January Sale: 50% off our books this week

Kick off 2019 with some literary loveliness and take advantage of our January sale – all our published books are half price for one week only.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

The sale ends midnight, Sunday 20 January. So which books can you steal away for half the price? Well – practically all of them! The sale includes all our published poetry, fiction and non-fiction books (only excluding forthcoming titles). With so much on offer, we thought you might enjoy some highlights…

 

Best for…
Late night reading:
£9.99  £4.99
Paul Deaton’s PBS Recommended debut, A Watchful Astronomy, is gloriously dark and atmospheric. The poet’s father stalks the poems like a ‘wounded bear’ as weathers and seasons are conjured onto the page: icy blasts of weather, frosts, and inky skies full of stars.
‘Each poem in this collection is like a little torchlight’
– Jen Cambell

 

Best for…
Transporting you to another time:
£9.99  £4.99
David Llewellyn’s gripping new novel, A Simple Scale, moves in narratives of love, death, deceit, Classical music and government oppression. Prepare to be transported to Soviet Russia, McCarthyite Hollywood and post-9/11 New York as a determined young PA tries to piece together the fragments of history.

 

Best for…
Cheering up a dull day:
£9.99  £4.99
Gen is the wonderful follow-up to Jonathan Edwards’ Costa Award-winning debut, My Family and Other Superheroes. It’s a book of wonder, nostalgia and music where poems are as likely to be voiced by a family member as by a lion, or a flag on the wall of Richard Burton’s dressing room. Gen is a celebration of everything that matters to Edwards – Wales, family, animals, history.

 

Best for…
Intellectual reading:
£19.99  £9.99
Challenging convention was Caradoc Evans’ life’s work. A controversial figure in Welsh literature, Evans’ books were publicly burned in the streets of Cardiff, yet praised across the border. But what lay behind his writing? John Harris’ biography is the first of its kind and a marvel – extensively researched and brilliantly written.

 

Best for…
Glimpsing into history:
£19.99  £9.99
Dear Mona collects together the private letters of Jonah Jones, sent during and after World War Two to his mentor and friend, Mona Lovell. Their tumultuous relationship informed the evolution of Jonah’s character. We see this in his intimate and emotional letters as he describes work as a conscientious objector, his time on the Home Front as a non-arms bearing medic, and his artistic progression.

 

Best for…
Armchair travelling:
£9.99  £4.99
In Stowaway, Richard Gwyn navigates the rich history and landscapes of the Mediterranean. The central character, an anti-Ulysses figure, seems to transcend time, and acts as the witness to major events: from the fall of Byzantium to the Syrian civil war. This is a richly imagined and thrillingly inventive new collection.

 

Best for…
Daytime entertainment:
It was 1960 when teenaged Vernon Hopkins recruited a new kid to his band. They didn’t know it yet, but this boy from Pontypridd would grow up to become Tom Jones. Just Help Yourself is the gritty, honest story of the band’s journey towards superstardom – from tiny gigs in South Wales to record deals in London – and then the inevitable bust up. It’s a wild ride that you might find hard to put down.

 

 

We hope you find a bookshelf full of hidden gems before the sale ends. Have a browse and see what catches your eye before the offer ends (midnight, Sunday 20 January).

 

 

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Veganuary: Tips & vegan recipes from Sarah Philpott

Forget the January blues – in recent years this cold and gloomy month has instead brought cooking inspiration and healthy eating ideas as ‘Veganuary’ has taken off.

What is Veganuary? Whether you’re new to the vegan diet or you’ve dabbled before, the idea is to cut out meat and dairy throughout January – and if you find you like it, then continue for as long as you’d like! To help kickstart your vegan journey, vegan cook Sarah Philpott, author of The Occasional Vegan, has some tips, tricks and recipes:

Getting started
Eating and cooking as a vegan might seem like a minefield but it’s simple once you know
how. Despite what your mother says, you’d be surprised by how little protein you actually
need and it can be found in a number of vegetables, beans and pulses. The same goes for iron, calcium and healthy fats.

Where to shop & what to buy – Can eating vegan be budget-friendly?
You might think that veganism is only for well-off lefties but it’s not a middle-class fad; it’s actually really accessible for those of us on a tight budget. Seasonal fruit and vegetables are cheap and plentiful, and beans, pulses, rice and other grains cost pennies. Meals like chilli, dhal and curry are tasty tummy fillers which, armed with a well-stocked cupboard, will cost you next nothing to make. You can buy big bags and tins of pulses for next to nothing from supermarkets and international stores, and pound or bargain shops often sell quinoa, nuts, seeds and dried fruit at a fraction of the price you’d pay elsewhere. Most supermarkets sell everything from plant milk to vegan cheese, as well as a variety of ready meals, and if you fancy a treat, there are plenty available, including vegan Magnums and Ben and Jerry’s. Most restaurants now offer a vegan menu and you can even enjoy a vegan sausage roll at Greggs.

Get started – try these vegan recipes!

 

The healthy meal:
Beat the Blues Salad
This vibrant and filling salad pairs smoky tofu with beetroot, orange and salty black olives.

Video credit: Manon Houston

Read the full recipe

 

The mid-week treat:
‘KFC’ – Kentucky Fried Cauliflower
This spiced, fried cauliflower tastes amazing and is surprisingly easy to make.

Video credit: Manon Houston

Read the full recipe

 

The decadent dessert:
Vegan Chocolate Mousse
This gorgeously light and creamy mousse has just four ingredients and comes together as if by magic.

Video credit: Manon Houston

Read the full recipe

 

We hope you feel inspired and ready to begin your voyage into veganism. Hungry for more great recipes? Get your copy of The Occasional Vegan from our website: £12.99

Create your free Seren account and enjoy 20% off every book you buy direct from us.

 

Summer Sale: a whole week of half price books

The sun is shining, school’s out for the summer, and – what’s this? All our books are half price!

Fiction, non-fiction and poetry – and this is just a tiny portion of it…

Whether you’re looking for some poetry to dip into, or an immersive holiday read – we’ve got you covered. We’ve even picked out a few highlights below…

Best for…
Holiday reading:
£9.99 £4.99
A dear elderly neighbour has died under suspicious circumstances and the only one searching for justice is eleven-year-old Michael. No-one believes his cries of ‘murder’, so how will he prove his version of events? This is a truly touching coming-of-age story with an addictive mystery at its heart.

 

Best for…
Dipping into in moments of peace:
£9.99 £4.99
Elizabeth Parker’s debut book of poems is delicate, precise, and utterly captivating. From flowing rivers to the Forest of Dean, let yourself be lured into landscapes both captivating and strangely unfamiliar.

 

 

Best for…
Armchair reading:
£12.99 £6.49
For at least the last 1,500 years, Capel-y-Ffin has been a spiritual retreat: a beautiful, lonely, timeless place where people have gathered to escape from the outside world. And so it was for artists Eric Gill and David Jones: with fascinating insight, Jonathan Miles explores their years spent in this Welsh wilderness, and its promise of religious and artistic evolution.

Best for…
Livening up a long journey:
£9.99 £4.99
Whether reading on a stuffy train, whilst waiting at the airport or, perhaps, somewhere more peaceful, these six masterful short stories will transport you: to the South China Sea in 1946 to a nameless place at the end of time, and many others in-between. Christopher Meredith is a writer at the height of his powers – these beautifully crafted stories are all the proof you need.

Best for…
Broadening the mind:
£12.99 £6.49
Acclaimed novelist and playwright Barney Norris ponders cultural identity and the nature of creativity in these conversations with his father, David Owen Norris – ‘quite possibly the most interesting pianist in the world’ (Toronto Globe and Mail). This is a deeply personal, entertaining and at times provocative study of how people and societies find their voice.

 

Best for…
Keeping you up past bedtime:
£9.99 £4.99
Norse gods tumble out of Ross Cogan’s new collection, intermingling with the environmental concerns so pressing in the modern day, and eulogies for vanishing wildlife. The pitch-perfect re-tellings of creation myths and bloodthirsty battles will hold you spellbound until the last page.

 

 

Our Summer Sale lasts for one week only – so treat yourself and have a browse before midnight on Sunday, 29 July! Who knows what gems you’ll find…

50% discount subject to availability. Excludes forthcoming titles.

 

Read Women: International Women’s Day 2018

Today we celebrate International Women’s Day – a day of recognition for women’s achievements, and also a time to acknowledge and challenge the gender inequality still present in society.

We are also just days away from Mother’s Day, and whilst fluffy books about romance and cooking usually dominate consumers’ gift choices, we say: why not give mum, and yourself, something important instead?

Until Monday, these two significant anthologies are 50% off – and we will also upgrade postage to First Class at no extra charge (why wait longer to enjoy these books than you absolutely have to?)

Writing Motherhood, ed. Carolyn Jess-Cooke
RRP £12.99 £6.49
The perfect literary gift, Writing Motherhood explores the relationship between creativity and motherhood, and queries the persistent societal obsession over whether women ‘can do both’. With contributions from writers such as Carol Ann Duffy, Sharon Olds and Hollie McNish.

‘This is a truly inspiring collection, all the more so for its wit and its grit, its poetry and its honesty; here we have women producing ‘good art’ despite – and often  because of – ‘the pram in the hall.’ – Shelley Day

Women’s Work, ed. Amy Wack & Eva Salzman
RRP £14.99 £7.49
Some may ask: is the literary establishment still as dominated by men as it once was? Who gets to decide the canon? Eva Salzman opens Women’s Work with a lively polemic, making the case for the women-only anthology with characteristic wit and flair. With over 250 contributors, this generous selection of poetry by women features poets from the USA, Canada, England, Ireland, Scotland, Wales, Australia, and New Zealand.

 

Celebrating Seren’s women writers

The list of women writers Seren has published is a long one – and we would like to take a moment to send out our love and thanks to every talented one who has graced our list – and those we look forward to publishing in future.

January Sale 2018: Half Price Highlights

The New Year festivities may have been and gone, but here at Seren we’re still celebrating – all our books are half price until midnight Thursday, 11 January.

You might wonder, “with so much choice, how will I ever decide what to read next?” And to that we say: take a look at our recommendations below. Or ignore them! It’s really up to you…

Best for… curling up with on cold winter nights:

The Chicken Soup Murder by Maria Donovan
£9.99 £4.99
Clear your diaries before you pick up this addictive, engrossing book – you won’t want to put it down until the mystery has been well and truly unraveled. The narrative follows sharp and imaginative young Michael, who believes his sweet elderly neighbour has been murdered whilst making him chicken soup. Nobody seems to care, so Michael decides to take on the burden of doing the right thing himself: seeking answers, and justice.

 

Best for… wintery adventures:

Wild Places, Iolo Williams
£19.99 £9.99
It’s not only in summer that you can explore Wales’ stunning landscapes – the colder months are filled with beauty too. From the frosty fenland at Magor Marsh to birdwatching at beautiful Dolydd Hafren, Iolo Williams’ stunningly illustrated book will guide you to the best and most nature interesting places Wales has to offer.

 

Best for… devouring along with your comfort food:

Masque by Bethany W. Pope
£9.99 £4.99
This rich and gothic re-telling of The Phantom of the Opera skillfully fleshes out the dark desires and deadly ambitions of the three central characters: the intensely ambitious Christine finds herself caught between the twin evils of the Phantom’s murderous pursuit of artistic perfection and Raoul’s ‘romantic’ vision of her as a bourgeois wife. Love, lust, adventure, romance, and the monstrous nature of unfulfilled creativity await you here.

 

Best for… moments of reflection:

A Watchful Astronomy by Paul Deaton
£9.99 £4.99
Sombre and exquisite, Paul Deaton’s PBS-recommended debut collection is a thing to be treasured. These quietly intense, formal poems are haunted by the ghost of the author’s father, a figure embodied in glowering mountain ranges, icy blasts of weather, and bits of bleak, monosyllabic dialogue. Nature is also a prime factor and facilitator: both rural and urban scenes are beautifully observed and presented. There is a gift for the visceral here, for tastes and sounds. A rigorous intelligence meets an adept sensitivity.

 

Best for… satisfying your wanderlust:

The Road to Zagora by Richard Collins
£9.99 £4.99
The gloriously eccentric author stumbles across fresh snow leopard tracks in the Himalayas, is robbed in Peru, and watches a volcanic eruption in Ecuador – all in his quest to visit as many strange and beautiful places as he can after he is diagnosed with Parkinson’s Disease. You will find great humour and honesty here in equal measure, as Collins’ rich descriptions bring the many little wonders of the world to life.

 

Best for… broadening the mind:

Forbidden Lives by Norena Shopland
£12.99 £6.49
Wales has a rich and fascinating LGBT history that has for the most part remained, rather frustratingly, untold. This glorious new book shines much-needed light on key Welsh LGBT figures, from the twelfth century to the present day. Among them are seventeenth century poet Katherine Philips, the Ladies of Llangollen, Henry Paget, artists Gwen John and Cedric Morris, and actor Cliff Gordon.

 

Best for… brief escapes from reality:

Writing on Water by Maggie Harris
£8.99 £4.49
Worlds of heartbreak and tenderness, separation and fierce familial bonds are played out in Maggie Harris’ mesmerising stories, which refuse to loosen their grip on the reader even long after they are finished. These tales transport you into the Caribbean scenes and memories with which they are infused, into dreams and lives, where there is struggle, hardship, and endurance.

 

Best for… staying under the covers with:

This Is Not A Rescue by Emily Blewitt
£9.99 £4.99
Uplifting and witty, these poems tackle love and cats, Welshness and The Walking Dead. Sharp, satirical poems confront issues such as office lechery, misogyny, domestic violence and depression, whilst consistently subverting expectations. The poet is a whirlwind, whose passions and influences swirl around, chaotic and irresistible.

 

We hope you enjoy browsing our January sale. The half price offer ends at midnight on Thursday 11 January, so don’t delay – see what you can find before the time runs out.

 

 

Free poetry alert – enjoy samples from all our 2017 collections

Who doesn’t love a freebie? We’ve put together something a little special for  all you poetry lovers – the Seren Poetry Sampler 2017. This free PDF is now available to download, and contains a free poem from each of our 2017 collections.

It also contains an exclusive 30% discount code – so when you inevitably fall in love with all ten books, you won’t break the bank.

 

 

 

 

 

 

There are a number of poems from striking debut collections: ‘Lake Fever’ from Polly Atkin’s Basic Nest Architecture, ‘The Coffin Hut’ from Paul Deaton’s PBS-Recommended debut A Watchful Astronomy, and ‘The Walking Wed’, Emily Blewitt’s Walking Dead-inspired poem from This Is Not A Rescue.

Experienced poets Siobhán Campbell, Martyn Crucefix, and Graham Mort feature too, with poems from fresh new collections: ‘Why Islanders Don’t Kiss Hello’ (Heat Signature), ‘R-O-M-J-X’ (The Lovely Disciplines), ‘Froglet’ (Black Shiver Moss), alongside ‘Closing Down’ from Robert Walton’s long-awaited second collection, Sax Burglar Blues.

There are also poems from two new pamphlets: ‘The Birds’ from Brood by Wales Book of the Year winner Rhian Edwards, and ‘Howlet’ by promising young poet Yvonne Reddick, from Translating Mountains, winner of the 2016 Mslexia Poetry Prize.

A final treat is ‘Hare’, a poem by Carolyn Jess-Cooke from the Writing Motherhood anthology, which brings together poetry, essays and interviews on the subjects of motherhood and creativity.

 

Download the Seren Poetry Sampler 2017 for free from our website.

 

 

What to read on Halloween

You can’t beat a chilling tale to read as darkness creeps ever earlier into the evening. From classics with haunted houses and man-made monstrosities to modern physological terrors, these books are at the top of our list of what to read on Halloween.

The Haunting of Hill House
Shirley Jackson’s slow-burning psychological horror sees four paranormal enthusiasts explore a brooding, mid-Victorian mansion in the hope of finding indisputable evidence of the psychic phenomenon called haunting. As they begin to cope with horrifying occurrences beyond their control or understanding, they cannot possibly know what lies ahead. For Hill House is gathering its powers – and soon it will choose one of them to make its own.

 

Sugar Hall
Easter 1955 and Britain waits for a hanging. Dieter Sugar finds a strange boy in the red gardens of crumbling Sugar Hall – a boy unlike any he’s ever seen. As Dieter’s mother, Lilia, scrapes the mould and moths from the walls of the great house, she knows there are pasts that cannot be so easily removed. Sugar Hall has a history, buried, but not forgotten.
Based on the stories of the slave boy that surround Littledean Hall in the Forest of Dean, this is a superbly chilling ghost story from Tiffany Murray.
Enter to win a hardback copy of Sugar Hall with this month’s Seren book giveaway.

 

The Woman in Black
Few attend Mrs Alice Drablow’s funeral. There are undertakers with shovels, of course, a local official who would rather be anywhere else, and one Mr Arthur Kipps, a solicitor from London. He is to spend the night in Eel Marsh House, where the old recluse died. Young Mr Kipps expects a boring evening alone sorting out paperwork and searching for Mrs Drablow’s will. But when the high tide pens him in, amidst a sinking swamp, and a blinding fog, what he finds – or rather what finds him – is something else entirely.

 

Frankenstein
Composed as part of a challenge with Byron and Shelley to conjure up the most terrifying ghost story, Frankenstein narrates the chilling tale of a being created by a bright young scientist and the catastrophic consequences that ensue. Considered by many to be the first science-fiction novel, the tragic tale of Victor Frankenstein and the tortured creation he rejects is a classic fable about the pursuit of knowledge, the nature of beauty and the monstrosity inherent to man.

 

Ritual, 1969
What are little girls made of? What will they become? From the playground to adulthood the path is beset with misunderstandings, missed dates and hidden traps for the unwary.
This darkly gothic collection of stories explores the unsettling borderland between reality and the supernatural. Not all is as it seems in a world where first impressions may only conceal disguises and false trails – and there’s no going back. Shortlisted for Wales Book of the Year 2017.

 

The Call of Cthulhu and Other Weird Stories
Credited with inventing the modern horror tradition, H.P. Lovecraft remade the genre in the early twentieth century. Discarding ghosts and witches, and instead envisaging mankind at the mercy of a chaotic and malevolent universe. Experience the extraterrestrial terror of ‘The Call of Cthulhu’, which fuses traditional supernaturalism with science fiction, which features here alongside early tales of nightmares and insanity, and grotesquely comic stories.

 

Slade House
Turn down Slade Alley – narrow, dank and easy to miss, even when you’re looking for it. Find the small black iron door set into the right-hand wall. No handle, no keyhole, but at your touch it swings open. Enter the sunlit garden of an old house that doesn’t quite make sense; too grand for the shabby neighbourhood, too large for the space it occupies. A stranger greets you and invites you inside. At first, you won’t want to leave. Later, you’ll find that you can’t.

 

 

 

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International Day of the Girl 2017 – 8 Books we should All Read

International Day of the Girl is celebrated every year on 11 October in order to bring attention to issues of gender inequality and the barriers girls come up against, from birth to adulthood. Here are eight outstanding books we think everyone should read – books which engage with the issues girls and women face, and will leave you empowered with knowledge and eager for change.

The Handmaid’s Tale, Margaret Atwood
Newly broadcast as a celebrated television series, Margaret Atwood’s modern classic, A Handmaid’s Tale, is a story of female subjugation at the hands of a male dictatorship, and the desperate hope of a young woman who cannot obliterate her memories and desires. Everyone should read this masterful story, which re-imagines modern society’s fears and flaws in a narrative at once otherworldly and entirely plausible.

 

The Colour Purple, Alice Walker
Winner of the Pulitzer Prize, Alice Walker’s haunting novel follows Celie, a young black girl born into poverty and segregation. Raped repeatedly by the man she calls ‘father’, she has two children taken away from her, is separated from her beloved sister Nettie and is trapped into an ugly marriage. But then she meets the glamorous Shug Avery, singer and magic-maker – a woman who has taken charge of her own destiny. Though violent and explicit in its portrayal of the issues facing African-American women in the US, The Colur Purple also has its moments of empowerment and joy, showing that strength can be found even in the most tragic conditions.

The Yellow Wallpaper, Charlotte Perkins Gilman
Charlotte Perkins Gilman’s chilling short story was first published in January 1892, in an attempt to shine a light on the devastating impact of 19th century attitudes toward women’s health, both physical and mental. As a form of treatment, the protagonist is forbidden from reading, writing and all other forms of activity so she can recuperate from what her husband, a doctor, calls a “temporary nervous depression – a slight hysterical tendency”. With nothing to stimulate her, she instead becomes obsessed with the patterned wallpaper in her confining room, and suffers a descent into psychosis. Short but powerful, The Yellow Wallpaper is an important early work of American feminist literature, illustrating society’s profound ignorance of women’s wants and needs.

Writing Motherhood, ed. Carolyn Jess-Cooke
This important book reconsiders Cyril Connolly’s statement, that ‘there is no more sombre enemy of good art than the pram in the hall’. Through a unique combination of interviews, poems, and essays by established writers, Writing Motherhood interrogates contemporary representations of motherhood in media and literature, queries why so many novels dealing with serious women’s issues are packaged in pink covers with wellies and tea cups, and portrays the exquisite moments of motherhood as often enriching artistic practice rather than hindering it.

A Girl Is a Half-formed Thing, Eimear McBride
Eimear McBride’s multi award-winning debut novel tells the story of a young woman’s relationship with her brother, and the long shadow cast by his childhood brain tumour. It is a shocking and intimate insight into the thoughts, feelings and chaotic sexuality of a vulnerable and isolated protagonist. To read A Girl Is a Half-formed Thing is to plunge inside its narrator’s head, experiencing her world at first hand. This isn’t always comfortable – but it is always a revelation.

The Bell Jar, Sylvia Plath
The Bell Jar, Sylvia Plath’s only novel, was originally published in 1963 under the pseudonym Victoria Lucas, just one month before Plath tragically took her own life. The novel the story of a gifted young woman’s mental breakdown beginning during a summer internship as a junior editor at a magazine in New York City in the early 1950s. It explores unsettling themes of depression and is thought (by some) to mirror Plath’s own spiral into mental illness. It is also a feminist masterpiece, unpicking uneasy female stereotypes and despairing at what it was to be a woman at the time.

A Thousand Splendid Suns, Khaled Hosseini
This tragic and achingly tender novel follows Mariam who, after a sudden and devastating loss, is sent at the age of fifteen to marry the much older Rasheed. After decades of servitude and oppression, Mariam strikes up an unlikely friendship with Rasheed’s new teenaged bride, Laila. When the Taliban take over, and life becomes a desperate struggle against starvation, brutality and fear, we see a brilliant resilience in these Afghan women, reluctantly brought out by their deep love for one another.

The Beauty Myth, Naomi Wolf
Every day, women around the world are confronted with a dilemma – how to look. In a society embroiled in a cult of female beauty and youthfulness, pressure on women to conform physically is constant and all-pervading. Naomi Wolf’s groundbreaking book will make you think about why and how you judge yourself when you’re stood in front of the mirror. First published in 1991, The Beauty Myth is sadly still all-too-relevant today.

 

 

Happy International Day of the Girl, and happy reading.

Feline favourites for International Cat Day

International cat day is the purr-fect time to celebrate man’s true best friends: cats. Here are a few of our favourite feline-centric books.

This Is Not A Rescue, Emily Blewitt (£9.99)
The author’s much-loved tortoiseshell cat is at the centre of this sharply satirical and entertaining book of poetry, bursting into poems with powerful personality. ‘We Broke Up’, the poem begins: ‘Because my cat/ screamed her passion on our lawn’. In ‘Dear Emily’ the feline voice asks:

Will you fall the way that cats do,
arch your spine in a defiant, graceful twist
and land on your feet?

Artist Karin Jurick’s painting of her own cat, ‘Bitz’, makes up the beautiful cover.

My Falling Down House, Jayne Joso (£9.99)
When young salaryman Takeo Tanaka loses his home, his girlfriend and his job all in quick succession, he finds himself completely alone – apart from the company of a stray cat:

A cat had joined me on my journey from the station. He was black and handsome looking, and I guessed he was still quite young – I remember how the heat kept everything weighted, our moves made in a sun and dust slow motion.

His fears and failing health keep him inside the house through four testing seasons, and he is driven to the edge of insanity, with only a cello and the black cat to connect him to the world. Joso has written a moving exploration of identity – a must-read.

Fauverie, Pascale Petit (£9.99)
The Fauverie of this book is the big cat house in the Jardin des Plantes zoo, home to Aramis the black jaguar, who haunts the Paris of this poetry collection: a city savage as the Amazon.

Transforming childhood horrors to ultimately mourn a lost parent, Fauverie redeems the darker forces of human nature whilst celebrating the ferocity and grace of endangered species. Five poems from Fauverie won the 2013 Manchester Poetry Prize, and the manuscript in progress was awarded an Arts Council England Grant.

The Other Tiger: Recent Poetry from Latin America, Richard Gwyn (£14.99)
The title is a nod to Borges’ poem, in which: ‘I go on pursuing through the hours/ Another tiger, the beast not found in verse.’ This anthology of Spanish language poetry from the Americas consists of 97 poets from 16 countries, born over five decades. It includes work from Argentina, Colombia, Mexico, Peru, Nicaragua, Chile, Uruguay, Venezuela, Cuba, the Dominican Republic, Ecuador, Costa Rica, Bolivia and El Salvador.

Richard Gwyn has arranged the poems thematically – Where We Live; Memory, Childhood, Family; the Natural World; Politics, Journey and Exile; Love, Sex and the Body – to cut across nationality and the generations, illustrating the things poets have in common, and how they differ, across continents.

 

Find more great poetry, fiction and non-fiction on our website.

Join our free, no-purchase-necessary Book Club for 20% off every book you buy direct from us.

 

Summer Sale Bestsellers

There’s still time to take advantage of our big summer sale, which ends midnight tonight. But what should you buy?

All our books are half price, and that includes a gloriously diverse range of books – everything from novels and short stories to poetry, biography and travel books – so we can’t blame you if you are struggling to choose what to read next. To help you decide, take a look at our sale bestsellers below.

 

Poetry

1. This Is Not A Rescue, Emily Blewitt
£9.99  £4.99
Top of the charts is young Welsh poet Emily Blewitt’s striking debut collection.
In This Is Not A Rescue, vibrant love lyrics contrast with poems confronting trauma and violence. Lighter themes include an homage to Jane Austen and an irreverent portrait of a Star Wars character.
‘Here is a riotous, cacophonous and wonderful book. Here is an important new voice in British poetry.’
– Jonathan Edwards, author of My Family and Other Superheroes.

2. Basic Nest Architecture, Polly Atkin
£9.99  £4.99
Coming in a close second is Polly Atkin’s first collection, which follows her Mslexia Prize-winning pamphlet, Shadow Dispatches. Atkin has already built up a loyal readership for her complex, intelligent, densely metaphorical lyrics, often inspired by the beauties of the Lake District where she has made her home for a decade. The remarkable poems in Basic Nest Architecture are a testament to her persistence and artistry: as well as being profoundly personal, they reach out to the modern world in all it’s complexity and diversity.

3. Heat Signature, Siobhan Campbell
£9.99  £4.99
There is a beautiful ruthlessness to the poetry of Siobhán Campbell, and it comes as no surprise that her latest collection, Heat Signature, is proving so popular in the sale. These are poems of moral tension, of provocation, but they are also artful: full of marvellously terse textures, of clashing consonants, subtle rhymes and insistent rhythms.
The blend of dark comedy, tragedy and politics is entirely typical of Campbell’s complex, thoughtful and profoundly entertaining poetry.

4. What the Water Gave Me: Poems after Frida Kahlo, Pascale Petit
£8.99  £4.49
‘Pascale’s poems are as fresh as paint, and make you look all over again at Frida and her brilliant and tragic life.’ – Jackie Kay, The Observer
What the Water Gave Me contains fifty-two poems in the voice of the iconic Mexican painter, Frida Kahlo. More than just a verse biography, this collection explores how Kahlo transformed trauma into art after the artist’s near-fatal bus accident. Petit, with her vivid style, her feel for nature and her understanding of pain and redemption, fully inhabits Kahlo’s world. Each poem is an evocation of “how art works on the pain spectrum”, laced with splashes of ferocious colour.

 

Fiction

1. Ritual, 1969, Jo Mazelis
£8.99  £4.49
Jo Mazelis’ darkly beautiful short story collection is your favourite fiction book so far. These subtle, unflinching stories explore the unsettling borderland between reality and the supernatural. Ranging from early twentieth-century France to 1960s South Wales and contemporary Europe, we are introduced, with singular vision and poetic language, to characters caught up in events and feelings they do not fully understand or control.

2. Six Pounds Eight Ounces, Rhian Elizabeth
£8.99  £4.49
In second place is Rhian Elizabeth’s tragicomic tale of growing up in the South Wales valleys.
Hannah King is a liar, so everyone says. That means her stories of growing up in the Rhondda must be treated with caution. Rhian Elizabeth opens Hannah’s notebook up on her own little world of crazy friends and crazy family, and a crazy school with crazy teachers who aren’t always what they seem. From dolls and sherbet lemons, to a bright student who drops out of school in favour of drink, drugs and glam rock up on an estate which feels like another planet, Hannah, it seems, has always been trouble.

3. Larkinland, Jonathan Tulloch
£9.99  £4.99
Jonathan Tulloch’s remarkable new novel isn’t officially released until 27 July, but that hasn’t stopped it being one of our most popular books in the sale.
A pitch-perfect realisation of Philip Larkin’s poetic world, Larkinland follows the moving misadventures of would-be poet Arthur Merryweather, revealing the loneliness, commonplaces, fears, lusts and hope we all must face. Drawing on meetings with the women in Larkin’s life, Larkinland casts startlingly fresh light on one of Hull’s greatest ever poets.

4. Ibrahim & Reenie, David Lewellyn
£8.99  £4.49
David Lewellyn’s impressive and daringly human book comes in fourth on the fiction list.
Ibrahim is a young Muslim ex-student with a tough few years behind him, and Reenie, a seventy-five year old cockney, has her life’s luggage in a shopping trolley, complete with an orange tent and a cockatiel. Meeting by chance in Newport, the odd couple discover they are both walking from Cardiff to London, and not for charity. Ibrahim & Reenie follows their journey and the unexpected relationship that builds between them.

 

Non-Fiction

1. Dark Land, Dark Skies, Martin Griffiths
£12.99  £6.49
Proving popular in our non-fiction list is Martin Griffiths’ Celtic re-interpretation of the night sky. Dark Land, Dark Skies is an exploration of how ancient Welsh peoples may have used their legends and beliefs to understand the stars above:  Leo, for instance, becoming a fearsome boar, and Pegasus (coupled to Andromeda on his back) representing the goddess Epona riding her white horse. This is a fascinating book, suitable for both amateur and professional stargazers.

2. Mametz, Aled Hughes
£14.99  £7.49
Aled Hughes’ extraordinary photographs are an artistic commemoration of the Battle of Mametz Wood, the most significant battle in World War I for Welsh troops. Over 4,000 soldiers of the 38th Welsh Division were killed or wounded there in July 1916, and Hughes’ photographs show the lingering evidence of this devastating event: images of actual trees from the war (some ‘embracing’ artillery shells), battlefield detritus, military mementoes, and images of places of modern pilgrimage and remembrance. It’s not hard to see why so many of you have chosen to buy this remarkable book.

3. Wild Places, Iolo Williams
£19.99  £9.99
We hope all those of you with fresh new copies of Iolo Williams’ Wild Places don’t keep them pristine for long – this book is for exploring Wales’ wilderness with, rain or shine, and is compact enough to take with you on all your journeys. Informative and lavishly illustrated, Wild Places will reveal rarities like the Snowdon lily and the Snowdonia hawkweed, show you where hares box and otters swim, where to spot dolphins and salmon, and where to see Wales’ great variety of hawks and other birds of prey.

4. Writing Motherhood, ed. Carolyn Jess-Cooke
£12.99  £6.49
Last but certainly not least is the Writing Motherhood anthology, a deeply moving and inspiring selection of poems, interviews and essays by female creatives. Why are still asking female writers with children how they find time to write? This book challenges preconceptions about motherhood as a creative hindrance, portraying the exquisite moments of motherhood as often enriching artistic practice instead.
‘Essential reading for anyone who is a mother, or who had a mother, and is interested in how motherhood and creativity intertwine.’ – Helen Cadbury

 

The half price sale ends at midnight. Take a look at all we have to offer on the Seren website.