Just a few weeks ago, the world’s leading climate scientists announced that mankind has just twelve years left to limit the irreversible impact of climate change on our planet. Sparking conversation across the globe, the news has, for most, awoken a desire for change. But in order to ignite this change, perhaps we should first […]

On the 27th October 2018, acclaimed poet and playwright Ntozake Shange died at the age of 70

Gurnaik Johal reviews the Faber New Poets reading at The International Anthony Burgess Foundation as part of the 2018 Manchester Literature Festival

Gurnaik Johal discusses Anna Burns’ novel Milkman, which has made her the first Northern Irish writer to win the Man Booker Prize

Bayley Cornfield reviews ‘A Celebration of Muriel Spark’ at this year’s Manchester Literature Festival after the centenary of her birth

Shaheena Patel reviews James Baldwin: A Cabaret for Freedom at St John’s Church as part of 2018’s Manchester Literature Festival

Kelleigh Greenberg-Jephcott’s novel is a brilliant representation of a literary icon, Truman Capote, and an incredible debut novel, writes Robert Boddy

As the first graphic novel ever to make it onto the Man Booker Prize long list, Sabrina explores the nastier side of conspiracies

Daisy Lester shares her thoughts on the chat show host’s appearance at the Manchester Literature Festival, discussing his new book, The Keeper

Frank Radcliffe-Adams reviews ‘Hold’ a debut novel written by Michael Donkor, an Observer New Face for Fiction 2018, and published by 4th Estate

A recent change to The Women’s Prize for Fiction entry requirements means that the publishers of the 16 long listed books will need to pay a fee of £1000

Julia De Miguel re-examines the treatment of female writers and characters after her Spanish Literature course sidelined women poets on their syllabus.

Sally Rooney has been getting a lot of hype. Urussa Malik reads her latest novel, Normal People, to find out how such a comparatively young writer (she’s written two best-selling books by the age of 26) has been so successful.

Last week, the 2018 Forward Prizes for Poetry were awarded at the Royal Festival Hall, London. They are the most coveted awards in British poetry, with past winners including Ted Hughes, Seamus Heaney and Carol Anne Duffy. This year saw the £10,000 first place prize for Best Collection awarded to 29 year-old Danez Smith, making […]

Established in 2013, The Goldsmiths Prize aims to celebrate and reward fiction which “breaks the mould or extends the possibilities of the novel form”. With an annual prize of £10,000, and an impressive list of past winners, the winning novel must be a well-crafted piece of dynamic long-form fiction. One of my favourite novels, Eimear […]

Get to know the novels in the running for this year’s prestigious fiction award and their authors

On the 6th September, the 2017/18 MA Creative Writing class launched The Manchester Anthology VI at HOME. At the event, the writers read small sections of their work, showcasing a wide range of styles, forms and subject matter. Each piece seemed to be completely unique but hearing them read aloud together, it was clear there […]

Gurnaik Johal picks out highlights from the upcoming Manchester Literature Festival and looks ahead to an exciting season of literary events

I picked up Amer Anwar’s debut novel, Brothers In Blood, because it was set in Southall, the place that I’m from. When I met him, I was on my way from Southall to get a coach up to Manchester. He was on his way back from an event promoting the book, which had just been […]

Gurnaik Johal explores the issues surrounding reading and misreading race after a character in one of his stories was incorrectly assumed to be white