Edition Twelve is here, and it marks the end of year two of Northern Gravy. Two years is, paradoxically, both a long time and a very short time.
It seems like only yesterday we were launching Northern Gravy, smashing a bottle of champagne/bargain bin fizzy plonk on the hull as the Gravy Boat took to the waves. Setting sail to publish the best in new writing with a distinctly northern flavour.
And yet, that was two whole years ago. And what a two years it’s been! We’ve now published 42 new pieces of work, 12 articles, hosted events, launched a podcast, been to festivals, spoken to many students and future writers and successfully managed to stay afloat without getting editorial scurvy. And we still pay our writers.
But the horizon is always ahead, and so we look to it and year three. Exciting things are brewing, we can almost lift the lid and share what we’re cooking, but it’s meant the world to have you along with us for the ride. We hope you stick with us, and look forward to what we find.
This edition, however, we can very much show off and talk about. We’re very proud to present a new article from the fantastic Russ Thomas, who like us is a graduate of the MA Creative Writing course at Sheffield Hallam. We’re pleased as punch to have him aboard, leading the charge ahead of this edition’s new writing.
A word from our Poetry Editor, Ralph Dartford
Here are serious poems that cut through the humdrum of the traffic of life. Direct and lyrical. Urgent in their movement and their sense of place and history. From Peckham to Rwanda to monologues of the mind and shopping lists. These poems meditate on the past, present, loss and the people we are by made circumstances. A fine suite of poems!
A word from our Fiction Editor, Nick Jones
The pieces I’ve chosen for this edition aren’t themed around a single image, genre or concept, so much as they’re themed around length. All of them are short, and yet carry an idea in such a fully realised way that they possess an incredible strength and potency. There’s lots to choose from, from magical realism, historical fiction, mythology and more, but each is small, powerful, and perfectly formed.
A word from our Kid Lit Editor, Jonny Syer
For this edition Jonny has chosen prose and poems that he hopes will stretch and build upon our successful back catalogue of KidLit so far. We’ve come ALONG way here at Northern Gravy in our children’s writing department. We believe we are still one of the only few places who pay in this area and hope to grow many more opportunities in the future as we move into year three!
Guest Article
Our twelfth article is written by best selling author Russ Thomas! Author of the DS Adam Tyler series Fire watching, Nighthawking and Cold Reckoning. Published by Simon & Schuster in the UK and by G.P. Putnam’s Sons (Penguin Random House) in the US. I’m represented by Sarah Hornsley of Peters, Fraser + Dunlop.
Northern Gravy continues to break down barriers by paying every writer they feature.
As ever, we would like to thank our friends and advisors: Arts Council England, Sheffield Hallam University, New Writing North, Writing on the Wall, Spread the Word, Harper North, Writing East Midlands and Bradford Literature Festival.
