The Unseen – a detective novel
Valerio Varesi
Commissario Soneri from Parma is investigating an unsolved case of a dead body found in the Po River three years before. His investigation leads him to river life, where he tries to break the wall of silence, typical of small communities harbouring poachers, petty criminals and big time profiteers. Soneri realises that the fog surrounding the Po makes things invisible and people unseen; it changes their identities; it deceives. And sometimes it kills.
Singing in the Dark Times
Margaret Corvid
Margaret Corvid has been writing for many years, but this is her first published poetry collection. Her poems are accomplished and interesting. She shows confidence, innovation and intelligibility and the poems have a confident and easy structure. Above all, there is a variety and exuberance in the collection and verve in the subject matter.
Now This – Reflections on our Arts and Cultures
Patricia Borlenghi, Editor
This collection of essays by visual artists explores current political and health issues adversely affecting our arts and cultures. With the dreadful tragedy of Covid-19, our shared suffering and loss confirm our place in Europe more firmly than ever, regardless of those attempting to cut our ties.
Rebel Alliance – Short Story Anthology
Anna Johnson, Editor
Human existence is all about the grey areas — and it is those that this anthology of short stories explores — providing a space for stories to be told and voices to be heard. Some stories are based on true experiences, or speculative fiction and political parables to reflect on our present day problems.
Chaos – Poetry Anthology
Anna Johnson, Editor
We are all looking for truth in these chaotic times. Hopefully, as well as truth, this poetry anthology restores some humanity, some significance and some love. Contributors to ‘Chaos’ include George Szirtes, Christine De Luca, Catherine Coldstream and MW Bewick.
Never Knowingly Understood
Anthony Roberts, Dr
A collection of reflections, ideas and commentary from Dr Robert’s regular local Essex newspaper column. He steps through the frustrations and idiosyncrasies of everyday life with a comic eye and a candid approach to family life. Mixed in with these irreverent musings are some caustic attacks on homophobia and some beautiful and moving words on the commonality of young male suicide.
Colchester WriteNight Short Prose Collection
Sue Dawes and Emma Kittle-Pey, Editors
This is a selection of short prose from Colchester Writenight, a community writing group, formed in 2011. The theme of the collection is ‘Open Book’, representing the diversity of creative writing they produce. It will intrigue and inspire you.
Refugees and Peacekeepers – A Patrician Press Anthology
Anna Johnson, Editor
This anthology of poems and short stories is the result of a writing competition Patrician Press ran in 2016. The short-listed works including that of the winner, Penny Simpson, are now published in the anthology as well as contributions by Patrician Press authors and others.
My Europe – An Anthology
Anna Johnson, Editor
This diverse and varied anthology of poems, short stories and essays includes contributions by Canon Giles Fraser, Helena Kennedy QC, Lemn Sissay, George Szirtes and Stephen Timms MP. For any reader interested in knowing more about our ties with Europe, the EU and Brexit.
Tempest – An Anthology
Anna Vaught and Anna Johnson, Editors
This diverse and varied anthology of short fiction, essays and poems includes contributions by Sam Jordison, Steven O’Brien, Justine Sless, Patrick Wright and poet M W Bewick. The anthology concerns our present political ‘tempestuous’ times and some of the works have a science-fiction flavour to include dystopian, authoritarian and imagined worlds.
Northern alchemy – Shetlandic poems with versions in English
Christine De Luca
A bi-lingual collection of 40 poems, each in the original Shetlandic, along with a version in English. Shetlandic is a unique ‘dialect’ or language, a blend of Old Scots with strong Norse vocabulary and sound; the most distinctive within Scotland. Nordic poets, when they hear it, describe it as a ‘cousin language’.
Arcobaleno Rainbow
Sara Elena Rossetti
This is delicately written poetry by a young Italian writer. The poems are divided into sections based on the colours of the rainbow. The English translation appears alongside each Italian poem. Readers will be able to appreciate the original cadence; rhythm and rhyme of each poem in the Italian language whilst at the same time better understand the meaning of the words.
Stance
Mark Brayley
Working within the constraint of the lipogram, Stance is a poetry collection completely constructed without the use of the letter i. Moving beyond the personal pronoun to be more objective, this collection delves through characters and narratives, as well as taking, at times, an imperative stance.
Disarming the Porcupine
Mark Brayley
Blurring the boundaries between poetic catharsis, dramatic exploration of character, and challenging the reader, Disarming the Porcupine is a daring collection of poetry, spanning nearly ten years of writing. As a document of the mind of a man in the early twenty-first century, this is not poetry for the faint hearted.
The Unfettered Cube
Mark Brayley
The beauty of OULIPO (Ouvroir de Littérature Potentielle) with the use of a mathematical formula is evocatively expressed in this imaginative, erudite and clever poem. Reading the cantos and interpreting the structure of the poem make it an entertainingly visual and interesting experience.
Robert Macfarlane’s Orphans
Martin Johnson
Martin Johnson, inspired by Robert Macfarlane’s The Old Ways, has extracted poems from Macfarlane’s very poetical prose in much the same way that Edward Thomas, a poet loved by both writers, was inspired by Robert Frost to do the same with his own prose writings.
Letters to the Cultural Rehabilitation of the Unemployed
Andrea Inglese
The book is composed of 17 ‘love’ letters written by an unemployed man and addressed to a vague entity – the Cultural Rehabilitation. This Cultural Rehabilitation sometimes assumes the abstract and anonymous form of an institution, at others, a female public official with whom the man establishes an erotic understanding. The second part is entitled Circumstances of the Sentence and includes 15 prose passages representing unpredictable small worlds.
War Changes Everything
Melanie Hughes
This is Nita’s Story. Born during the First World War, she is illegitimate. When her mother marries, she doesn’t get on with her stepfather. At grammar school she meets Yolanda who introduces her to the vibrant Italian community. The two young women become involved in the left-wing intellectual life of London in the 1930s. She meets Rikh, an activist in the India League. When war is declared, Rikh is seconded to bomber command and they marry in haste.
La Guerra Cambia Tutto
Melanie Hughes
Il romanzo è il vero racconto di due donne eccezionali. Nita, nata durante la prima guerra mondiale è illegittima. Al liceo, incontra la vivace Yolanda, della comunità italiana londinese. Le due giovani diventano amiche del cuore e, negli anni trenta, partecipano alla vita intellettuale della sinistra.
Midnight Legacy
Melanie Hughes
Nita’s story continues. She and Rikh arrive in Madras. Rikh’s squadron is based in Ambala, one of India’s oldest military bases and head of operations for the Combined Allied Forces. Rikh takes part in bombing raids on Burma. Bored and miserable, Nita has an affair with a young pilot. She leaves Rikh and goes to Lahore, ‘the Paris of the East.’ She discovers she is pregnant when the Second World War ends and communal violence is building up all over India.
The ground is full of holes
Suzy Norman
Marcus, an Irish-born consultant anaesthetist in London, makes a disastrous error. In a moment of panic he tries to cover his tracks. During the subsequent inquiry, his half-truths are exposed by Asabi, his assistant, who is smarting from his withdrawn attention.
Duff
Suzy Norman
Recovering from a near-fatal bout of pneumonia, Duff Boyd plans to win back his estranged wife, Nerys. He suggests a road trip. Their destination is Aberdeen, the city where they fell in love. As they rattle along from Wales to Scotland, Duff’s romantic mission is challenged by the strange characters they encounter. There is also the curious reappearance of a battered white Citroen. Who is driving it and what do they want from Duff?
Once upon a time in Chinatown
Robert Ronsson
Once Upon a Time in Chinatown is the second novel by Robert Ronsson to be inspired by film. It starts with the narrator embarking on a search for the father he never knew. This leads to a ruined stately home in Malaysia and the Chinese family that owns it. The ‘castle’ and its romantic story become the focus of the novel and its fate impels the narrative.
Out of Such Darkness
Robert Ronsson
Cameron Mortimer follows fellow-writer Christopher Isherwood to 1930s Berlin. In a separate narrative, Jay Halprin, an Englishman working in Manhattan, survives 9/11. When Jay’s second-chance life collides with the repercussions of Cameron’s travels, the outcome, though always inevitable, is both surprising and shocking.
Gold Adornments and other stories
Emma Kittle-Pey
This collection contains humorous stories and vignettes of the false honesties and small-world stereotyping that the various characters encounter on their individual journeys. For instance, whilst they shop for bras or visit charity shops or find themselves involved in domestic ‘confrontations’ with estate agents and others.
Fat Maggie and other stories
Emma Kittle-Pey
This quirky and subtly witty collection of short stories tackles women’s daily life interaction at home, in the workplace, on holiday or at social events. The animal-related tales contain an interactive element and readers are invited to suggest their own moral at the end of each story, thus contributing to the dead-pan humour they evoke.
Faded Letters
Maurizio Ascari
1944, Northern Italy. Antonio’s life is shattered when he is deported to Germany as a forced labourer. Thereafter, his joys consist of small things: being able to breathe, to feel the plaster of a wall with his fingers, and the hope that perhaps, one day, he will return to his world. The book, partly in the form of letters and postcards, reconstructs that former world and is itself an act of commemoration…
La Pagina Cancellata
Maurizio Ascari
La Pagina Cancellata racconta l’esperienza di Antonio Ascari, deportato in Germania come lavoratore coatto nel 1944. Attraverso la scrittura creativa, questo libro dà voce a documenti e memorie, colmandone i vuoti con l’immaginazione e perseguendo una verità in primo luogo affettiva, un rituale di commemorazione che abbraccia insieme ad Antonio la sua intera famiglia.
Coma – La vita in un altro tempo
Arturo Croci
COMA – Life in another time – embraces a world beyond time, beyond reality. We can ask ourselves whether it’s possible to experience two realities: to live in a world where time cannot be fixed or measured and the answer is yes.
Coma – Life in another time
Arturo Croci
This is the English edition of ‘Coma – La vita in un altro tempo’.
Four Quartets – T S Eliot and Spirituality
Richard Brock
The book explores the spiritual themes underpinning one of the twentieth century’s most celebrated literary masterpieces. The author unpacks and elucidates for the modern reader the complex religious and philosophical ideas which influenced T. S. Eliot’s poem.
As Fit as a Fish – the English and Italians Revealed!
Laura Tosi and Peter Hunt
Did you know that the Italians invented the fork, and the English named the Dolomites? That you can’t drink cappuccino after noon or buy coloured pasta in Italy without being instantly recognised as English? This original guide to English-Italian stereotypes and prejudices – sometimes funny, sometimes serious – is an essential part of every European traveller’s luggage!
Three Wishes
Philip Terry
Between 1970 and 1982, Georges Perec sent his friends small pamphlets with his best wishes for the New Year. These were collections of short texts based on homophonic variations. The three pieces are neither translations of this material (which is, by its very nature, untranslatable), nor entirely original pieces of work, rather a sort of homage to Perec.
Zaira – a girl before her time
Patricia Borlenghi
This is an historical novel set in Northern Italy at the turn of the 20th century. Zaira is a young, determined girl, seeking a new life away from her restricting peasant farming background. However things do not go according to plan when she meets Leonardo, a rich landowner and becomes companion to his delicate wife, Livietta. When Zaira gives birth to twins their lives are changed forever.
Zaira – Italian edition
Borlenghi, Patricia
The new, revised Italian edition of Zaira is now out in paperback and can be ordered direct from this site.
Clarisse – an honest woman
Patricia Borlenghi
A London-born woman’s life changes drastically after her husband dies suddenly and she develops breast cancer. The novel recounts her life in France and move to East Anglia; the people she meets; her reactions to death and illness and her refusal of conventional treatment. The novel ends with her journey of discovery to New Zealand.
Dorek – deaf and unheard
Patricia Borlenghi
Dorek has no sense of achievement in life. As a boy, he was obsessed with a girl who lived opposite him and finds it difficult to relate to other people. This is a result of his deafness and his uncertain sexuality. He relies on his best friend, Mungo, for companionship. Then unexpectedly his fortunes change and through learning about his family history and the surprising connections he uncovers, Dorek finally finds fulfilment and an inner peace.
The Wallowbang Tree
Danielle Wrayton
One fatal night young Rosie Sparks’ world is turned upside down after listening to her granny’s strange but true tale of a magical tree, the Wallowbang Tree. In her subsequent adventure she encounters fiendish characters but new and old friends are there to help her on her quest to find her missing dad.
Darkling Park
Elisa Marcella Webb
This is a children’s adventure story set in a graveyard. When Fin and her embarrassing family move to Darkling Park, Fin worries about why their new home is called Blind Twin House and will she ever live it down at school? And there’s something lurking about in the bushes.
Godfrey and the Stars
Mike Fryer
Godfrey is a gargoyle living at the top of the cathedral. One day, a passing scatter-brained Pigeon who has lost his way, lands on Godfrey’s head. Surprisingly, Godfrey and the Pigeon become friends. They spend an evening stargazing at various sky wonders such as the Moon, the Pole Star, the Great and Little Bears, comets, the Milky Way and the Northern Lights.
Godfrey’s Flying Adventure
Mike Fryer
Godfrey can’t fly even though he has ‘wings’ so he builds a flying machine. After a bumpy start he and the Pigeon take off for an adventure in the sky and encounter different kinds of weather.
Godfrey’s Clever Inventions
Mike Fryer
Godfrey the Gargoyle invents many things such as a Rain Machine and a Lightning Machine. In the process he answers various questions about science posed by his friend, the Pigeon.
A to Z – an animal alphabet in five languages
Patricia Borlenghi and illustrated by Piers Harper
This is an ingenious and unique alphabet in English, French, German, Spanish and Italian. In this book, the names of the animals all start with the same letter in each language. The five different languages always appear in the same order on the page and each language has its own design style.
The Necklace
Patricia Borlenghi
This is a modern fairy tale about a princess with a difference. Princess Lucy is the most beautiful girl in the world but she isn’t interested in finding her prince charming. She prefers to dabble in magic and witchcraft with her beloved friend, a witch called Willow.
Gli Animali Pellegrini
Patricia Borlenghi
A group of animal pilgrims are making the long journey to visit the shrine of Saint Francis of Assisi, and Chaucer the cat suggests that they tell each other stories to make the trip more enjoyable.
The Birmingham Collection
Wersha Bharadwa
Wersha Bharadwa’s ‘Sunny the Indian Datsun’, ‘Living History’ and ‘This is Earth’ – three funny short stories for our unsettling times.
The New York Collection
Robert Ronsson
PDF edition of Robert Ronsson’s five bittersweet short stories for our unsettling times.
Food Fetish – a life of eating and drinking
Patricia Borlenghi
The everyday life and diary of a food lover describing the enjoyment of simple meals and wine. It is mainly set in Emilia Romagna in Italy but there is some background information about the author’s food-dominated childhood in London and other events. The book contains recipes and illustrations.
The Book of Coincidences
Patricia Borlenghi
This book is an autobiography; recounted as a collection of the coincidences in the author’s life. The author describes how many of her friends and members of her family link up, often with more than two connections between them. Interspersed with these anecdotes are further biographical details about her life and work, both as a publisher and a writer.
Il Tempo del Disgelo – The Thawing
Ilaria Locati
A book of photographs and poems about the tundra. In 2015 Ilaria Locati returned to the most northern part of Europe to experience first-hand the moment when the Arctic starts to thaw. She turned her feelings and reflections about the harsh nature of the tundra and northern forests into poems, some of which are collected in this book, together with the stunning photographs of the same places taken by the artist.
Dolores – a book of poems
Marianne Francis
An eclectic poetry collection about women, places, philosophy and feelings.