I'm excited to announce the publication of my second book!
It's like buses round here, as they say, and hot on the heels of my debut poetry pamphlet comes my debut prose pamphlet or chapbook, if you will, published by the rather marvellous Broken Sleep Books. Thanks to Aaron for selecting it and for creating such a beautiful cover, following my instructions to a tee! The book is released on 30 September and you can pre-order here.
Here's the blurb... "Merging true tales of adventures on the high seas with imagined dips in magical pools and manmade ponds, Marine Drive is an immersive showcase of fifteen short stories and flash fictions with a watery notion. Sarah-Clare Conlon writes with a clear and powerful prose that allows us to dive to unexpected depths. Come on in, the water’s lovely…"
“The sea will never let you create a desire line” Conlon tells us. And so it is in this exhilarating collection of short fictions which pulse with the rhythms of the sea as they shift us through “points of interest” from pier to shore to pavilion roof via starboard buoys, candle smut and heavy steel rings. Sentences rise and fall, like the pots and pans at sea set into cacophonous motion by a passing tanker, as Conlon deftly, humorously – “up to the church, down to the pub” – navigates the melancholy of faded towns and lost people, the “reckless” play of youth and commuter-carriage lives versus life “on the ocean wave”. In prose redolent of the clear precision of Lydia Davis, the material evocations of Sheila Heti, and the visceral spikes of Ann Berg, Marine Drive speaks brilliantly to the current convergence of ecological, political and social crises in which we are all bodies at sea. This collection soars! – Andrea Mason, Waste Extractions (Broken Sleep Books)
Her language as slippery and ungraspable as the contents of a pond, a lake, an ocean, Sarah-Clare Conlon captures the way that water transforms everything – and everyone – around it. – Nicholas Royle, London Gothic (Confingo Publishing)
Broken Sleep are hosting an online launch, also featuring Andre Bagoo, Taylor Edmonds, Kate Francis, James McDermott and Daniele Pantano, on Friday 30 September at 7.30pm – sign up here.
I'm also organising an IRL double launch for Marine Drive and cache-cache on Wednesday 26 October at Saul Haul Gallery, a lovely space on the canal in Manchester's Castlefield. I'll be joined by James Davies, launching his new book, it is like toys but also like video taped in a mall, out soon with Pamenar Press, and Nora Blascsok, whose book <body>of work<body> is out with Broken Sleep. It's 6.30pm doors for a 7pm start – hope you can join us!
