The Manchester Book Market
St Ann’s Square, Manchester
Friday 17 - Sunday 19 July

The Manchester Book Market returns this weekend for a three-day showcase of the region’s indie publishing accompanied by back-to-back performances from the cream of the region’s spoken word scene.

The market gives the public the opportunity to buy books, magazines and comics direct from leading independent publishers, as well as sample the latest emerging spoken word talent from the North West. Featuring over 20 publishers, the market will cover a wide range of genres and interests, from award-winning poetry and short fiction (from Route Publishing, Crocus Books and Comma) to internationally recognised science fiction and fantasy (from Interzone, TTA and Ballista), as well as childrens books (Bumble Books, DEP, Flapjack), and pioneering new literary magazines (Transmission, Bewilderbliss, Back to the Machine Gun, etc.).

In a special café area each day, over 50 of the region’s leading spoken word artists and story-tellers will perform throughout each day. Featuring such beauties as: Nick Murgatroyd, Joe Stretch, Andy Moses, Kim Wiltshire, Annie Clarkson, Nick Royle and Ailsa Cox, who for the more observant among you have graced the pages of Transmission. There are plenty more of them and a comprehensive list of times here.

The event is free and stalls are open 11am to 5.30pm. The readings will be between 1pm and 5.30pm.

“The Writing School at Manchester Metropolitan University is launching The Manchester Fiction Prize – a new literary competition celebrating excellence in creative writing. 

The Manchester Fiction Prize is open internationally and will award a cash prize of £10,000* to the writer of the best short story submitted. The competition is open to entrants aged 16 or over; there is no upper age limit.

A bursary for study at MMU will also be awarded to an entrant aged 18-25 as part of the Jeffrey Wainwright Manchester Young Writer of the Year Award*. Eligible entrants are asked to indicate on the entry form if they would like to be considered for the Manchester Young Writer of the Year Award in addition to the main prize. 

All entrants are asked to submit a complete short story of up to 5,000 words in length. The story can be on any subject, and written in any style, but must be new work, not published or submitted for consideration elsewhere. The competition will be judged by distinguished novelists and short story writers Sarah Hall, M. John Harrison and Nicholas Royle. 

The Manchester Fiction Prize celebrates the substantial cultural and literary achievements of Manchester, building on the work of MMU’s Writing School and enhancing the city’s reputation as one of Europe’s most adventurous and creative spaces. The prizes will be awarded at a gala ceremony, held as part of the 2009 Manchester Literature Festival.”

For more information, and to find out how to enter (always follow the submission guidelines to the letter!), go to the competition’s home page.

Review by Marianne Knowles

The Boy Named Crow … Johnnie Walker … Kafka … wild fish storms … talking cats … Colonel Sanders … and soldiers long lost from battle – these are not elements you may expect to create a spectacularly sound literary novel. It is not until these aspects are folded and shuffled back in (along with characters such as Nakata, an old, but magical man; Oshima, who has another story; Miss Saeki and her lost soul; and Hoshino, the driver in search of adventure and himself) that the eccentricities of the book begin to create a sense of synchronicity.

Whilst Norwegian Wood and The Wind-up Bird Chronicle deservedly hold their places amongst his best known works, Kafka on the Shore is really the most brilliant of Murakami masterpieces. Depth of plot and scenes depicted with pinpoint accuracy ensure consistently optimised visual appeal and a memorable experience. Two stories running parallel, (well three if you include the existentially rooted Boy) do eventually cross but never quite touch, and meet under miraculous, murderous and mystical circumstances.

Site map

The themes of the imagery which do transcend the novel – love, reality, humanity, belief, grief, desire and physicality – are the motivation for the characters to seek out their experiences and also the reason why I put myself through the pain of postponing reading the last few pages of the book for at least a week. Not in the least because it all got a bit much or that I could really think of anything else I would rather do.

I would have just rather it had not ended.

These books, like the castle they describe, are massive and uncompromising, ornately, obsessively detailed, with everything minutely and exactly described.  Mervyn Peake’s fine draughtsmanship is mirrored in his prose; he has clearly visualised every aspect of his Gormenghast, the place and its denizens.

The first volume, Titus Groan, follows the progress of disaffected kitchen-boy Steerpike.  Trapped under the apron of the florid, drunken chef Swelter, Steerpike knows that there is no future for him.  So he runs away, to begin a methodically calculated and callous career as a free radical in an otherwise meticulously plotted universe.

Nobody in Gormenghast is free.  Even (and especially) royalty have almost every moment of their life mapped out, in a never-ending series of rituals.  Lord Sepulchrave’s constant, symbolic parading through the towers and grounds of the massive castle has gone on, it would seem, forever and is intended to continue forever, down the line of Earls.  The scion of the realm, Titus Groan, is a baby when the book commences.

Throughout the books, there are occasional flashes of raw pain, of reflex violence, of livid hatred.  Flay, manservant to Sepulchrave, is especially prone to lashing out.  He is banished, after being caught by the Duchess in the act of injuring one of her perfect, white cats - but not before he has scarred Swelter’s face with an unexpected blow, during Titus’ christening.

The second volume in the trilogy, Gormenghast, slowly builds the fusty, heavy atmosphere in the imposing castle until, in one of the most remarkable passages of fiction I have ever read, Titus and Flay hunt the by-now criminally insane Steerpike through miles of damp, dark corridors deep in the forgotten interior of the castle.  The macabre events that transpire when Steerpike is finally tracked down to one of his hideouts will remain long with the reader.
It took me a while to sink into Titus Groan’s thick, brooding atmosphere, but once the penny dropped, I couldn’t put it down and moved straight on to .  Peake’s densely realised world seemed forbidding at first; but it is simply because the author has so much information about his world to impart.

Give him time.

The Gormenghast Trilogy by Mervyn Peake (Vintage Classics, £15) is available now.

You can still take advantage of the Lucky Dip offer over in the shop and if you order before this Friday we will post out your magazines in time for Christmas!

Merry Christmas Everyone!