Valley Press

17/01/2024

Help us re-launch this award-winning series for 8-12 year olds – in which young carers discover an alien egg and an intergalactic doppelganger... https://www.valleypressuk.com/crowdfunding

09/01/2024

Re-posting due to some spam issues.

Beginnings & Other Tragedies by Ilaria Boffa – Out now!

With the added opportunity of being able to improve your Italian (or English!) whilst reading – this poetry book is written in both the Italian and English languages!

Drawing on nature, poetry, dystopian fiction, and Greek tragedy, this powerful book-length poem, reimagines scientific and ecological language as sites of beauty, with the strength to change reality.

Available on our website https://www.valleypressuk.com/shop

05/01/2024

Introducing a new writing contest, with the chance to win books and publication:

Announcing the arrival of a happy, healthy new writing challenge

21/12/2023

❄ Perfect gift for your inner chefs! ❄

If you're a bookseller and you'd like to make an order of this extraordinary Valley Press title, please place your order via [email protected] or speak to your local Inpress rep!

21/12/2023

🌴Day 20 of our advent gift reveals is Queen Palm: A Bermuda Christmas. A love letter to the author's Bermudian heritage, this collection celebrates coming home at Christmas.
🌴Bermuda is the gift and Nancy Anne Miller has wrapped it up beautifully. Order your Bermuda Christmas here with 25% off using your member discount code > https://www.poetrybooks.co.uk/collections/christmas-gift-guide-2023/products/queen-palm-a-bermuda-christmas-by-nancy-anne-miller-pre-order

12/11/2023

Valley Press author Emma Brankin has a special offer for you! Emma is collaborating with the Hazlemere Bookshop, and if you purchase her short story collection, 'Attention Seekers', from their bookshop, before the end of November, (see image for more details) she will read and provide you with feedback on your writing!! What a great opportunity 😃

Click the link below to buy the book! (It's full of fascinating stories - you won't regret it I'm sure. And even if you aren't an upcoming author, but like quirky, thought provoking stories, buy it anyway!! 😁

https://haslemerebookshop.co.uk/products/9781915606280?_pos=1&_psq=attention%20seeke&_ss=e&_v=1.0

09/11/2023

As we approach Remembrance Day, it is often a time for reflection.

Last year, around this time, we published 'Ampersand' by Lydia Fulleylove .

As we turn the pages of 'Ampersand' we honour the voices of the past, celebrate the unbreakable bond between generations, and bridge the gap between history, heart, and the world's present challenges. Lydia Fulleylove's poetic journey, inspired by her mother's wartime diaries, beautifully weaves the echoes of the past into a tapestry of love and memory.

As we remember those who have passed and those who currently endure ongoing conflict in Ukraine and the turmoil of war in Israel and Palestine, these words remind us of the timeless connections that live on in our hearts. Let us pray for peace, unity, and the strength to overcome.

https://www.valleypressuk.com/shop/p/ampersand

06/11/2023

Shipping now from the Valley Press online bookshop, this "remarkable debut collection where the quality of writing, the precision and economy of characterisation, and the deft creation of context – both physical and emotional – ensure the reader is gripped from the first word until the last. A collection full of humour, but also edgy and unsettling at times, and believable throughout. Impossible to put down.” (Patrick Lodge).

Being hunted on a foreign island. Meeting your all-time hero. Seeking love when it doesn’t want to be found. Running through enemy territory. Almost losing a child. Getting lost in a hostile landscape. And realising your lover isn’t the one.

Survival comes in many guises.

https://www.valleypressuk.com/shop/p/surviving-larkin

01/11/2023

For anyone who may be interested... we came across this writing opportunity...

We are in search of emerging writers to submit their work for publication opportunity ‘Chapbook Series #6 ‘The Fragile Knots of Time’’. The writing must be your original work inspired by the theme of the call ‘‘The Fragile Knots of Time’’. Write your own ‘‘The Fragile Knots of Ti...

31/10/2023

Queen Palm – Poems by Nancy Anne Miller.

Christmas has come early! and amazingly, we are a little too! :)

The launch date for Queen Palm was November 2nd, however, this beautiful book has arrived already and is ready for dispatch! :)

Available as always, at https://www.valleypressuk.com/shop/p/queen-palm

Queen Palm celebrates the power of Christmas as a transformative and introspective time, where the boundaries of poetry and spirituality merge seamlessly.

Miller explores the unique blend of African/English influences found in Bermudian customs, the vibrant and sometimes extravagant American celebrations, the symbolism of Advent, and the poet’s personal creative process.

Nancy Anne Miller is a Bermudian poet with ten published collections, including Pink Typewriter (Kelsay Books, April 2023). Her poetry has been published internationally in journals such as Edinburgh Review, Poetry Ireland Review, The Moth, Salzburg Review, Agenda, Stand, Magma, Ambit, The Fiddlehead, Dalhousie Review, The International Literary Quarterly and The Caribbean Writer, among many others.

“A love letter to the author’s Bermudian heritage, this collection celebrates coming home, especially at Christmas. Bermuda is the gift and Miller has wrapped it up beautifully.”
– Tina Stevenson, The Bermudian

Pre-order: published November 2023 “A love letter to the author’s Bermudian heritage, this collection celebrates coming home, especially at Christmas. Bermuda is the gift and Miller has wrapped it up beautifully.” – Tina Stevenson, The Bermudian In Queen Palm , internationally-published p

05/10/2023

Yay!! Today is National Poetry Day!

I've learned a behind-the-scenes secret – to celebrate, Jamie usually likes to take this day off! He thinks it's like Father's Day... but I'm having none of that! :)

It is also the day of our latest poetry release, the bilingual long poem Beginnings & Other Tragedies by Ilaria Boffa. Why not give your favourite VP poem a shout out in the comments?

22/09/2023

Simon Maddrell Simon Maddrell is a q***r Manx writer, editor and performer living in Brighton & Hove. He’s published in fifteen anthologies and numerous publications including AMBIT, Butcher’s …

05/09/2023

You asked, and Jamie answered... as definitively (and entertainingly) as possible. Guest starring: the man from the Monopoly box and exciting new poet Brian Smethurst.

Answering my most frequently asked question, with a fun thought exercise

01/09/2023

After two years, Valley Press is officially open to submissions again, seeking your book-length works of fiction, non-fiction and poetry, for publication in 2024. Find out the full details on Jamie's blog, here: https://valleypress.substack.com/p/on-the-opening-of-submissions-plus

30/08/2023

Join Jamie on Substack... It's a new(ish) platform where you will receive bi-weekly newsletters from Jamie (VP Boss!) He will be covering various topics including interviews with our authors, publishing nuggets and much much more 😁

Regular newsletters are free - but you can support Valley Press by subscribing to By the Book, where for £3.50 a month, you will also have access to more juicy (useful) prose.

His latest (paid) post discusses the Valley Press publishing process - just in time for the opening of our submissions window on September 1st! You also have the opportunity to comment! What's not to like 😅

Jamie is conveniently holding a QR code - scan it, and it will take you straight there. Or click this link. https://valleypress.substack.com/

24/08/2023

Our latest author interview includes cats, Carrie Fisher, and a photo of Harry Styles holding a guide dog training puppy. Who else is offering you that on a Thursday night??

also featuring: cats, Carrie Fisher, and Harry Styles holding a puppy

14/08/2023

Jamie answers questions from blog readers, including how to take a book from words on a screen to printed product, how to achieve "soul on a shoestring", and how our packaging could eventually benefit your garden...

On the basic steps towards printing, soulful production values on a shoestring, and why you may need five hundred "green jiffys" in your life.

10/08/2023

Huge congratulations to Emma Must for making the Laurel Prize longlist, announced today, for her collection "The Ballad of Yellow Wednesday". She says: "I’m thrilled for everyone who tried to save Twyford Down thirty years ago ... I’m thrilled that it’ll mean more royalties going to the transport and climate campaigners of today."

Read the full story on the VP blog, including the surprising geological connection between Twyford, Hampshire, and the Yorkshire Coast...

Recognition for our "poet who made things happen"

07/08/2023

"I take pleasure in complexity, and writing about the world somehow increases its complexity and beauty for me."

On the new VP blog, Jamie has interviewed Matt Riker about his debut poetry collection, 'The Magnificent Vanishing Act': https://valleypress.substack.com/p/vanishing-magnificently-with-matt

03/08/2023

Valley Press has a new blog, found at https://valleypress.substack.com/ You can sign up for free, or for £3.50 a month to access some especially useful, practical posts.

So far, you'll find one explaining how the platform works, and another telling the parallel stories of how and when Jamie thought of starting the press – and the new blog – 15 years apart. (This illustration is a self-portrait of Jamie working on his university's reception desk in 2008, when he decided to become a publisher.)

27/07/2023

Joe Bedford, of 'Everybody's Reviewing's, gives his thoughts on Susan Furber's "We Were Very Merry"

https://shorturl.at/PQTVY

Available to purchase at https://www.valleypressuk.com/shop/p/we-were-very-merry

26/07/2023

Watch Simon along with readings from members of The Crocodile Collective: Nóra Blascsók, Rowan Lyster and Julie Runacres.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=P1n_uID5m5c

The Whole Island, explores the poet's relationship with the Isle of Man, in poems which touch on family and folklore, history and politics, nature and wildlife, as well as their tangled connections. Through lines that charm and blaze, Simon Maddrell considers what it means to be endemic: the island navigated as a body, the body as an island. Here, the poet calls upon his cherished isle as an allegory for the nature of his own q***rness, the q***rness of nature, and the threat of extinction more broadly: linguistic, cultural, physical, environmental.
The Whole Island constantly teeters on the fringe of its own peripheries. Here, history ‘repeats itself like a kippered burp’, and freedom ‘is an oxymoron.’ Throughout, the images are slick, taut, and multi-sensory. We move swiftly from sea, sugar, smoke – licked rock and the sweet-lipped tip of melting ice-cream – to barbed wire, broken branches, and ingested plastic.
Celebratory, lamenting, but also hopeful, The Whole Island ultimately resists definition, seeking, instead, to weave personal and communal narratives and examine their complex interactions through time. Meanwhile, a chorus of characters – Vikings and puffins, faeries and drag queens – introduce us to the histories of this conflicted isle. As the poet notes: ‘whose island is this anyway?’

ABOUT THE POET
Simon Maddrell is a q***r Manx poet, editor, facilitator and performer living in Brighton and Hove. He has been published in sixteen anthologies and numerous publications, including Poetry Wales, The Rialto, Ambit, Butcher’s Dog, Ink Sweat and Tears, Long Poem Magazine, Stand, The Moth and Under the Radar. Simon’s debut pamphlet, Throatbone, was published by UnCollected Press in 2020. His second, Queerfella, jointly won The Rialto Open Pamphlet Competition 2020. Nine Pens Press published the anthologies All About Our Mothers in 2022 and All About Our Fathers in 2023 – a three-poet collaboration with Simon Maddrell, Vasiliki Albedo and Mary Mulholland. Simon’s Manx q***r history pamphlet, Isle of Sin, was published by Polari Press in March 2023.

Order the book: https://www.valleypressuk.com/shop/p/...
Signed copies and other books direct: https://simonmaddrell.sumupstore.com/...

25/07/2023

Sara O'Donovan - Within You, Without You

From horse tails to telling tales, a case of mistaken identity proved the starting point for Sara O’Donovan’s debut novel. Find out more as Maria Moynihan of the Farmers Journal finds out more about the inspiration behind it.

https://www.farmersjournal.ie/i-had-faith-the-book-would-tell-itself-to-me-eventually-765551

'I had faith the book would tell itself to me eventually'

Sara O'Donovan
Farmers Journal

20/07/2023

📚 Discover the power of poetry that resonates with the heart and soul! 🌟 "Inside" by John Killick, published by Valley Press UK, is a profound collection that breathes life into the world of confinement, shedding light on the experiences of two seemingly disparate groups - patients in a hospital assessment ward and inmates in various prisons.
🧡 John Killick, an esteemed writer and educator with a deep connection to those with dementia, brings forth a poignant portrayal of their journey, alongside the stories of prisoners. His words hold nothing back, delivering sharp observations and unflinching honesty that leave a lasting impact.
🗣️ Through "Inside," Killick courageously speaks out, urging politicians and the public to understand the realities of dementia and its impact on lives. This collection serves as a powerful reminder of the importance of empathy and compassion in our society.
📖 Immerse yourself in the heartfelt verses of "Inside," a book that transcends boundaries and sparks conversations about mental health, empathy, and the human experience. 🌎💭
🛒 Grab your copy of "Inside" from all good online bookshops or head directly to the publisher's website at https://www.valleypressuk.com/shop/p/inside
to embark on this profound poetic journey.

11/07/2023

Within You Without You is the debut novel by West Cork-based author Sara O'Donovan.

Sara will be in conversation with Madeleine D'Arcy and Danielle McLaughlin tomorrow at 11.30am, at the independent Bantry Bookshop, Ireland.

https://www.westcorkmusic.ie/events/2023/sara-odonovan-within-you-without-you/

(https://bantrybookshop.ie/)

Wednesday 12 July 2023
Time 11:30 am
Bantry Bookshop

"This stirring evocation of love, Liverpool and the mysteries of time kept me gripped me from the first exquisite word to the last." Denyse Woods

"This is a wonderful debut novel from Sara O’Donovan. She writes beautifully and there is such a sense of compassion for her characters." Carol Drinkwater

06/07/2023

Out now at https://www.valleypressuk.com/shop/p/attention-seekers and all major online retail book stores.

05/07/2023

The Whole Island, out today!! https://www.valleypressuk.com/shop/p/the-whole-island