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 October we have a voucher, ARA10OCT, to get 50% off the following books.
The Don’t Touch Garden
Where We Find Ourselves
Outcome by Tom Dingley a collection of portraits of LGBT people with photos of themselves as children published 10/10/2015
Let Out the Djinn poems of everything from archaeology to space travel by way of growing up gay in the sixties and seventies by Jane Aldous, published 10/10/2019
The Don’t Touch Gardenby Kate Foley 19/10/2016 poems exploring adoption and growing up in London during the Blitz, leading to a search for identy that includes coming out as a Lesbian
Where We Find Ourselves an anthology of stories and poems by UK writers of the Global Majority edited by Sandra A Agard and Laila Sumpton published 28/10/2021
All you need to do is use the code ARA10OCT at the check out when you buy any or all of these books – you can only use the code once, so we encourage you to buy in bulk!
We could all do with some cheer in the bleak days of January, especially this year, so courtesy of Arts Council England, we are here to do just that.
We are the proud and happy recipients of a £45,000 grant from Arts Council England
This will pay for our next ten books, and (drum roll) audio books! Which means we can smack Covid on the nose by providing another way to enjoy our books without leaving home, and provide some work to actors who aren’t allowed into a theatre just now. I’m anticipating it will also be huge fun. Putting the plans together now with our audiobook partner Listening Books
Thanks to everyone who gave us their thoughts on whether this was the right way to go. It’s one of the fastest growing sectors in literature, but it’s tough to get right, and harder still to market, so the funding will also pay for …
A part-time marketing person, and a (separate) part-time admin person for a few months, so that I can concentrate on finding and supporting new writers and guest editors. We will be advertising these posts very soon. They will be remote working, so if you think that could be you, start polishing your CV, but don’t send anything until you see the advertisment please!
The Books
The books that are being supported by the ACE grant are:
This Poem Here – Poetry collection by Rob Walton (Just the audio book, as we’ve already done the rest)
Strange Waters -Short Story Collection by Jackie Taylor
Jackie
A Voice Coming from Then – Poetry collection (illustrated with collages) by Jeremy Dixon
An Anthology of poems and short fiction from UK based Deaf writers (no title yet) edited by Lisa Kelly and A N Other
Lisa
An Anthology of poems and short stories from UK based Black, Asian and Minority Ethnic Writers (no title yet) edited by Laila Sumpton and Sandra A. Agard
Solstice Shorts 2021 Anthology (provisional theme: time is running out but we’ll come up with a better title!)
On 8th March we held an International Women’s Day of readings from female authors and poets, surrounded by the Tatty Divine exhibition at the Stephen Lawrence Gallery. Many thanks to Greenwich University Gallleries for hosting.
You can buy the latest Solstice Shorts Festival anthology Time and Tide in two different editions from us, the standard one, available in the shops (from 21st March) or theillustrated limited edition.
We will be doing a VIRTUAL launch on 21st March, via our Facebook page, as we think it wise not to encourage people to congregate, but still want to celebrate our lovely book! We hope to just delay our event at Old Royal Naval College in Greenwich, but we’ll see how it goes!
Until I get round to editing the video files, here are some photos from Sunday’s event, where we launched Emma Lee‘s new collection, The Significance of a Dress, and thoroughly celebrated International Women’s Day with poems and flash from Laila Sumpton, Claire Booker, Sarah Lawson, Jenny Mitchell, Julie Easley, Cherry Potts, Michelle Penn, Shamini Sriskandarajah, and Emma Lee!
To celebrate the launch of Emma Lee‘s new poetry collection The Significance of a Dress, we are holding an event at the Stephen Lawrence Gallery, University of Greenwich, 10 Stockwell Street, Greenwich SE10 9BD on the actual day SUNDAY 8TH MARCH 2pm.
Michelle Penn Photograph by Andrew Tobin/Tobinators Ltd
Laila
The notional theme is women on the move, but this is being widely interpreted.
If you would like to take part in the open mic with on-theme poetry or flash fiction, please contact us, or sign up on arrival, there are a maximum of 6 500-word-limit slots.
The Knotsman does not exist, you will not find him in history books or collections of ‘bygone’ skills. But there he is, going from house to house, village to village, poem to poem, battlefield to gallows, unravelling knots and problems, physical, emotional and psychological; a new kind of cunning man, not always welcome, not always quite as clever as his fingers and picks would have him believe.
copyright Tyrone Lewis
Wednesday 5th June 7pm
We will be at the lovely Brockley Brewery, 31 Harcourt Road London SE4 2AJ
Readings of poetry and short stories on the theme of Noon from the Solstice Shorts Anthology of the same name
Everyone thinks of noon as being a split second as the clock’s hands draw together, the bell tolls twelve times – but there is so much more to it than that.
Barbara Renel and Susan Cartwright-Smith will read their own work and Alex Morrison, Becca Roberts, Esther Ridgway and Owain Lewis will read the work of writers who can’t get there.
Performers Marika Josef and Michelle Penn will read their own poems, and the excellent Carrie Cohen and Grace Cookey-Gam will be helping us out with work by authors who can’t be there in person.
We are celebrating this evening, with readings and cake and stuff at 7pm at The Stephen Lawrence Gallery, Stockwell Street, Greenwich SE10. Everyone welcome, don’t be shy, although there is an unspoken expectation that you WILL buy a book!
Here’s a taster, from yesterday’s pre-publication event at St John’s Festival Downham. Laila Sumpton (who can’t join us tonight) reading Starling Time.
A handful of authors and poets will be previewing DUSK(the book of the latest Solstice Shorts Festival), at Bellingham Festival, lunchtime on Wednesday 20th June.
One of the most imaginative, forward-thinking festivals in recent history: a nation’s length celebration of the dying of the light at the turning point of winter.
