The book porcupine

Be proud of your current reading list and store your books in style. Designed to sit beside your chair, this shelving unit has three different sizes of compartment to accommodate books of varying sizes. The Book Porcupine is by designer Holly Palmer. Unfortunately it costs £1750, but if that doesn't put you off and you want to find out more, visit the designer's website.

Carmine Starnino and Patrick McGuinness at Central Library

Poet and critic Carmine Starnino won the Canadian Authors Association Prize for Poetry in 2000. He has published four collections, including A Lover’s Quarrel (2004) and With English Subtitles (2004) and has won numerous awards. His poems, reviews, and essays have appeared in a large number of national and international publications. Since 2001 Carmine has also been the poetry editor for Vehicule Press's Signal Editions. You can read five of Carmine's poems here.



Patrick McGuinness was born in 1968 in Tunisia. In 1998 he won an Eric Gregory Award for poetry from the Society of Authors and his work has appeared in the Independent, PN Review, Poetry Wales, Leviathan and other journals and magazines, as well as the anthology New Poetries II, edited by Michael Schmidt (Carcanet). His first collection, The Canals of Mars, appeared in 2004. Also for Carcanet, McGuinness has translated For Anatole's Tomb by Stephane Mallarme from the French and edited the prose and poems of the Welsh modernist poet Lynette Roberts. He is a fellow of St Anne's College, University of Oxford, where he lectures in French. He lives in Cardiff.

His academic books include Maurice Maeterlinck and the Making of Modern Theatre (Oxford UP, 2000), Symbolism, Decadence and the fin de siecle (University of Exeter Press, 2000), and he has edited the Penguin Classics edition of Against Nature by J-K Huysmans and T.E. Hulme's Selected Writings for Carcanet. His French Anthologie de la Poesie symboliste et decadente is published by Les Belles Lettres (Paris, 2001).

Central Library Committee Room
Wednesday 10 June, 1-2

Manchester lecturer to publish third novel

Manchester lecturer to publish third novel. Hyland is a University of Manchester lecturer and the multi-award winning author of How the Lights Gets In and Carry Me Down.

The new book has been described as ‘a tour de force’ ‘a masterpiece,’ and ‘the most exciting book of the summer’.

And author Hilary Mantel said, ‘This is How marks Hyland as a true original. When you've been reading Hyland, other writers seem to lack integrity.’

In 2006, Hyland was shortlisted for the Man Booker Prize and has twice been shortlisted for the Commonwealth and has won both the Encore and Hawthornden.

This is How tells the story of Patrick Oxtoby. When his fiancée breaks off their engagement, Patrick leaves home and moves to a boarding house in a seaside town.

But in spite of his hopes and determination to build a better life, nothing goes to plan and he's soon driven to take a desperate and chilling course of action.

Born in London to Irish parents, Hyland spent her early years in Dublin. She studied law in Melbourne and the University College Dublin and worked for many years as a lawyer before quitting to pursue writing as a full-time career.

Hyland said: “This book was very, very difficult to write. The violent climax happens near the middle and there’s a fundamental shift in tone in the second half. The job of holding the reader’s attention , and keeping sympathy with (and for) a murderer, was an extraordinary challenge.”

New writing workshops

Rainy City and Commonword are offering some brand new writing workshops across the North West. The theme is 'Writing about place', and the workshops are being led by Suzanne Batty. Best of all though, the workshops are free. There are four sessions with just 12 places per session so you need to sign up quickly.

Stockport Art Gallery Saturday June 13, 2-4 pm
To book a place, please ring 0161 474 4453

Bury Fusiliers’ Museum Wednesday June 24, 7-9 pm
To book a place, please ring 01706 823264

Hyde Library, Tameside Thursday June 25, 1-3 pm
To book a place, please ring 0161 342 4450

Standish Library, Wigan Saturday June 27, 10am-12pm
To book a place, please ring 01257 400496

(via ManchesterWriting)

Guillermo del Tori hits Manchester

There are some exciting authors appearing at Waterstones over the next fortnight including The Name of the Wind author, Patrick Rothfuss on May 28th, plus Joe Abercrombie on June 4th and Guillermo del Toro on June 8th.

Abercrombie will be signing copies of his new book, Best Served Cold and Guillermo del Toro will be promoting The Strain, the first book in his new vampire trilogy.

(via Speculative Horizons).

A J Duggan book launch at Manchester Central Library

You see them on the news, staggering towards the camera, the innocent caught up in any conflict. Bewildered, covered in blood. But what happens years later, long after the headlines have faded into obscurity?

Celebrate the launch of Andy Duggan’s debut novel. Scars Beneath the Skin (Flambard Press), reflects the anxieties of a post 9/11 world. The traumatised survivor of a terrorist bomb finds love at the point of suicide. But is it enough to save him?

Central Library Committee Room
Wednesday 3 June, 6.30

Why Poetry Matters (more than The Apprentice?)

Why don't you switch over from The Apprentice tonight and do something more interesting instead? Over on BBC2 (9 0'clock) you can watch Griff Rhys Jones make a passionate and personal plea for poetry.

Griff dissects Keats with Simon Armitage, views a line-up of poetic dandies with Andrew Motion and encounters an experimental poem made from a dozen beach balls. He celebrates W.H. Auden's Night Mail with a team of railway drivers, takes a Shakespearean masterclass with Nick Hytner and is thrown into the bardic bear pit at a poetry slam.

You can also get involved the BBC's poetry season website by voting for your favourite poet. The winner will be announced in September. Other highlights include a search engine to find a poem for any mood and brand new short films featuring BBC celebs like Michelle Ryan, Alex James and John Sergeant.

What's your library story? 75th Anniversary Exhibition

This summer we celebrate the 75th birthday of Central Library. Officially opened by King George V on 17 July 1934, the library has served the people of Manchester for 75 years and the exhibition will tell the story of the library through archive documents and photographs. (Central Library, 5 June - 1 August).

Over the years Manchester Central Library has touched the lives of millions of Mancunians and we want to hear about it. Thousands attended the official opening ceremony with George V in 1934 - were you there? Do you have any Central Library memories you’d like to share? Perhaps it’s where you made an amazing discovery, read something life-changing or met the love of your life? We want to borrow stories from you (for a change)! Tell us your story and it may be included in the exhibition or on our Facebook pages.

To share your story or for more information, call 0161 234 1980, email archiveslocalstudies@manchester.gov.uk

BBC poetry season website launches today

Spring 2009 sees the launch of a pan-BBC season dedicated to poetry. Some of the nation’s best loved poets and celebrities will take part in a season of content across television, radio and online exploring the far-reaching and compelling world of poetry.

Griff Rhys Jones launches the Poetry Season on BBC Two with a passionate plea about Why Poetry Matters – how verse has the power to move and why everybody needs it.

A dedicated website, bbc.co.uk/poetryseason, launches today and features a wealth of content including a vote to elect the Nation's Favourite Poet, with short films from a host of celebrities making their case for their favourite poet including John Sergeant on Betjeman and Alex James on Auden. Plus the Poetry Season's dedicated website will feature a poetry search engine to find poems according to a particular theme or mood.

Other online activity will include a competition to elect the Nation’s Favourite Poet which will be announced on National Poetry Day in early October; plus the Poetry Season’s dedicated website will feature a poetry search engine to find poems for any occasion or mood.

BBC Learning is also supporting the season with a host of events and online activity including a viral campaign featuring BBC personalities reciting poetry in unlikely settings. The campaign begins with Kipling’s If and will culminate with an online clip dedicated to the newly chosen nation’s favourite poet.

The Ugly Tree - That's Your Lot

The Ugly Tree is ceasing publication! We invite you to a farewell event for one of Manchester's best loved poetry magazines.

The night is hosted by Conor Aylward and features Gerry Potter, Jackie Hagan, Dominic Berry, Simon Rennie, Dermot Glennon, Cathy Bryant, Richard Barrett & Paul Neads (Editor).

Manchester Central Library
Committe Room, Second Floor
Thursday 28 May 6pm

We are pleased to announce that issues 14, 15 & 16 are now available to view online at The South Bank Centre's Saison Poetry Library.

For more information please contact Libby tempest on 0161 234 1981 or email l.tempest @manchester.gov.uk

Blankpages launch party tonight

Celebrate the launch of Blankpages issue 12. For one night only, Scandanavian melodic folk from Kalbakken mingles with the poetry performance of Gerry Potter and Annette Cookson. Steve O’Connor performs his featured short fiction piece from issue 12, and Sara Li-Chou Han will be showing garments from her new eco-fashion ‘Trashed Couture’ brand. All this, lovingly glued together by your compere for the evening, blankpages’ Fiction Editor, John Leyland… oh and of course… free cake!

Friday 15th May, 8pm - Friday 15th May, 11pm

The Black Lion, 65 Chapel St, Manchester, M3 5BZ

Kalbakken / Gerry Potter / Annette Cookson / Steve O’Connor / Trashed Couture / Daniel Swan / Angela Guyton / Justin Watson

Ideas wanted for new Manchester user-generated event

Mancunians are invited to come up with inspirational ideas for the world’s first user-generated day of events on Saturday 20 June in Ancoats in east Manchester.

Cutting Room Experiment will be an afternoon of activities where every event has been created out of an idea from members of the public.

Very different 'flash mob' style events will take place on the hour every hour and hundreds of people will be able take part in the activities, which could range from 100 people playing violins at once, to a mass poetry reading.

People are invited to submit ideas under 10 different themes or categories that include art and craft, architecture and design, dance, literature, music, sport and science.

People can choose something they would simply like to see, such as a concert by the Halle Orchestra, or choose a group activity they would like to take part in themselves. Whichever they choose, if it is selected, Manchester-based events company Ear to the Ground will make it happen.

Visit www.cuttingroomexperiment.com for more details and to submit an idea by 29 May. Winning ideas will be announced on 4 June 2009.

24:7 2009: The Big Gathering

Individuals from as far afield as the United States, Ireland, Georgia, Iran, Russia, Australia, Brazil, Croatia, Cyprus, France, Thailand, Tunisia and Finland, not to mention lots of people in the UK, have all downloaded application forms and notes about entering plays into Manchester’s 24:7 Theatre Festival 2009.

The festival is an annual showcase of new writing held in Manchester city centre every year. Now in its sixth year, the event will run from 20th – 26th July and organisers are keen to hear from those wishing to get involved.

Organisers are looking for actors, directors, technical wizards and volunteers. If you’re interested, you might want to get yourself along to the ‘Big Gathering’ tonight, 11th May, at the Pure nightclub in the Printworks.

For more information visit the 24:7 Festival website

Follow the Orange Readers Day online

The Reading Agency is organising the third annual Orange Readers' Day. It takes place tomorrow, May 9, in Birmingham. The event is now sold out but you can join Kate Mosse, Joanne Harris, Sadie Jones and a host of other authors, plus 400 readers by joining the live blog or following on Twitter @bhambookfest. The event will also be liveblogged on the day.

Poetry Pillow tonight on Dale Street

Dominic Berry says 'Come down to POETRY PILLOW at 77 Dale Street (by Piccadilly Basin) tonight!"

Two minute open mic, 1st come 1st booked. Optional fancy dress (come in your pyjamas if you want) and lots of fab poetry from topper performance artists, plus guest slot from the ace Paul Blackburn. Don't miss out!!

The Manchester Fiction Prize is open for entries

The Writing School at Manchester Metropolitan University is launching The Manchester Fiction Prize – a new literary competition celebrating excellence in creative writing.

The Manchester Fiction Prize is open internationally and will award a cash prize of £10,000 to the writer of the best short story submitted. The competition is open to entrants aged 16 or over; there is no upper age limit.

A bursary for study at MMU will also be awarded to an entrant aged 18-25 as part of the Jeffrey Wainwright Manchester Young Writer of the Year Award.

All entrants are asked to submit a short story of up to 5,000 words. The story can be on any subject, and written in any style, but must be new work, not published or submitted for consideration elsewhere. The competition will be judged by distinguished short story authors Sarah Hall, M. John Harrison and Nicholas Royle.
More information and an entry form are available here.

The Times Stephen Spender Prize for poetry translation 2009

By means of this annual prize, The Times and the Stephen Spender Memorial Trust hope to encourage and stimulate a new generation of literary translators. To obtain a free booklet containing winning translations and commentaries, please email: info@stephenspender.org

Summer writing workshops

A series of fiction, scriptwriting and poetry workshops hosted by Incwriters will take place at Kitschen in Mossley this Summer. With easy rail links to Manchester and Huddersfield, buses to Oldham and Ashton, this is a great venue to explore your writing, learn new skills and meet fellow writers and poets.

Each workshop takes place in purpose built venue beside the Huddersfield Canal and Tame River, right beside the country side walk to Saddleworth. All participants will be supplied with free refreshments and a free notebook. Have a look at the full programme and directions.

Workshops include:

06/06/2009 GAIA HOLMES: The workshop of sensory delights
20/06/2009 ANDREW OLDHAM: Re-writing
04/07/2009 HELEN FARRALL: Character-based Scene Writing
11/07/2009 IAN PARKS: Narrative Poetry – Stories in Verse
02/08/2009 ZOE LAMBERT: Wordy People - Creating Fictional Characters
15/08/2009 ANDREW OLDHAM: Short Stories
25/07/2009 IAN PARKS & ANDREW OLDHAM: Workshop Words - for writers and poets on developing writing in progress:

For a full programme, contact Claire Summers at incwriters@yahoo.co.uk

Laureateship around the world

Carcarnet poet and National Poet of Wales Gillian Clarke was the subject of the BBC Radio 3 radio programme The Essay last week. She discusses becoming the first poet writing in English to hold the post of Welsh laureate, describing how she senses the ghosts of Welsh poets and how in Wales she can describe her profession as 'poet' without embarrassment.

As Gillian puts it, 'Cardiff taxi-drivers with bardic ancestors are surprisingly common'. Her commissions have included a poem for a bottled water label which had to praise the Brecon Beacons and include the words 'still' and 'sparkling'. Click here to listen again to the programme during the next 2 days.

The programme is part of a Radio 3 series examining laureateship around the world, broadcast to coincide with today's appointment of Carol Ann Duffy as the new Poet Laureate (click here to her Duffy's first interview as laureate on Woman's Hour this morning). Sign up for the Carcanet newsletter to receive poetry news direct to your inbox by emailing info@carcanet.co.uk

Carol Ann Duffy is first female Poet Laureate

Carol Ann Duffy has been officially named as the new Poet Laureate, taking over from Andrew Motion. The new Poet Laureate has wasted no time requesting her butt of sack (600 bottles of sherry) which traditionally comes with the job, because "Andrew [Motion] hasn't had his yet so I've asked for mine up front" she said on the BBC News website.

Poet, playwright and freelance writer Carol Ann Duffy was born on in 1955 in Glasgow and read philosophy at Liverpool University. She moved from London to Manchester in 1996 and lectures in poetry at Manchester Metropolitan University.

You can reserve Carol Ann Duffy's poetry collections from the library online catalogue. It's free and we'll email you to let you know your books are ready to collect. If you don't have library card you can also join here for free.

Her adult poetry collections are Standing Female Nude (1985), winner of a Scottish Arts Council Award; Selling Manhattan (1987), which won a Somerset Maugham Award; The Other Country (1990); Mean Time (1993), which won the Whitbread Poetry Award and the Forward Poetry Prize (Best Poetry Collection of the Year); The World's Wife (1999); Feminine Gospels (2002), a celebration of the female condition; and Rapture (2005), winner of the 2005 T. S. Eliot Prize. The Hat (2007) is her latest poetry collection for children. Previous collections include Meeting Midnight (1999) and The Good Child's Guide to Rock N Roll (2003).

The new Poet Laureate is also a playwright and author of several books for children. You can listen to Carol Ann Duffy read from her work at The Poetry Archive.

James I created the first Poet Laureate granting Ben Jonson a pension in 1616. Since then there have been 21 Poet Laureates. John Masefield was the longest serving Laureate and spent 37 years in the role until his death in 1967. Thomas Shadwell was Poet Laureate for the least amount of time. He had only been Poet Laureate for four years when he died of an opium overdose in Novermber 1692.

You can explore the lives and work of more British Poet Laureates at the Oxford Dictionary of National Biography. There are over 100,000 pages of biography compiled by 10,000 experts and it's all free. Just log in the the 24 Hour Library using your library card number. If you don't have a library card you can join online for free and we'll post the card to your door.

Poet U. A. Fanthorpe dies aged 79

Acclaimed British poet U. A. Fanthorpe died on April 28th aged 79. The popular poet started writing poetry in her forties and her first collection,"Side Effects", was published in 1978 when she was 49. In 2003 she was awarded the Queen's Gold Medal for Poetry.

'I began writing because I felt obliged to describe the strange specialness of the patients in the hospital where I worked. Neuropsychiatric disorders were new to me, and I felt the urge to tell the world. Also I wanted to resurrect the language of poetry, which moulders prosaically in hospital folders, and I wanted to ask, not what is diagnosis? but why? or even, who is the patient?. After this breakthrough I found other things to write about, mostly of a riddling sort. But the hospital was where I began.'
U.A. Fanthorpe March 2002

You can listen to the poet reading her own poems at The Poetry Archive and also listen to the poet selecting her favourite music on Desert Island Discs on BBC Radio 4 on May 9th.