on a Sunday, along Kirklees Road… I wanted to think and write more about characters like these, and they came to be a sort of proto-Susan Alison and proto-Douglas. Also, This Good Book grew out of energy and the vision of the artists, writers and musicians of that unique time in Glasgow in the 80s and 90s. (A writer friend suggested this line as, she says, these questions should serve as advertisements for the book, but she was also right on the money.) More than anything, though, I build books out of other books, other stories. Here are some that I thought about as a I wrote This Good Book: Trocchi’s Young Adam; Robinson’s Gilead; Wallace’s This is Water and Good Old Neon; the New Testament; Spark’s The Ballad of Peckham Rye and The Prime of Miss Jean Brodie and all of her books, in fact; I have Camus’ The Outsider on this list which I drew up as I wrote the book, though the connection now eludes me; and, finally, Warner’s Morvern Callar.
Are there any main themes or points you want the reader to take away from your book?
I was talking to my pastor (I have a pastor the way the POTUS must) about what my point was with the book, and talking to him, where I got to was I wanted Christians to become atheists… and atheists to become Christians, and Christians become Muslims, and atheists become more atheist, and Christians become more Christian and Muslims become… Well, you get the picture: just for everyone to think, and not even for them to think and change, but just pause for a moment in their thinking, just pause and think. That’s the point.
Which other writers do you most admire and why? Are there any books which have changed your life?
It would be wrong of me, given my preparations to be in Dublin again for Bloomsday this centenary year of the publication of Ulysses, to say anything other than Joyce’s book, which utterly changed my life when I first read it, uncomprehendingly the first few times, at the age of 17 and 18. I got to the bit in Ulysses that usually ends the whole game for most readers, ‘Ineluctable modality of the visible: at least that if no more, thought through my eyes’, and I thought, I want to know what these words mean! Though, really, perhaps Portrait of the Artist hedges it because I read that age 15 or 16 and it encouraged me to go on to read Ulysses.
What’s the best piece of writing advice you’ve ever received?
‘The first draft of anything is always shit.’ Hemingway, allegedly.
‘Aux yeux de ces amateurs d’inquiétude et de perfection, un ouvrage n’est jamais achevé, – mot qui pour eux n’a aucun sens, – mais abandonné ; et cet abandon, qui le livre aux flammes ou au public (et qu’il soit l’effet de la lassitude ou de l’obligation de livrer) est une sorte d’accident, comparable à la rupture d’une réflexion, que la fatigue, le fâcheux ou quelque sensation viennent rendre nulle.‘ (In essence: ‘A book is never finished, it’s abandoned.’) Valèry.
‘A writer writes, always.’ Throw Momma from the Train.
If you could offer a budding writer one piece of advice, what would it be?
You’re brilliant and you can do it!
What drew you to your genre?
It’s not so much a genre, but I think of This Good Book as a Muriel Spark novel, in tone, at least. What’s not to be drawn to?
What’s the strangest job (besides writing) that you’ve ever had?
At a vulnerable point in my life I was drawn into the sphere of a gang of evil experimental psychologists who were investigating the connection between alcohol and violence. While being covertly filmed, I was employed to noise up drunk people playing Tetris on a computer by pulling the plug on the computer without warning to see if they would hit me. This is a true story.
Where do you write?
Everywhere.
What’s the best place to read?
Anywhere.
You’re hosting a literary dinner party. Which famous writer (from any point of history) do you invite?
It would be Muriel Spark, though the thought scares me and makes me anxious.
What’s the background music at your dinner party?
Mogwai. Spark: ‘What IS that infernal noise?’
Any outlandish hobbies?
Planning books I’ll never write?
What’s next? Every Trick in the Book, to be published in September 2022. A genre-deconstructing novel that explodes the police procedural and undercover-cop story with nouveau-romanish glee. An alchemical trick of adding Perec, Captain Beefheart and His Magic Band and Met Police scandals to Virginia Woolf and FOOF!! The whole thing blows up in your face!
‘Sometimes I wonder, if I had known that it was going to take me fourteen years to paint this painting of the Crucifixion with Douglas as Jesus, and what it would take for me to paint this painting, would I have been as happy as I was then?’
Susan Alison MacLeod, a Glasgow School of Art graduate with a dark sense of humour, first lays eyes on Douglas MacDougal at a party in 1988, and resolves to put him on the cross in the Crucifixion painting she’s been sketching out, but her desire to create ‘good’ art and a powerful, beautiful portrayal means that a final painting doesn’t see the light of day for fourteen years.
Over the same years, Douglas’s ever-more elaborately designed urine-based installations bring him increasing fame, prizes and commissions, while his modelling for Susan Alison, who continues to work pain and suffering on to the canvas, takes place mostly in the shadows. This Good Book is a wickedly funny, brilliantly observed novel that spins the moral compass and plays with notions of creating art.
‘There’s only control, control of ourselves and others. And you have to decide what part you play in that control.’
Cast your eye over the comfortable north London home of a family of high ideals, radical politics and compassionate feelings. Julia, Paul and their two daughters, Olivia and Sophie, look to a better society, one they can effect through ORGAN:EYES, the campaigning group they fundraise for and march with, supporting various good causes.
But is it all too good to be true? When the surface has been scratched and Paul’s identity comes under the scrutiny of the press, a journey into the heart of the family begins. Who are these characters really? Are any of them the ‘real’ them at all? Every Trick in the Book is a genre-deconstructing novel that explodes the police procedural and undercover-cop story with nouveau romanish glee. Hood overturns the stone of our surveillance society to show what really lies beneath.
Over the last year we’ve been living in a suspended state of fear and confusion, and we are all fed up. Political discourse has been toxic, relationships strained, and it feels as though we need some sort of ‘goal’ – something to look, or work, towards.
New Beginnings is a poetry competition seeking to celebrate this theme of New Beginnings, open to all those who feel their voice was silenced in 2020 – from anyone in the world, any age. We want the resulting anthology – scheduled for September – to be a celebration of the end of the toxic aspects of 2020 and the pandemic, to be a glimmer of hope for the future and a manifesto for change.
Open to: anyone who felt their voice was silenced in 2020. Anywhere in the world, any age. Rules →
Poetry length: up to 100 lines or 750 words, only one (must be previously unpublished) poem per applicant.
1st prize: £200
2nd prize: £100
Special mentions at the judges’ discretion.
All of the poems on the shortlist will be published in a volume, and everyone included will receive a copy of the book, and will be invited to take place in an online launch event.
Miriam was a teacher for 25 years, and, having worked with refugees and asylum seekers in schools, her writing engages with historical and contemporary issues that affect children across time – most notably the plight of refugees. Her young-adult novel, Hidden, was a Sunday Times Children’s Book of the Week, was nominated for the Carnegie Medal and has been adapted for the stage. Saving Hanno, Miriam’s new book, is about a boy who comes on the Kindertransport and reflects on the grief and loss experienced by refugee children.
Denise is a writer, based in east London. She is an alumni of Spread the Word’s Development Programme, the first chapters of her novel in progress achieved ‘highly commended’ in the Writers & Artists Working-Class Writers’ Prize and she is contributing to Common Gossip, a working-class anthology. Outside of writing, she has been vocal about the lack of career progression across the civil service for black and brown women on BBC’s Women’s Hour and Sky News. As well as writing her novel, Marisol’s Baby, Denise works for the National Theatre, where she leads the organisation’s communications team.
Hannah Fields is a writer, editor and publisher from Texas. She founded the independent publishing company, Folkways Press, in 2020, and launched the company with an anthology, We Are Not Shadows, as its inaugural publication. The anthology selected writing from women of all ages and backgrounds and covers a wide range of topics – including issues of race, gender, sexuality, trauma, adversity, disability, and more. She has worked on various publications, from children’s books to award-winning magazines, along with various publishers in the US and UK.
Tom Denbigh lives in Bristol with an obscene number of books. He is the first Bristol Pride Poet Laureate and a BBC 1Extra Emerging Artist Talent Search winner. He has performed at the Royal Albert Hall and festivals around the UK, and has brought poetry to Brighton and London Prides. He is a producer at Milk Poetry and has facilitated writing workshops for groups of students from the UK and abroad (he is particularly proud of his work with queer young people). His debut collection …and then she ate him is out now with Burning Eye Books.
Support the Project
If, like us, you think this is a really important project, we’d love your help! Please do help us to get the word out – on social media (#NewBeginningsPoetryComp) and in real life, as we’d love to reach people who aren’t on Facebook or Twitter, too!
This project is going to need money to get off the ground. If you’re able to, please pre-order the anthology or consider becoming a sponsor of the project – in return we’ll add your name to a special ‘thanks’ page in the book, and you can choose your level of support and receive various perks, including tote bags, deluxe editions, art prints and more. Sponsor →
Booksellers, librarians, teachers, all, can we send you a poster to put up? (While stocks last.) Drop us a line →
If you know someone who would be interested in the project, please share this page with them! Click here to email them →
Sponsor the Project
We estimate that this project will cost about £1,500 for a basic print run and the cash prizes. As a small independent press setting up in a time of crisis, this is a lot of money! If you’re able to, please consider becoming a sponsor – we’ll add your name to a special ‘thanks’ page in the book, and you can choose your level of support and receive various great perks from the options below. We will keep this progress bar updated as often as possible, to show how close we’re getting. Thank you in advance!
Target: £1,500 | Funded so far: £1,304.53 | Backers: 32 | Sponsorship closed; we’re making up the difference!
86.97%
Print & Digital Supporter
£15 | 11 backers
Sponsor by £15 to receive:
The anthology in print once it’s published
The e-book edition too
Your name on a special ‘thanks’ page in the book
Print & Digital Plus Supporter
£20 | 8 backers
Sponsor by £20 to receive:
The anthology in print once it’s published
The e-book edition too
A set of postcards with the cover art
A Renard Press tote bag
Your name on a special ‘thanks’ page in the book
Deluxe Supporter
£50 | 6 backers
Sponsor by £50 to receive:
A deluxe hardback edition of the anthology
A copy of the paperback too
The e-book edition too
A set of postcards with the cover art
A Renard Press tote bag
Your name on a special ‘thanks’ page in the book
Doubled Up and Arty Supporter
£100 | 7 backers
Sponsor by £100 to receive:
Two deluxe hardback editions of the anthology
Two copies of the paperback too
The e-book edition too
A set of postcards with the cover art
A Renard Press tote bag
A limited edition art print of the cover artwork
Your name on a special ‘thanks’ page in the book
Longlist
10/08/21: We’re delighted to say that the judges have compiled the longlist, which you can find below. Please help us to spread the news – click here to share on Twitter!
In alphabetical order:
‘99%’ by Rumelia Licheva
‘270,000,000’ by Melissa Sia
‘A’ by Alex Banister-Fletcher
‘A Condensed History of My Father’s Addiction’ by Karan Kapoor
‘A Countryside Walk’ by Heather Rodgers
‘A Morning’s Welcome’ by Anneliese Amoah
‘A New Day’ by Laura Chouette
‘A Poem for My Baby Sister as She Heads Off to University’ by L. Meadows
‘Affection in the time of Covid’ by Lizzy Lister
‘After Lockdown, I’m Quicker off the Mark’ by Catherine Edmunds
‘Alarm in the CCU’ by Heinrich Beindorf
‘Battlefield’ by Georgia Skelly
‘Becoming’ by Simon Jackson
‘Canal Street’ by Connie Louise Rigby
‘Casual Eugenics’ by George Parker
‘Chasing Rainbows’ by Lucy Beckley
‘Collective Grief’ by Evie Groch
‘Denouement’ by Lynne Taylor
‘Dysphoria’ by Kayleigh Saunders
‘Epiphany’ by Debanshi Chatterjee
‘Four Weeks’ by Allie Bullivant
‘Freedoms, Limitations and Lockdowns’ by Hannah Waddingham
‘Gender’ by Ayshen Irfan
‘Get in the Kitchen’ by Charlotte Boxley
‘Getting a Voice Back’ by John Gallas
‘God Only Knows the Blend’ by Ellie Herda-Grimwood
‘Home School’ by Eve McGowan
‘How To Breathe’ by David Bottomley
‘Hug Me Tight’ by Mario Russo
‘Hysterical Little Girls’ by Claire Louise Chamberlain
‘I Am a Girl of Many Colours’ by Ebony Sallery
‘I Will Leave this Year Behind’ by Rebekah Hulme
‘I’m Sure it Wasn’t’ by Nicola Thornberry
‘If I Were a Sculptor’ by Emily Cooke
‘If Life Puts You Under Pressure (After Roger Robinson)’ by Rachel Burns
‘If Someone Had Asked Me Why’ by Hui Chien Ngoi
‘Insurrection’ by Kim Yaged
‘It Is Within Us’ by Charlotte Amoret
‘Just the Way You Are’ by Johanne Turner
‘Labouring Alone’ by Abigail Pitt
‘Let the People Sing!’ by Richard Westcott
‘Lockdown 3’ by Katy Peters
‘Lockdown Antidote. Colle Fiorito/Rome’ by Martin Bennett
‘Metagenomics, Coding, and Spring: The Many Green Hues of Fearing the Unknown’ by Ieva Dapkevicius
‘My Eventual Baby’ by Stephanie Lambourne
‘Notre Dame’ by Magdalena Jurczuk
‘Occupation: Housewife’ by Kai Leigh Harrison
‘On Ampudia’s I Cristantemi in Three Acts, Barcelona 2020’ by Jenna Smith
‘On the Arrival of My First Child’ by Marianne MacRae
‘One Strong Day’ by Jennifer James
‘Open Windows’ by Sabrina Chen
‘Our Hearts Won’t Beat Forever’ by Muskaan Admani
‘Pandemic’ by John Ling
‘Pandemic Classroom’ by Karin Molde
‘Pandemic Mums’ by Kathryn Knight
‘Paradise’ by Codi Russell
‘Petrosinella’ by Rose Cook
‘Phoenix’ by H.D. Hurworth
‘Pipe dreams’ by Brintha Yasodaran
‘Postpartum’ by Jessica Johnson
‘Pride’ by Charlotte Whiting
‘Reality’ by Isabelle Linders
‘Reclaim the Night’ by Rachael Ragland
‘Room With a View’ by Jill Simpson
‘School Shoes’ by Georgina Shaw
‘Self Therapy’ by Jodine van Wyk
‘Self-Love Song’ by Vi Nguyen
‘Sertraline Resin’ by Anna Dallaire
‘Sick Rapunzel’ by Charlotte Murray
‘Sing the Song’ by Rebecca Miles
‘Skin Just Like…’ by Lauryn Okerago
‘Social Suicide’ by Emma Christian
‘Still Ain’t In’ by Sharnta Bullard
‘Stones’ by Christian Ward
‘The Country Called New Beginning’ by Priyanka Kelly Burns
‘The Day You Stop Surviving’ by Sophie Sparham
‘The Gift’ by Voirrey Faragher
‘The Girl with the Flute’ by Ruth Yates
‘The Important Thing Is to Keep Going’ by Ilias Tsagas
‘The Lights Are On… But I Fear There Is No One Home’ by Kevan Taplin
‘The Middle, Lebanon, KS’ by Alison Jennings
‘The Music’ by Lata Nobes
‘The Overwhelm’ by Cath Nichols
‘The Prevailing Wind’ by Anonymous
‘The Race’ by Miebi Youdeowei
‘The Song’ by Molly Evans
‘The Upholding’ by David Hensley
‘The Veil’ by Grace Palmer
‘The Wild Green Sea’ by Jane Olive
‘The Year I’ve Had’ by Dunja Lu
‘There’s a Bird Flying Around the Mirror’ by Daisy Edwards
‘This Ark’ by Charles Becker
‘To a Friend’ by Ella Dane-Liebesny
‘Today We Are Allowed to Hug Again’ by Rosie Gliddon
‘Toxicity’ by Tadsyiayanie Govan
‘Trapped’ by William Foster
‘Treading Carefully’ by Nisha Bhakoo
‘Tsunami’ by Aly Smith
‘University Will Be Online Today’ by Martha Grogan
‘Walk Away’ by Peter Hill
‘When I come Out’ by Hannah Ross
‘Window’ by Robyn Walsh
‘Wings’ by Nichola Matthews
‘Woman’ by Jasmine Kaur
Shortlist
23/08/21: We’re delighted to say that the judges have compiled the shortlist, which you can find below. Please help us to spread the news – click here to share on Twitter!
In alphabetical order:
‘270,000,000’ by Melissa Sia
‘A Countryside Walk’ by Heather Rodgers
‘A New Day’ by Laura Chouette
‘A Poem for My Baby Sister as She Heads Off to University’ by L. Meadows
‘Affection in the time of Covid’ by Lizzy Lister
‘After Lockdown, I’m Quicker off the Mark’ by Catherine Edmunds
‘Alarm in the CCU’ by Heinrich Beindorf
‘Becoming’ by Simon Jackson
‘Chasing Rainbows’ by Lucy Beckley
‘Denouement’ by Lynne Taylor
‘Dysphoria’ by Kayleigh Saunders
‘Four Weeks’ by Allie Bullivant
‘Getting a Voice Back’ by John Gallas
‘God Only Knows the Blend’ by Ellie Herda-Grimwood
‘How To Breathe’ by David Bottomley
‘I Am a Girl of Many Colours’ by Ebony Sallery
‘If Someone Had Asked Me Why’ by Hui Chien Ngoi
‘Lockdown Antidote. Colle Fiorito/Rome’ by Martin Bennett
‘Metagenomics, Coding, and Spring: The Many Green Hues of Fearing the Unknown’ by Ieva Dapkevicius
‘Occupation: Housewife’ by Kai Leigh Harrison
‘On Ampudia’s I Cristantemi in Three Acts, Barcelona 2020’ by Jenna Smith
‘One Strong Day’ by Jennifer James
‘Open Windows’ by Sabrina Chen
‘Pandemic Classroom’ by Karin Molde
‘Pandemic Mums’ by Kathryn Knight
‘Petrosinella’ by Rose Cook
‘Postpartum’ by Jessica Johnson
‘Pride’ by Charlotte Whiting
‘Sertraline Resin’ by Anna Dallaire
‘Sick Rapunzel’ by Charlotte Murray
‘Stones’ by Christian Ward
‘The Country Called New Beginning’ by Priyanka Kelly Burns
‘The Day You Stop Surviving’ by Sophie Sparham
‘The Gift’ by Voirrey Faragher
‘The Race’ by Miebi Youdeowei
‘The Song’ by Molly Evans
‘The Upholding’ by David Hensley
‘To a Friend’ by Ella Dane-Liebesny
‘Today We Are Allowed to Hug Again’ by Rosie Gliddon
‘Trapped’ by William Foster
‘Treading Carefully’ by Nisha Bhakoo
‘Tsunami’ by Aly Smith
‘University Will Be Online Today’ by Martha Grogan
‘Walk Away’ by Peter Hill
‘When I come Out’ by Hannah Ross
‘Wings’ by Nichola Matthews
‘Woman’ by Jasmine Kaur
Winners
Winner: ‘University Will Be Online Today’ by Martha Grogan
Runner-up: ‘Today We Are Allowed to Hug Again’ by Rosie Gliddon
Special Mentions from the Judges
Miriam Halahmy nominated ‘Sick Rapunzel’ by Charlotte Murray
Denise Rawls nominated ‘God Only Knows the Blend’ by Ellie Herda-Grimwood
Hannah Fields nominated ‘The Race’ by Oyinmiebi Youdeowei
Tom Denbigh nominated ‘Four Weeks’ by Allie Bullivant
Enter
The competition is now closed. If you missed out, make sure you sign up to our newsletter to be the first to hear about future competitions.
Rules
We want to keep this fairly simple and open – the only rules we have for entry are below.
There is no minimum (or maximum) age requirement for entry, but please bear in mind that if you’re under 18 you legally need to have parental or guardian consent to enter. Anyone can submit, but the entry is limited to ‘those who feel their voice was silenced in 2020’. While we don’t impose categories on this condition, we do ask why you think it applies to you.
The work must be your own, and we ask that you don’t submit it elsewhere in the mean time.
Please do not include photographs or illustrations.
Please only submit once – we will only consider your first entry if you enter again.
Entries must be received by 11.59PM on Friday 21st May 2021 to be considered.
Iain Hood was born in Glasgow and grew up in the seaside town of Ayr. He attended the University of Glasgow and Jordanhill College, and later worked in education in Glasgow and the west country. He attended the University of Manchester after moving to Cambridge, where he continues to live with his wife and daughter. His first novel, This Good Book, was published by Renard in 2021, and his second novel, Every Trick in the Book was published in September 2022.
Are there any main themes or points you want the reader to take away from your book?
No comment. I’m making no statements until my lawyer’s present.
Which other writers do you most admire and why? Are there any books which have changed your life?
No comment.
What’s the best piece of writing advice you’ve ever received?
Shouldn’t you be allowing me one phone call, yeah? Has my brief been called?
If you could offer a budding writer one piece of advice, what would it be?
I invoke my privilege to avoid self-incrimination. You people.
What drew you to your genre?
No comment.
What’s the strangest job (besides writing) that you’ve ever had?
What are you getting at?
Where do you write?
Where are you going with this?
What’s the best place to read?
I wasn’t even there. This is a stitch-up. I want my brief!
You’re hosting a literary dinner party. Which famous writer (from any point of history) do you invite?
What are you angling at? Why would this matter? No comment. No comment. No comment.
What’s the background music at your dinner party?
Oi! Keep your hands off me. Stop twisting the cuffs!
Any outlandish hobbies?
All right, all right! I confess! I wrote it. I wrote Every Trick in the Book! Are you happy now? And yeah, I was playing at it. Literary allusions, temporal sleights of hand, skewed mise-en-scène! I used…satire. I knew that no copper talks at length and in detail about Captain Beefheart and His Magic Band! But I couldn’t help myself. I admit it. The whole thing was just so ripe for… I couldn’t help it. It just got…out of control so quickly. Suddenly I found myself researching the Sugababes and focaccia recipes. I knew it was wrong, but it felt so right. Righteous, even. I’m not sorry. I won’t say it. You can’t make me, copper!
What’s next?
I suppose I’m going down, yeah? I’m not sorry. I’ll be back at it as soon as I’m out! I fought the law AND I WON!
‘There’s only control, control of ourselves and others. And you have to decide what part you play in that control.’
Cast your eye over the comfortable north London home of a family of high ideals, radical politics and compassionate feelings. Julia, Paul and their two daughters, Olivia and Sophie, look to a better society, one they can effect through ORGAN:EYES, the campaigning group they fundraise for and march with, supporting various good causes.
But is it all too good to be true? When the surface has been scratched and Paul’s identity comes under the scrutiny of the press, a journey into the heart of the family begins. Who are these characters really? Are any of them the ‘real’ them at all? Every Trick in the Book is a genre-deconstructing novel that explodes the police procedural and undercover-cop story with nouveau romanish glee. Hood overturns the stone of our surveillance society to show what really lies beneath.
The Roaring Twenties are off to a troubled start, and although 2022 is a different world in many ways to the beginning of the pandemic – thankfully the majority of us are not in lockdown any more – still fear, concern, ‘culture wars’ are rife, and it feels just as important to keep channelling positive energy into the ether.
Following the success of the New Beginnings project in 2021, Spectrum: Poetry Celebrating Identity seeks to provide a poetry platform for those who feel marginalised or ‘othered’. We want the resulting anthology – scheduled for October – to be a celebration of our differences, a determined and joyous collection resolute in the face of those who would use them to divide us.
Competition opened on Friday 25th March; closed on Saturday 18th June
Longlist announced on Monday the 22nd of August
Shortlist announced on Thursday the 1st of September
Entry cost: free
Open to: anyone who wants to talk about their identity. We’re particularly keen to hear from those who do not see their identity represented in traditional or mainstream media. Anywhere in the world, any age. Rules →
Poetry length: up to 100 lines or 750 words, only one (must be previously unpublished) poem per applicant.
1st prize: £200
2nd prize: £100
Special mentions at the judges’ discretion.
All of the poems on the shortlist will be published in a volume, and everyone included will receive a copy of the book, and will be invited to take place in an online launch event.
Miriam was a teacher for 25 years, and, having worked with refugees and asylum seekers in schools, her writing engages with historical and contemporary issues that affect children across time – most notably the plight of refugees. Her young-adult novel, Hidden, was a Sunday Times Children’s Book of the Week, was nominated for the Carnegie Medal and has been adapted for the stage. Saving Hanno, Miriam’s new book, is about a boy who comes on the Kindertransport and reflects on the grief and loss experienced by refugee children.
Tom Denbigh lives in Bristol with an obscene number of books. He is the first Bristol Pride Poet Laureate and a BBC 1Extra Emerging Artist Talent Search winner. He has performed at the Royal Albert Hall and festivals around the UK, and has brought poetry to Brighton and London Prides. He is a producer at Milk Poetry and has facilitated writing workshops for groups of students from the UK and abroad (he is particularly proud of his work with queer young people). His debut collection …and then she ate him is out now with Burning Eye Books.
Hannah Fields is a writer, editor and publisher from Texas. She founded the independent publishing company, Folkways Press, in 2020, and launched the company with an anthology, We Are Not Shadows, as its inaugural publication. The anthology selected writing from women of all ages and backgrounds and covers a wide range of topics – including issues of race, gender, sexuality, trauma, adversity, disability, and more. She has worked on various publications, from children’s books to award-winning magazines, along with various publishers in the US and UK.
Will Dady grew up in the wonderfully named Great Snoring in North Norfolk, and now lives in London. He is the Publisher at Renard Press, which he founded in 2020. A publisher of classic and contemporary fiction, non-fiction, theatre and poetry, part of Renard’s raison d’être is to empower and provide a platform to marginalised voices. The New Beginnings project was set up in 2021 as an antidote to the less pleasant aspects of the pandemic, and its huge success in attracting stirring entries has made these projects a firm fixture in Renard’s publishing programme.
Support the Project
If, like us, you think this is a really important project, we’d love your help! Please do help us to get the word out – on social media (#SpectrumPoetry) and in real life, as we’d love to reach people who aren’t on Facebook or Twitter, too!
This project is going to need money to get off the ground. If you’re able to, please pre-order the anthology or consider becoming a sponsor of the project – in return we’ll add your name to a special ‘thanks’ page in the book, and you can choose your level of support and receive various perks, including tote bags, deluxe editions and more. Sponsor →
If you know someone who would be interested in the project, please share this page with them! Click here to email them →
Sponsor the Project
Many thanks to those who have sponsored the project – the crowdfunding phase is now over, and we’re pleased to say that we managed to raise:
Entry to the competition is now closed. Keep an eye on this page for updates! If you’re able to, please consider sponsoring the project to help us bear the costs involved.
Rules
We want to keep this fairly simple and open – the only rules we have for entry are below.
There is no minimum (or maximum) age requirement for entry, but please bear in mind that if you’re under 18 you legally need to have parental or guardian consent to enter. Anyone can submit, but please read the brief first and make sure that your poem and entry fits.
The work must be your own, and we ask that you don’t submit it elsewhere in the mean time.
Please do not include photographs or illustrations.
Please only submit once – we will only consider your first entry if you enter again.
Entries must be received by 11.59PM on Saturday 18th June 2022 to be considered.
Longlist
22/08/22: We’re delighted to announce the longlist (101 poems) for the Spectrum competition, which you can find below (sorted by surname – you can search this page with ctrl/cmd + ‘F’ to find a name). Poems that have been shortlisted are marked with an asterisk; some longlisted poems are available to read online – in which case they will be orange in the list below. In the mean time, please consider becoming a sponsor to help us bear the costs of this important project.
Aashi Chadha, Nikita, ‘Not for You’
Adamitz Scrupe, Mara, ‘Rope’
Affonso, Rayne, ‘God Is a Trini’*
Alnuaimi, Samah, ‘My Dear Iraq’*
Am Bergris, Caroline, ‘Mother Tongue’*
Appleby, Jessica, ‘Screw the Pantomime’*
Aranas Aranas, Shalom Galve, ‘The Babbles of Time’
01/09/22: We’re delighted to announce the shortlist (55 poems) for the Spectrum competition, which you can find below (sorted by surname – you can search this page with ctrl/cmd + ‘F’ to find a name). We hope to publish as many of these as possible in the anthology – so show your support by pre-ordering or becoming a sponsor to help us bear the costs of this important project. The winners will be announced in a special launch – information to follow!
Affonso, Rayne, ‘God Is a Trini’
Alnuaimi, Samah, ‘My Dear Iraq’
Am Bergris, Caroline, ‘Mother Tongue’
Appleby, Jessica, ‘Screw the Pantomime’
Baggs, Steve, ‘The Boy from the Estate’
Bryant, Cathy, ‘Elderly Swimmers at the Pool’
Burn, Jane, ‘When I Balanced Who I Am Upon the Turning of a Book’
Burns, Rachel, ‘Body’
Cartwright-Smith, Susan, ‘Transformation’
Chidiebere Sullivan, Nwuguru, ‘Memory Is a Mother to Every Little Beginning’
Chiemenam, Arinze, ‘Listen, Stranger Man’
Connolly, Abhainn, ‘T4T (Trans for Trans)’
Cousins, Jennifer, ‘I Am Not What You Think’
Dawod, Neshma, ‘But Where Are You Really From?’
Deep, Martins, ‘To the Caged Bird in Church’
Dixon, Kat, ‘Olympus’
Echendu, Elle, ‘Lavender Menace’
Finding, Deborah, ‘Keys to the City’
Goveas, Anita, ‘Some Comments on Your Thoughts About Being British Indian’
Hardwick, Oz, ‘Cardiogram Variations’
Harkin, Roisin, ‘Emigrant/Immigrant’
Herda-Grimwood, Ellie, ‘Grounded’
Hill, Peter, ‘Dissimilarities’
Honeybone, Sam, ‘Mum’s Heels’
Ibiteye, Overcomer, ‘Home is Here’
Ireton, LJ, ‘The Wraith and the Magpie’
Kiely, Tim, ‘Pink Carnations Outside the Russian Embassy’
Leonard, Matthew, ‘Sunday Lunch’
Madlock, Naomi, ‘Sunday Vaudeville’
McCoull, Jazz, ‘Half-Life’
McPhelim, Dianne, ‘All that I Am’
Mitchell, Jenny, ‘Barber off the Harrow Road’
Muriithi, Raina, ‘The Odd Space in Between’
Nnadi, Samuel, ‘Nebulous Strike in Minnesota’
North, Carolann, ‘Penance’
Oakwood, Jessica, ‘The Collector’
Onyebuchi, Ewa Gerald, ‘A Garden of New Song’
Onyekwelu, Chiwenite, ‘On Reading My Transatlantic Poem, She Sends Me the Laughing Emoji’
Raff, Ivy, ‘A Bicycle Reminisces About 1962’
Rew, Cameron, ‘Dance of the Drag Queens’
Rhodes, Mia Jasmine, ‘12 Years Old, in My Superman Dressing Gown’
Ryan, Kerry, ‘Whale Watching in the Arctic Circle’
Sampson, Daphne, ‘BBC Young Dancer 2022’
Silver, Lana, ‘A Highly Sensitive Mission’
Skyleson, Jess, ‘Changing State’
Smiley, Thea, ‘Be Careful Who You Invite Home’
Smith, Alyson, ‘Back to Black’
Tesleem, Fadairo, ‘In Shaa Allah’
Waters, Sophie Laura, ‘Autumn Drive With Father’
Welch, Ozzy, ‘Sappho’s Nightwalk’
Whiting, Faith, ‘He’
Wynne-Jones, Dave, ‘Where Four Worlds Meet’
Young, Damon, ‘Community Payback’
Zhang, Lucy, ‘Switched Out’
Suman, ‘Precious’
Winners
First place
Affonso, Rayne, ‘God Is a Trini’
Runner-up
Burn, Jane, ‘When I Balanced Who I Am Upon the Turning of a Book’
Special mentions from the judges
Ryan, Kerry, ‘Whale Watching in the Arctic Circle’ (special mention from Miriam Halahmy)
Dixon, Kat, ‘Olympus’ (special mention from Tom Denbigh)
Mitchell, Jenny, ‘Barber off the Harrow Road’ (special mention from Hannah Fields)
Baggs, Steve, ‘The Boy from the Estate’ (special mention from Will Dady)
Following the success of the New Beginnings project in 2021 and Spectrum project in 2022, the Kinship project seeks to continue celebrating identity through poetry. We want the resulting anthology – scheduled for October – to be an exploration of community and belonging, a firm but joyous collection that celebrates what unites us, resolute in the face of those who seek to divide us.
Concepts of belonging and community have constantly evolving definitions, and have been at the centre of fierce debate in recent years. The first twenty-three years of the new millennium have seen a rise in rhetoric aimed at those without the voice to argue back, and waves of toxic abuse have proliferated – and genocide. How relevant, then, to unite and raise our voices, to celebrate the rich tapestry of humanity, and to explore the labels we use to identify and express ourselves.
Kinship is a poetry anthology that seeks to provide a platform for marginalised voices, and to celebrate the great diversity and rich variation in the identities of people from around the world and from a huge cross-section of walks of life.
Competition opened on Friday 21st April; closed on Saturday 17th June
Longlist announced on Tuesday 12th September
Shortlist announced on Monday 2nd October
Winners announced at a virtual launch on Monday 17th October
Entry cost: free
Open to: anyone, anywhere, any age. We’re particularly keen to hear from those who do not consider the aspect of kinship they’re writing about to be represented in traditional or mainstream media. Rules →
Poetry length: up to 100 lines or 750 words, only one (must be previously unpublished) poem per applicant.
1st prize: £200
2nd prize: £100
Special mentions at the judges’ discretion.
All of the poems on the shortlist will be published in a volume, and everyone included will receive a copy of the book, and will be invited to take place in an online launch event.
Miriam was a teacher for 25 years, and, having worked with refugees and asylum seekers in schools, her writing engages with historical and contemporary issues that affect children across time – most notably the plight of refugees. Her young-adult novel, Hidden, was a Sunday Times Children’s Book of the Week, was nominated for the Carnegie Medal and has been adapted for the stage. Saving Hanno, Miriam’s new book, is about a boy who comes on the Kindertransport and reflects on the grief and loss experienced by refugee children.
Tom Denbigh lives in Bristol with an obscene number of books. He is the first Bristol Pride Poet Laureate and a BBC 1Extra Emerging Artist Talent Search winner. He has performed at the Royal Albert Hall and festivals around the UK, and has brought poetry to Brighton and London Prides. He is a producer at Milk Poetry and has facilitated writing workshops for groups of students from the UK and abroad (he is particularly proud of his work with queer young people). His debut collection …and then she ate him is out now with Burning Eye Books.
Reshma Ruia is an award-winning author and poet. She has a PhD and Master’s in Creative Writing from Manchester University. She has published two novels (including Still Lives with Renard Press), a poetry collection and a short story collection. Her work has appeared in international anthologies and journals, and she has had work commissioned by the BBC. She is the co-founder of The Whole Kahani – a writers’ collective of British South Asian writers. Born in India and brought up in Rome, her writing explores the preoccupations of those who possess a multiple sense of belonging.
Will Dady grew up in the wonderfully named Great Snoring in North Norfolk, and now lives in London. He is the Publisher at Renard Press, which he founded in 2020. A publisher of classic and contemporary fiction, non-fiction, theatre and poetry, part of Renard’s raison d’être is to empower and provide a platform to marginalised voices. The New Beginnings project was set up in 2021 as an antidote to the less pleasant aspects of the pandemic, and its huge success in attracting stirring entries has made these projects a firm fixture in Renard’s publishing programme.
Support the Project
If, like us, you think this is a really important project, we’d love your help! Please do help us to get the word out – on social media (#Kinship) and in real life, as we’d love to reach people who aren’t on Facebook or Twitter, too!
This project is going to need money to get off the ground. If you’re able to, please pre-order the anthology or consider becoming a sponsor of the project – in return we’ll add your name to a special ‘thanks’ page in the book, and you can choose your level of support and receive various perks, including tote bags, deluxe editions and more. Sponsor →
If you know someone who would be interested in the project, please share this page with them! Click here to email them →
We want to keep this fairly simple and open – the only rules we have for entry are below.
There is no minimum (or maximum) age requirement for entry, but please bear in mind that if you’re under 18 you legally need to have parental or guardian consent to enter. Anyone can submit, but please read the brief first and make sure that your poem and entry fits.
The work must be your own, and we ask that you don’t submit it elsewhere in the mean time.
Please do not include photographs or illustrations.
Please only submit once – we will only consider your first entry if you enter again.
Entries must be received by 11.59PM on Saturday 17th June 2023 to be considered.
Longlist
We’re delighted to announce the longlist (102 poems) for the Kinship competition, which you can find below (sorted by title – you can search this page with ctrl/cmd + ‘F’ to find a name). Some longlisted poems are available to read online – in which case they will be orange in the list below. In the mean time, please consider becoming a sponsor to help us bear the costs of this important project.
‘12.7.22’ by Jasmine Kate Wickens
‘A Memoirist Asks What Desert I Will Have to Enter to Tell My Story’ by Ivy Raff
‘A Return’ by Michele Clement
‘A Speech on How to Knot a Hausa Tongue’ by Zaynab Iliyasu Bobi
‘When I Ask Ammā to Sponsor Me for Pride Run 10K’ by Gayathiri Kamalakanthan
‘When You Were (Before I Was)’ by Vijaya Venkatesan
‘Wielkanoc’ by Beatrix Hart
‘Xuēlóu, Hénán 2021’ by Mea Andrews
‘Yellow’ by Yong Takahashi
‘You (A Puddle)’ by Tom Chachewitz
Shortlist
‘A Memoirist Asks What Desert I Will Have to Enter to Tell My Story’ by Ivy Raff
‘A Return’ by Michele Clement
‘A Speech on How to Knot a Hausa Tongue’ by Zaynab Iliyasu Bobi
‘A Three-Foot-Wide Dream’ by Anne Marie Wells
‘At 1 a.m. on the 6th of March’ by Connor Johnston
‘Bad Indian’ by Srishti Jain
‘Beautiful Apostate’ by Bek King
‘Birthright’ by Jessie Lee
‘Blood Orange’ by Caoimhe Matthews
‘Breaking Ground’ by Jean Gillespie
‘Can You Spell That For Me?’ by Roisin Harkin
‘Carbon Slowly Turning’ by Steve Baggs
‘Carried’ by Dianne McPhelim
‘Chain of Supply’ by Benedict Hangiriza
‘Diagnostic, AB Form’ by Helen Chen
‘Domestic Bliss’ by Ilisha Thiru Purcell
‘Double English’ by Stuart Wrigley
‘Down to the Sea at Malaga’ by Rosalie Alston
‘Drop In’ by Thea Smiley
‘Earthstruck’ by Junyi Chew
‘Elegy for Great Aunt Trudy’ by Renee Emerson
‘Fable’ by Naoise Gale
‘Family Trees’ by Daphne Sampson
‘Generational Trauma’ by Inga Piotrowska
‘Hades’ by Elizabeth Train-Brown
‘Here’s to Us Spanglish Kids’ by M.A. Dubbs
‘Hiraeth’ by Sam Szanto
‘His Shoes’ by Deborah Gaudin
‘History Baked in a Hot Oven’ by Caroline Bracken
‘I Think I Might Be Human’ by Kay Saunders
‘Journeyman’ by Oz Hardwick
‘Last Supper 1993’ by Mariyam Karolia
‘Laundry Litany’ by A.W. Earl
‘Letterfall’ by Utsuk Upreti
‘Lovesong’ by Alyson Smith
‘Ma, Your Little Girl Is Becoming a Planet’ by Fedora Mensah
‘Ohana’ by Ellie Herda-Grimwood
‘Our Family Scrapbook’ by Erin Gannon
‘Our Kitchen’ by Rachel Robertson
‘Rebel Yell’ by Jazz McCoull
‘Sitting on a Bench, Waiting’ by Steve Denehan
‘Sitting on Your Bed’ by Ginger
‘Styx’ by Jayant Kashyap
‘Teeth Removal Can Be Fun, Sometimes’ by Rush Day
‘The Old Man and the Violin’ by Catherine Edmunds
‘The Singer’ by Niam Moore
‘We Pictured it Sunny’ by Naomi Dean
‘When I Ask Ammā to Sponsor Me for Pride Run 10K’ by Gayathiri Kamalakanthan
‘When You Were (Before I Was)’ by Vijaya Venkatesan
‘Xuēlóu, Hénán 2021’ by Mea Andrews
‘You (A Puddle)’ by Tom Chachewitz
Winners
First place
‘History Baked in a Hot Oven’ by Caroline Bracken
Runner-up
‘Carried’ by Dianne McPhelim
Special mentions from the judges
‘At 1 a.m. on the 6th of March’ by Connor Johnston (special mention from Miriam Halahmy)
‘A Three-Foot-Wide Dream’ by Anne Marie Wells (special mention from Tom Denbigh)
‘A Memoirist Asks What Desert I Will Have to Enter to Tell My Story’ by Ivy Raff (special mention from Reshma Ruia)
‘Styx’ by Jayant Kashyap (special mention from Will Dady)
Have you ever wondered how far animals can communicate, if the sea can hear and if the landscape bears pain and loss? Our questions may be legion. Why was The Ark of the Covenant lodged, for a while, in a corner of south-west Wales? Why do Rhesus Monkeys have a fondness for oysters? And what do hummingbirds hum? Is it true there is an Ethiopian silver thaler in the mud of the upper Daugleddau estuary in Pembrokeshire? Why do fascists show off in planes and when fencing? And which London lemur had a deckchair? Why should the aristocracy hobnob with Nazis when we have plenty of home-grown monsters?
Then, who was Matthews the Monk? And was there really an Allied Operation Zebra? Can the hardest heart learn? Who was the big idea behind some of Dylan Thomas’s finest poems? And what has this to do with Kit Marlowe, a dog called Rex and a clutch of chinchillas?
SO many questions.
So, The Zebra and Lord Jones is a book of mysteries, riddles and jokes – a true story and just a hint of a shaggy-dog tale for fun; a joyful exploration of grief, landscape and the wars that men make, because that is what they do: they are still doing it now. A love story, an examination of wealth, class and privilege, of why most days it is better to be Welsh and why one lonely man stole an escaped zebra in September 1940.
You will meet many real people and discover true things, times and places, and yet the world tilts on its axis and you see strange and beautiful things from the corner of your eye. I hope you can feel the magic, taste what is in the air and enjoy the more… preternatural elements of the book. It is magical realism, after all, which is a wonderful medium for exploring dark, difficult things, for hinting at things which are difficult to express and for exploring what happens, generation after generation, through trauma: war; not being loved; being crushed and lonely, brutal, bitter and desperate, and handing it on.
I hope you find it a beautiful book, but it is also unforgiving and brutal in places, and I want you to read all the end material and then you will see who told you the story.
Let’s tell you some more about what happens. A listless toff, the Baron of Jesmond (known to you as Lord Jones – it’s all explained), is in London attending to insurance matters following potential damage to extensive family property during the Blitz. It is September 1940. He meets an escaped zebra (this is based on a true event, because when London Zoo was bombed, the zebra escaped, ran away and was commemorated in a painting, running against the flames – you can see the pictures and hear a bit more about this here on the BBC.
Little loved by his fascist sympathiser parents, something in the man softens: he is lost, as is the zebra. He is soon to be dispatched to south-west Wales, where the family has extensive property and stabling (the name Lord Jones is given to him by the mocking locals); the zebra follows him, and on impulse he takes it with him. He steals her. Or perhaps she steals him.
What then ensues is a new episode in Lord Jones’s life, with a zebra and her child in tow; he manages to fall in love passionately with the housekeeper Anwen Llewelyn, the natural world, finds himself at the centre of a spy ring, because locals are spying on the family knowing his parents to be fascist and Nazi sympathisers; he is further softened by interactions with local people and a young evacuee boy called Ernest and, extraordinarily, spends Christmas with Haile Selassie, who, in exile (also true) comes to attend the Ark of the Covenant which had been smuggled out of Abyssinia (as was) when Mussolini invaded. (This was a rumour – and it probably wasn’t in Wales.)
While the book sweeps from London, to Dunkirk, to Lake Ziway in Ethiopia, to Lisbon and Dresden, its focus is largely on a small corner of south-west Wales. Why? Because it is where the good things happen. I have recreated the home on the Daugleddau in Pembrokeshire where my grandmother and great-grandmother lived – itself full of magic and storytelling and mystery. The story is an account of all this and of the lives of Lord Jones and Anwen Llewelyn and the love story which unfolds; of spy plots and an international spy investigation involving zebra keepers; of war, loss and grief. An account of real events and people – Mosley, the Mitfords, Hitler, Goebbels, Haile Selassie and several others – plus the true story of the zebra and that tiny quay on the Cleddau in Pembrokeshire. To me, this was always where the magic started; so I made it a book where miracles and cold facts met, shook hands, became friends – overseen by a zebra or two.
I hope you like the sound of the book. It’s a sweeping love story, a curiosity, an engaging fable, but at its heart it holds tough facts about the ravages of landscape, fascism, war, class, tolerance and prejudice, trauma and intergenerational trauma, colonisation and the suppression of indigenous culture. It’s playful, keeps you guessing, and it gave me the chance to live with my own grief and heartbreak – I wrote it often during the night, so you see, it was made in difficult circumstances – and it has a special touch of nerdiness in its scholarly footnotes and end material, and I hope readers love it.
One more thing: the zebra. She is real, and she did indeed escape from London Zoo when her enclosure took a direct hit during the Blitz. I first saw her in Carel Weight’s Escape of the Zebra from the Zoo during an Air Raid, 1941.* THERE is the very zebra the book is about! Now, in the papers it says she only got as far as Camden – but what did they know?
Ten Questions for book groups
Why is Mother important to Lord Jones, and why is he important to her?
What is your opinion of Earl Ashburn and Lady Ashburn? Did you expect — or hope! — that they would change in some way?
How important is the theme of landscape in the book?
Do you feel differently about zebras having read the book?
Did you think the zebras would be given her back to London Zoo?
How much of this is true? What about the footnotes?
Who was the narrator? Why do you think that?
What were your favourite scenes, and which were least satisfying for you?
Is it a convincing love-match between Anwen and Lord Jones?
Did you enjoy the way that the book wove in real history with magical realism (see point 6)?
Footnotes
* For copyright reasons we can’t include the picture(s) here, but you can see them, and hear a bit more about that story, here on the BBC.
A listless aristocrat, Lord Jones, finds himself in London during the Blitz, attending to insurance matters. A zebra and her foal, having escaped from the London Zoo during a bombing, cross his path, and he decides to take them back to his estate in Pembrokeshire. Little loved by his fascist-sympathiser parents, something in Lord Jones softens, and he realises he is lost, just like these zebras.
The arrival of the zebras sparks a new lease of life on the Pembrokeshire estate, and it is not only Lord Jones but the families his dynasty has displaced that benefit from the transformation. Full of heart and mischief, The Zebra and Lord Jones is a hopeful exploration of class, wealth and privilege, grief, colonialism, the landscape, the wars that men make, the families we find for ourselves, and why one lonely man stole a zebra in September 1940 – or perhaps why she stole him.
‘I loved The Zebra and Lord Jones – it’s quirky, touching, original and heartfelt; a real breath of fresh air in the publishing landscape.’ — Joanne Harris
The countdown to the millennium has begun, and people are losing their heads. A so-called Y2K expert gives a presentation to Scotland’s eccentric Tech Laird T.S. Mole’s entourage in Edinburgh, and soon long hours, days, weeks and months fill with seemingly chaotic and frantic work on the ‘bug problem’. Soon enough it’ll be just minutes and seconds to go to midnight. Is the world about to end, or will everyone just wake up the next day with the same old New Year’s Day hangover?
A book about what we know and don’t know, about how we communicate and fail to, My Book of Revelations moves from historical revelations to the personal, and climaxes in the bang and flare of fireworks, exploding myths and offering a glimpse of a scandal that will rock Scotland into the twenty-first century. As embers fall silently to earth, all that is left to say is: Are we working in the early days of a better nation?
The countdown to the millennium has begun, and people are losing their heads. A so-called Y2K expert gives a presentation to Scotland’s eccentric Tech Laird T.S. Mole’s entourage in Edinburgh, and soon long hours, days, weeks and months fill with seemingly chaotic and frantic work on the ‘bug problem’. Soon enough it’ll be just minutes and seconds to go to midnight. Is the world about to end, or will everyone just wake up the next day with the same old New Year’s Day hangover?
A book about what we know and don’t know, about how we communicate and fail to, My Book of Revelations moves from historical revelations to the personal, and climaxes in the bang and flare of fireworks, exploding myths and offering a glimpse of a scandal that will rock Scotland into the twenty-first century. As embers fall silently to earth, all that is left to say is: Are we working in the early days of a better nation?
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