About Cherry Potts

Cherry Potts is a publisher/editor. fiction writer and teacher, event organiser, photographer, book designer, NLP master practitioner, life coach and trainer. She sings for fun. Through Arachne Press she publishes fiction and non fiction and runs spoken word events and cross-arts workshops for writers at interesting venues. Always interested in new opportunites to perform, write or explore writing.

FLASH SALE ON OVERSTOCKS 50% OFF ONE WEEK ONLY

FOR THE FINAL WEEK OF MARCH A FLASH SALE OF 50% OFF OVERSTOCKS WITH CODE OVER50

on the following titles

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ACCIDENTAL FLOWERS

AN OUTBREAK OF PEACE

BRAT

DEPARTURES

DEVILSKEIN & DEARLOVE

DUSK

ERRATICS

FIVE BY FIVE

HAPPY ENDING NOT GUARANTEED

IN RETAIL

INCORCISMS

LET OUT THE DJINN

LIBERTY TALES

LONDON LIES

OUTCOME: LGBT PORTRAITS

SHORTEST DAY, LONGEST NIGHT

SPELLBINDER

STATIONS

STRANGE WATERS

For the Spring Equinox, looking forward to Byways

We will be publishing Byways, an anthology of poems and stories that take us off the beaten track this time next year, for the Spring Equinox, a time for getting the caked mud of winter off your boots and getting out for a walk!

Here are our contributors, mainly from the UK and USA, including a handful of poems in Welsh.

Adele Evershed

Amelia Foster

Angela Arnold

Annemarie Cooper

Annie Kissack

Attalea Rose

Cath Humphris

Des Mannay

Diana Powell

Eabhan Ní Shuileàbhain

Em Gray

Gloria Heffernan

Gregory McGreevy

Gwyn Parry

Heather Lane

Helen Campbell

Jane McLaughlin

Jeff Phelps

Jonah Corren

Josie Levin

Judith Mikesch-McKenzie

Katie Harrison

Katie Margaret Hall

Kelly Davis

Laura Besley

Lisa Farrell

Lizzie Lovejoy

Mab Jones

Maddison Price

Marcus Smith

Michael Shann

Michelle Penn

Mitzi Dorton

Nicholas McGaughey

Phil Wood

Raymond Luczak

Rhys Owain Williams

Ros Woolner

Sara Louise Wheeler

Seth Crook

Simon Chandler

Sue Burge

Sue Moules

Thea Smiley

Being Published for the First Time in Mid-Life – Lesley Kerr

Continuing our conversation with older women writers

Lesley Kerr

Lesley Kerr is a contributor to our anthology Where We Find Ourselves

Having my short story published in midlife in the anthology, Where We Find Ourselves has been an extraordinary experience which inspired me greatly.  It re-ignited my passion for writing by exposing me to authors and poets of different ages, races, and life experiences with amazing stories to tell.

Whilst I was a shy child and spent a lot of time ‘in my head’ I had a vivid imagination and enjoyed making up stories to entertain myself and my siblings.  However, the idea of being a writer was never discussed as realistic career option for someone like me.  My dad wanted me to leave school after my ‘O’ levels and get a job to start contributing to the household, but my English teacher thought I should stay on to do A levels. As a compromise I went to a local college to do a one-year secretarial course – something solid and useful.  My dad’s attitude was not uncommon to immigrant parents who want a better life for their offspring.  He thought that one’s life purpose was to get a good safe job and do that until you retire in 40 years’ time, and only then can you do what you really want to do.  Fortunately, my secretarial training led me to roles in HR in the voluntary and public sector which I do enjoy.  However, my love of writing has never left me.  When my daughter was at school, I often found myself living vicariously through her schoolwork: reading the literature she was set and taking any opportunity to help with her essays and course work!

It was only when she went to Birmingham University that I thought about writing seriously.  Whenever I visited her, I would come away inspired by the university buildings and lecture theatres and thought how marvellous it would be to have my own further education – even if it felt slightly delayed.

So, I signed up to take a creative writing beginners’ class at the same college I went to more than 30 years ago!  As I waited nervously at enrolment for the first class, I couldn’t help but feel my age, seeing the last straggle of childlike adults leaving for the day in boisterous groups.  Many seemed younger than my daughter, and it made me wonder what I had let myself in for!  However, once I was in the class this feeling dissipated as I found myself surrounded by mostly women of a similar age to me or older, some who had, like myself, come straight from work, while others arrived after looking after grandchildren or spending the day in less strenuous retirement pursuits such as gardening or catching up with friends.

Many had files of manuscripts honed over the years, or folders full of poetry or prose.  The course taught me to express myself and to give myself permission to carve out time for completing writing prompts, which seemed to give my writing some legitimacy and feel less self-indulgent.  I learned a huge amount from the tutor but also my classmates.  One woman in particular encouraged me to not to downplay my ambitions.  I remember she encouraged me to have my photo taken in the class when I was placed third in a competition.  As my natural reticence took over, I remember her saying to me  “Oh go on up there, will you? When you’re a published writer you’ll look back on this….”  Her words seemed unbelievable to me at the time.

The range of writing styles showcased in class was also eye-opening.  I think that there are preconceptions of what women of a certain age want to write and read.  Rather than just cosy romances we heard YA fiction, folklore and fairy tales, crime drama as well as inspiring lived experience stories.

After the beginners’ class, I felt emboldened to take the Intermediate class and then joined Watford Writers to continue my writing journey.  I now have my own folder of work, and the start of a manuscript!

It has been inspiring to witness so many women expressing themselves creatively at a time of life when it has traditionally been that we come less visible and active as the years go by.  I am looking forward to contributing to the voices and adding my own stories to the discourse.

Sign Language Week 2023

It’s Sign Language Week. To celebrate we have a special offer: 50% off our book, What Meets the Eye: The Deaf Perspective. Use the code DEAF at the checkout between now and Sunday.

Here’s one of our favourite BSL videos from What Meets the Eye, Coffee Shop, by Colly Metcalfe, Performed by DL Williams  Every story or poem in the book is by a Deaf, deaf, or Hard of Hearing writer. We have translated many of them into BSL (an ongoing project, which you can help fund here) and some of them are BSL in origin.

We are the planning  stage for an in person BSL poetry workshop in London in June. get in touch of you are interested in attending.

Save A Spider Day!

small spider wavingIt’s save a spider day! Let’s celebrate being a saver not a squisher, and have a flash sale on our very own spider saving tome, No Spider Harmed in the Making of this Book. Use the code SPIDERSAVE at the checkout to get 50% off our 8th anniversary anthology – Poems and stories that stick up for the small and not terribly attractive.

Here are some sillinesses we made to support the book

With thanks to our lovely friends Carrie, Chukwude and Greg

For International Women’s Day: The Menopause Anthology Contributors

Happy International Women’s Day!

We are delighted to announce the contributors whose work we have chosen for our Menopause anthology. We are still considering a title for the book as a whole, ( is THE Menopause Anthology too obvious??) and still in discussion with a couple of authors, but the current roll call stands like this.

Adele Evershed
Alison Habens
Alyson Hallett
Amanda Addison
Anne Caldwell
Anne Eccleshall
Anne Macaulay
Cath Holland
Cheryl Powell
Chloe Balcomb
Claire Booker
Claire Lynn
Clare Starling
Ellesar Elhaggagi
Elizabeth Richter
Em Gray
Erica Borgstrom
Genevieve Carver
Ginger Strivelli
Helen Campbell
Jane Ayres
Jane Burn
Jane McLaughlin
Jessica Manack
Joanne Harris-Duff
JP Seabright
Julie-ann Rowell
Karen F Pierce
Kavita A Jindal
Kim Whysall-Hammond
Lucy Lasasso
Marina Sànchez
Martha Patterson
Mary Mulholland
Rachel Playforth
Ruth Higgins
Sian Northey
Susan Bennett
Susan Cartwright-Smith
Tessa Lang
Tina Bethea Ray
Victoria Bailey
Victoria Ekpo

Thank you everyone who submitted and congratulations to our contributors.

The Menopause Anthology will be published on Menopause Day, 18th October 2023. When, we have decided, all menopausal women should celebrate their last period, since we never actually know when it happened. Memorial or celebration, you choose, but we will be having cake. Put the date in your diary!

Tenth anniversary events: Writing the Body, with Lewisham Libraries

Tuesday 14 March 7- 9pm
The Library at Deptford Lounge, 9 Giffin Street, SE8 4RJ
Writing Stories, Making Senses
Using physical and sensory experience to evoke setting, character and emotion and creating 3D scans to further explore the body and inspire creativity. With author, creative writing tutor and Liars’ League host, Katy Darby

Saturday 22 April 2 – 4pm
Manor House Library 34 Old Road, London, SE13 5SY
Memoir and Monologue
Using memory and humour to create a short piece that has the potential to be
performed. With author, comedienne and Polari Prize judge, VG Lee.

Saturday 13 May 2 – 4pm
Catford Library 23-24 Winslade Way, Catford Centre, SE6 4JU
Exploring Creativity
Using visual and physical prompts related to the body to spark ideas. Particularly, but not exclusively, open to anyone thinking of submitting to Arachne Press’s LGBTQ+ poetry anthology Joy//Us. With author and editor/publisher at Arachne Press, Cherry Potts.
Book on this link or in person/by phone at the relevant library

FREE!

The Library at Deptford Lounge 020 8314 7299
Manor House Library    020 8463 0420
Catford Library   020 8314 8816

Arachne Tenth Anniversary Sale – MARCH

Featured

We are celebrating our 10th Anniversary by exploring our back catalogue and inviting you to do likewise with special offers on books celebrating their anniversaries in each month.

So for MARCH we have a voucher, ARA10MAR, to get 50% off the following books

A470/A470 (Signed) Bilingual bestseller – Poetry for the Road, Cerddi’r Ffordd

A470

Noon 2018 flash fiction and poems for Solstice Shorts

Noon

Time & Tide/ Time & Tide special edition 2019 coastal stories and poems for Solstice Shorts

Time and Tide

This Poem Here by Rob Walton Covid response poetry

This Poem Here

All you need to do is use the code ARA10MAR at the checkout when you buy any or all of these books – you can only use the code once, so we encourage you to buy in bulk!

Upcoming Real life book launches

Wednesday 22nd February 6.30pm, we are launching our first book of 2023, Saved to Cloud, by Kate Foley, at Keats House.

The algorithm
of my own life, faded
and spidery,
is written,
not keyed in.

Kate takes a slightly jaundiced but clear-eyed look at the state of the planet, and our over-reliance on technology as a lens to review her relationship with religion and memory.

Free Tickets

And for International Women’s Day on Wednesday 8th March at 4.30pm, we have a prepublication event for More Patina than Gleam by Jane Aldous at St Colomba’s-by-the-Castle Church Hall in Edinburgh.

In her 70th year, Jane decided to write a novella in seventy poems, exploring a fictionalised version of a life she almost lived.

This series of poems, based in post war Edinburgh, tell linked love stories, including the story of Linda, fleeing with her eleven-year-old daughter from England and an abusive relationship. In hiding as a lady’s companion in one of the city’s suburbs, mother and daughter settle into their new life in Elsie’s rackety house, and encounter a variety of characters who will change their lives forever.

Free Tickets

Both books are part of our continued program of publishing older women, and in this case, lesbians.

 

Events at our Cover Art Exhibition – BSL tour, Diaspora Poetry/Art conversation

Arachne Press: Ten Years of Book Cover Art, continues until 15th February
Tuesdays to Fridays 11-5 and Saturdays 11-4
Stephen Lawrence Gallery University of Greenwich
10 Stockwell Street, Greenwich London
SE10 9BD

More information about the exhibition can be found here

As part of the exhibition, we have two LIVE IN PERSON events at the gallery

Tuesday 7th February 6.30 BSL interpreted curator tour with Cherry Potts and Deaf artist, Nina Thomas.

Recently, we have been choosing cover artists who share the experience of our authors, and for our Deaf anthology, What Meets the Eye, we asked Nina Thomas to provide the cover. Her complex, multi-layered photographic creations perfectly captured the theme of Movement that we chose for the book.

Join us for a BSL interpreted wander around the exhibition and find out about books, book covers, art, and putting on an exhibition.

BSL interpetation provided by Paul Michaels

 Details and  Free tickets

Tuesday 9th February 6pm Routes, Imagining the Diaspora with artist, Suman Gujral and poet, Rhiya Pau:

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Suman and Rhiya met when we chose Suman’s Story Plate for the cover of Rhiya’s poetry collection Routes. Both are inspired by their families’ journeys and the diaspora more generally.
Join them for a poetry reading, art sharing, discussion of where their work intersects, and a short hands-on workshop making poetry boats, which you can take home, or leave to be displayed in the gallery.
You might want to bring a favourite pen, relevant newspaper articles or family photos printed onto (both sides of) paper that will easily fold.
Free tickets

NOTE!! Stephen Lawrence Gallery is in STOCKWELL STREET, not to be confused with Stephen Lawrence Centre or Building also in Greenwich.