Artsfest Online: Myriad Editions Literary Salon

Artsfest Online is pleased to present a literary salon with publisher Myriad Editions and three of their authors, Elleke Boehmer, Elaine Chiew and Hannah Vincent, who will discuss and read from their recent short story collections.

This event is hosted by Dr. Lisa Blower, fellow Myriad author and senior lecturer in creative and professional writing at Wolverhampton.

They will also be joined by Myriad's Publishing Director, Candida Lacey, who'll reveal what she really looks for in a short story collection, why she's published who she has, and why the UK market should not be afraid to publish more collections over novels.

Lisa Blower is an award-winning short story writer and novelist. She won The Guardian’s National Short Story competition in 2009, and has been shortlisted for the BBC National Short Story Award, The Sunday Times Short Story Award, and The Bridport Prize.

Her work has appeared in various presses including The Guardian, Comma Press, The New Welsh Review, The Luminary, Short Story Sunday, and on Radio 4.

She's the author of 'Sitting Ducks', the short story collection ‘It’s Gone Dark over Bill’s Mother’s’, and a contributor to Common People.

In her role as a senior lecturer in creative and professional writing, Lisa champions working-class fictions and regional voices.

'Pondweed' is her second novel.

Elleke Boehmer is the author of five novels including 'Screens Against the Sky' (1990), 'Bloodlines' (2000), 'Nile Baby' (2008), and 'The Shouting in the Dark' (2015).

'The Shouting in the Dark' won the triennial Olive Schreiner Prize (2018).

'Screens Against the Sky' was shortlisted for the David Higham Prize, and 'Bloodlines' for the Sanlam Prize.

'Sharmilla, and other Portraits' (2010) was her first collection of short stories, and is now followed by 'To the Volcano and other stories' (2019).

‘Supermarket Love’, one of the stories in the collection, was commended for the 2019 Elizabeth Jolley Prize in Australia.

Elleke Boehmer is Professor of World Literature in the English Faculty at the University of Oxford, and Director of the Oxford Centre for Life Writing.

In 2019 she was made a Fellow of the Royal Society of Literature and of the Royal Historical Society.

Elaine Chiew is a visual arts researcher and writer.

She is the author of 'The Heartsick Diaspora' (Myriad, 2020) and editor/compiler of 'Cooked Up: Food Fiction Around the World' (New Internationalist, 2015).

Twice winner of the Bridport, she has stories in anthologies in the UK, US and Singapore, and her story has been broadcasted on BBC Radio 4.

She currently lives in Singapore and is on Twitter, Facebook and Instagram.

Hannah Vincent is a novelist and playwright who lives in Brighton.

She studied Drama and English at the University of East Anglia and completed the MA in Creative Writing at Kingston University.

She has a PhD in Creative and Critical Writing from the University of Sussex.

Hannah teaches creative writing on the Open University’s MA and life writing on the autobiography and life writing programme at New Writing South.

This free online event is part of Creative & Professional Writing's Get Shorty short story series. It takes place on Thursday 10 December at 6.30pm. Places can be booked through Eventbrite: https://artsfestonlinemyriadeditions.eventbrite.co.uk