I spent a lovely few hours at my local library today listening to some local authors share their writing with us. The event was opened with a talk by Mary Torjussen which was both entertaining and informative. Mary Torjussen is a new-to-me-author who I first came across thanks to a fellow book blogger’s review of her debut novel Gone Without A Trace, which has been on my bookshelf since. I was lucky enough to get it signed by the lady herself today as well as grabbing a signed copy of her second novel, The Girl I Used To Be 🙂

I was also gifted a copy of Buried Tears by Vivien Jones, another new-to-me-author, which was so kind of her.

Here was the line up…..

I have to say Spoz the Poet is just brilliant! It was a real pleasure to hear him recite poems to us from memory, with accents and all. Such talent! 

Mary Torjussen…..

Amazon Author Page

Mary Mae Lewis…..

http://www.author-marymaelewis.co.uk/

Facebook:@solymarpublishing

Mary Mae Lewis has been writing all of her life; she has kept a diary since she was sixteen and it is from the pages of her memoirs that her fiction is born.

Mary Mae has had articles published in the Press, including The Telegraph, and is also a published poet.

The Author has always been a prolific letter writer, too, and prides herself on having kept most correspondence ever sent to her… in fact, her dream is to write forever!

The Stoke-on-Trent born Mary Mae, always had a yearning to live in foreign climes and, together with husband, Chris, and their first son, lived in Grand Cayman for four years and then Malawi for five, where two other sons were born. Mary is now a frequent visitor to The United States, where one son and his and family live and has also visited Australia where both her brother, and a long standing pen-friend reside.

In Grand Cayman, Mary Mae worked as a reporter for the Island’s weekly newspaper and as a copy writer/account executive for the monthly magazine, The Northwester. In Malawi, she was Secretary of the local Golf Club and produced a monthly newsletter with all the local Expat news.

Mary Mae excelled in sports and as a teacher helped others to fulfil their potential (she loved netball and was a champion swimmer ). She taught English as a foreign language for the last ten years of her working life, after completing a degree in Combined Studies, with Spanish and French as her main subjects.

The Author, now spends her time equally between Southern Spain – where she does most of her writing – and Newcastle-under-Lyme, where she enjoys buying and selling antiques, and delving into local history.

Mary Mae Lewis Amazon Author Page

John Anakwenze…..

Do you have a terrible memory from your childhood that you can’t escape? Maybe you remember it daily, or maybe there is a certain trigger that takes you back to that time and place. Udenka, a boy in Nigeria, thought his painful memories were left in the past. His childhood was difficult; he was small, underfed and struggled to make it through school. Poverty, civil war and death were all trying to block his future. Despite this, he used his humble persistence and intelligence to eventually become a doctor. However, one experience in his past was different than the rest: the bee chase. Read on to share in his journey and uncover how a traumatic sight in Udenka’s young life vibrantly comes back to him, even with all else he has overcome in the passing years.

Vivien Jones…..

 

Vivien grew up in a small terraced house in the village of Goldenhill, Stoke-on-Trent, Staffordshire, England with her three brothers and two sisters. She married in 1971 and has one daughter, a son-in-law and a grandson.

After leaving Summerbank Secondary Modern Girls’ School at fifteen years of age Vivien continued to study part-time and finally graduated as a mature student from Manchester Metropolitan University with a BA (Hons) degree in Professional Studies in Education. She worked for many years as a Lecturer in Medical Administration at Stoke-on-Trent College.

Vivien Jones Amazon Author Page

 

Phil Emery…..

Phil Emery teaches creative writing in Britain. His work has been published in the UK, USA, Europe and Canada since the seventies. Besides a novel, “Necromantra”, published in 2005, a radio play, “Virtual Grafix”, was produced by Minute Radio Drama and a short story, “ID” is regularly broadcast on BBC radio since 2007. Other short stories appear in a variety of locations, including several of the “Rogue Blades” anthologies. In 2003 he was jointly awarded a script development grant from the PAWS Drama Fund. The play “Sirens” was performed in 2006 at Leicester and Staffordshire universities and the monologue “Identity Crisis” can be found on thegoodearreview.com website. He was nominated for the Rhysling long poem award in 2000. The novelette, “Blasphemer” came out from Damnation Press at the end of 2010, and another book, “The Shadow Cycles”, came out in 2011. The short stories “Vicious Circle” and “Pricks of Conscience” are now available on NAWE’s Cutalongstory website (http://www.cutalongstory.com/authors/phil-emery/1095.html) A story and verse collection, “The Celt in the Machine” is now out in e-book and “Echoes out of Abaddon”, an e-chapbook of gothic monologues, was released at Halloween!

Phil Emery Amazon Author Page

Phil Tittensor…..

John Baverbrook was an ordinary man with a dangerous job and a tendency to play as hard as he worked. He was also a dreamer, so when a stranger with a story so implausible it might just be true crossed his path, he was hooked.

The Nubian Quest tells Baverbrook’s story, as he plans a mission to recover an ancient artefact, passed down through generations of his new acquaintance’s family. His tenacity to solve the mystery surrounding the object leads him from the desert of southern Egypt, to the spires of Oxford and the United Nations in New York, eventually taking him to a place unseen by human eyes for almost three-thousand years.

Baverbrook enlists the help of old friends in his adventure, but events do-not go entirely as planned. It’s not long before he is forced to trust strangers with his life to see the job done, particularly as his exploits have not gone unnoticed by the world’s superpower. A game of cat and mouse with United States military intelligence ensues, running the risk of global Armageddon. Only Baverbrook can put right the ensuing mayhem… if he can piece together the jigsaw in time.

Julie Bagnall…..

https://www.amazon.co.uk/Cissie-Bella-familys-Julie-Bagnall/dp/0993055532/ref=sr_1_2?keywords=julie+bagnall&qid=1556988043&s=digital-text&sr=1-2-catcorr

Roger Bloor…..

Dr. Roger Bloor is a retired consultant psychiatrist and former Senior Lecturer and Teaching Fellow at Keele University School of Medicine. He was prior to his retirement the Lead for Medical Humanities at Keele and has written scientific research papers, popular medical journal articles, medical history articles and has also been writing poetry for over 60 years.
Some of his poetry writing is influenced by his experiences as a Royal Air Force Medical Branch psychiatrist and a specialist in Addiction Psychiatry the remainder owes a great deal to life in general.
I have poems published or in press in The Hippocrates Prize Anthology 2017, Poetry Now Anthology ” Growing Old’, Allegro Poetry , Affect Publications ‘StillBorn’ & Words for the Wild Anthology 2018.

My collection of Poems ‘A Less Clear Dream’ was shortlisted for the Arnold Bennet Book Prize 2018.

Roger Bloor Amazon Author Page

Misha Herwin…..

Misha Herwin was born in England of Polish parents. English was not her first language but once she learned to speak it, she has never stopped. At twelve she wrote and staged her first play in a theatre made from a cardboard box. Since then things have improved and her plays have been both performed in England and Jamaica, where she lived for a while. As Misha M Herwin she has written two novels “Picking up the Pieces” and “House of Shadows”, both published by Penkull Press. “Dragonfire” “Juggler of Shapes” and “Master of Trades” are her fantasy trilogy for kids. “City of Secrets” is her most recent book and is the first in a fantasy adventure series for children. Her stories for adult readers have appeared in a number of anthologies including “A Fairy’s Story,” in “Bitch Lit”, and “The Satan Stones” in “Ancient Wonders,” by Alchemy Press. Her latest “The Loop Line” is in “The Darkest Midnight in December”. Her children are grown up and she lives in Staffordshire England with her husband in a house with a dragon in the garden.

Misha blogs at http://mishaherwin.wordpress.com/

Misha Herwin Amazon Author Page

Jan Edwards…..

Jan Edwards – Winner of the Arnold Bennett Book Prize (for her crime novel ‘Winter Downs’) Recipient of a Karl Edward Wagner award (British Fantasy Awards) and Recipient of the Winchester Slim Volume award (for Sussex Tales). Short listed for both the British Fantasy Award for Best Short Fiction and Best Collection.

Her short fiction has appeared in many crime, folk horror, horror, pulp, weird fiction, main stream and urban fantasy anthologies. For full list of writing credits follow the link to: Author Bibliography (Details here) inc Bookmuse Reccommended Read award for her crime novel, Winter Downs!

She is part of the script team writing Olive Hawthorne: Daemons of Devils End – a 3 disc Dr Who DVD. As an editor Jan has produced fiction anthologies with editing partner Jenny Barber for The Alchemy Press and Fox Spirit Press. Jan has ghost written for several other titles.

Born in Sussex, despite her thoroughly celtic parentage, Jan is currently living in Staffs Moorlands with 3 cats and husband, Peter Coleborn. In addition to being a writer she is also a Reiki Master Teacher and Meditational Healer and has been (in no particular order) Master Locksmith, motorcycle seller, bookseller, civil servant, ostler, market gardener, librarian…

BA hons, Eng. Lit. with creative writing; past chairperson of the British Fantasy Society and Fantasycon organiser.

Jan Edwards Amazon Author Page

Jem Shaw…..

Jem became fascinated by words in a small primary school in Sutton Coldfield and by the age of five and a half had consumed all of the available Dick and Dora stories and moved onto a child’s edition of Homer’s Odyssey.

His love affair with aviation came a little earlier. Brought up close to Castle Bromwich aerodrome in the early post-war years, he would pursue his father and elder brother into the back garden to watch Spitfires, Walruses and, later on, Vampires and Venoms as they swept over the chimneys.

Nowadays he spends as much as possible of his time aloft in venerable aircraft. He earns part of his living by writing articles and designing and developing web applications for one of the world’s largest flyable vintage aircraft collections.

So given these ingredients it’s pretty inexcusable that he passed the age of sixty before it occurred to him to put them together and write a novel.

He lives in Staffordshire with his long-suffering wife and enjoys the peace that results when the kids grow up and leave home.