RofC Newsletter no (x)
News from Weatherglass Books, Scotland Street Press and Moist Books
We’ll be opening submissions for the Republic of Consciousness Prize for Small Presses 2024 in July, including announcing the judges, and new eligibility criteria. This will reflect the changing landscape of small presses in the UK and ROI, which has thrived even during this extended difficult period, which is testament to both the hard work of those behind the presses and the readers who continue to want the kinds of books small presses strive to publish against the (commercial) odds.
If you want to spread the love further, then please do think about subscribing to our book of the month club - all revenue goes into the prize’s prize fund.
Weatherglass Books
Please join us for the launch of The Pages of the Sea, the debut novel by Anne Hawk.
Here is what is being said about it:
“The Pages of the Sea is a beautifully written and intimately imagined debut novel coming out of the Caribbean. Intensely moving and lyrical, here is a story of our times, another piece of the mosaic of our fractured and remade Caribbean lives.” Monique Roffey, The Mermaid of Black Conch
“An evocative and at times heart-breaking work of Caribbean fiction. In The Pages of the Sea, Anne Hawk gives fresh form to the Windrush era and new voice to its neglected narratives.” Anthony Joseph, winner of the T.S. Eliot Prize for Poetry.
“This is a stunning debut. It’s great to see a new author championing in fiction the unheard voice of a child left behind in the Caribbean migration story of the 1960s. Beautifully told, The Pages of the Sea will resonate for many thousands.” Yvonne Bailey-Smith, The Day I Fell Off My Island
“What can I say except I think this is a great novel. The story breaks your heart and, at the very same time, the writing heals it. Anne Hawk’s vision is miraculously, tenderly lucid. I can’t think of a better depiction of the confusions and insights of girlhood.” Toby Litt, A Writer’s Life
The launch will take place at The Brixton Studios, on 10th July, between 6.30pm-9pm.
Anne will be in conversation with Zakia Sewell.
It is free but please do register on Eventbrite as numbers are limited.
News from Scotland Street Press
We are delighted to reveal the cover for Jenni Daiches’s epic historical novel Somewhere Else hitting the shelves this September. For more information head to our website.
Leslie Hills’s stunning non-fiction debut, 10 Scotland Street, described by author Sara Sheridan as a ‘triumph’, comes out in paperback on Friday 16th August. Pre-order today.
Janet McGiffin’s feminist Byzantine adventure, Betrothal and Betrayal, has made the Historical Association’s Young Quills 2024 shortlist. Read the full announcement here. The winner will be announced in July.
New from Moist
Published 30th July 2024 | Paperback £12
An unnamed, female narrator travels through school, then art school, then art school teaching jobs, finding or fashioning "the selves of herself" via encounters with PJ Harvey, the ghosts of Ann Quin, Susan Sontag, and a mansplaining Analyst that she first encounters in her grandparents' garden. Both a love letter to creative life, and a requiem for all that is lost in its pursuit, UH HUH HER asks is it possible to record—and retain—our experiences of being on the outside? Or can such stories only exist within the institutions that shape them?
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"UH HUH HER made me realise that when people describe a surreal dream they experienced, they're describing the life of an artist; the self-taken quest in-and-out of our control and the uncanny comfort of feeling connected to everything and everyone."
Jen Calleja
"An intimate, loveable and witty whirl through a life in art. Uh Huh Her is a blissful homage to Ann Quin, PJ Harvey and anyone who’s picked up a purple felt tip pen in anger and love."
Toby Litt
"Cattle weaves ways of telling that conjure a life as a canon of writers, artists, musicians, women, magically unfolding, box within box, life within life. Subtle, twisty, rich, nimble."
Joanna Walsh
"Drawing upon early punk years through to the stresses of precarious institutional life UH HUH HER weaves avant-garde and familial influences into a compassionate, compelling and politically astute work. A delight."
Anne Tallentire
"It is a rare thing, when a work is openly trying to figure itself out like this, right there in the process of its own making. Rare but very welcome ... When I put this book down and turn off the light, it will still be pulsing, high on its own supply, humming, whirring, continuing to read and to write itself, smiling at itself in mirrors."
Paul Becker
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Rachel Cattle is an artist, writer, and co-editor of JOAN. Previous publications include the sonic poem La a dybird (Ma Bibliotheque, 2019), and auto-fictive text/score Witch Dance (Centre for Useless Splendour, 2017). A member of experimental sound collective BxNT, and art-writing collective We Are Publication, Rachel has broadcast, exhibited, performed and collaborated with a number of UK arts organisations including Camden Arts Centre, Tate, and the ICA in London. She holds a Contemporary Art PhD from Kingston University, and an MA in creative writing from Birkbeck, University of London. UH HUH HER is her first full-length work.
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We're hosting an open reading period throughout July.
Check out website and/or Instagram to find out more.
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