For those of you know don’t know, I’ll be appearing at this year’s Leeds Big Bookend Festival alongside fellow local author Richard Smyth. My event is on Saturday 6th June at Leeds Central Library.
And the Leeds Big Bookend has today published its official programme, featuring the details of ALL the wonderful literary events across the city. To find out more and to download the programme, follow this link: http://www.bigbookend.co.uk/the-big-bookend-programme-2015-mapping-leeds/
My short story What Happened when the Rodeo was in Town has been published in the latest issue of Zodiac Review and you can now read it online for free. Check it out here.
Louis van Gaal: Dutch Courage is just 99p on Amazon this week, following a promo price cut by publishers Endeavour Press. That’s HALF PRICE. You can get your hands on a copy by following this link.
Here’s what the reviewers have said:
Straight from the White House Press blog comes this exciting news…
Things Won’t Fix by AJ Kirby is now OUT and available to purchase from all good bookshops, including Amazon. Go here.
And here’s a write-up of the book:
Kirstie Smith’s nickname is Kirst, and she believes she is cursed. She’s lost her boyfriend, her job, her self-esteem. She’s in danger of losing her house too. It all goes back to one bad mistake she’s made. A mistake which has the potential to change her whole life. She believes she’s been somehow chosen to become a kind of magnet to which all the bad stuff in life can get attracted.
Alex Chase also has an apt name. He’s chasing seemingly unattainable dreams, on the hunt for fame at any price. He too thinks he’s been chosen, only, for a very different fate. But Alex’s luck is running out, he’s starting to get found out. And, more worryingly, he’s being chased…
View original post 177 more words
Direct from the White House Press website…
A Man Could Lose Himself is our second AJ Kirby fiction release in a week. You can get your sticky paws on a copy by following this link.
And here’s a write-up of the book:
‘A Man Could Lose Himself’ is a supernatural, surreal, cruelly comic mystery/ crime thriller about identity, belonging, and tourism. Set against the dramatic back-drop of Venice, the most romantic city of the world, the book introduces us to Michael Moss, a security systems sales manager, on the day he wakes up and discovers he has lost his wife.
Not lost as in she has died, no, she has literally disappeared off the face of the earth. We follow him as he tries to come to terms with this confusing discovery, as he comes to believe, or is led to believe that he was never married in the first place, and he starts to question…
View original post 104 more words
I will be appearing at the Leeds Big Bookend festival in June this year at an event which I am joint-hosting with fellow author Richard Smyth. You can book tickets and find out further information about the event by going here.
The Gen
In 2013 Richard Smyth and AJ Kirby and were selected among the 20 best writers under 40 in Leeds in our LS13 competition. Two years later, the burgeoning early careers of these two West Yorkshire-based writers have continued apace. This event brings them together to discuss the development of their writing, in particular their two recently published novels, Perfect World and Wild Ink. It asks what next for these two authorial Tyke-tyros? More broadly, the conversation considers what the current topography of the Leeds writing scene might be, and wonders whether the city might be putting itself back on the literary map.
Richard Smyth’s first novel, Wild Ink, was published by Dead Ink Books in 2014 and his prize-winning short fiction has appeared in The Stinging Fly, Riptide, The Fiction Desk, The Stockholm Review, Litro, Firewords and Vintage Script. His history books include English History: Strange But True (The History Press, 2014).
AJ Kirby’s Perfect World was released in paperback by TWB Press in October 2014. His short fiction has been published across the web, and in magazines, anthologies and literary journals, as well as in three collections: Trickier & Treatier, The Art of Ventriloquism and Mix Tape. He is also the author of the novels When Elephants Walk Through The Gorbals, Paint This Town Red, Bully, and Sharkways.
My football book Louis van Gaal: Dutch Courage continues to receive rave reviews… just like the Dutchman’s United team now they’ve properly clicked. The book’s in the Champions League spots at present, and has recently received yet another five-star report… Just like yesterday’s 4-2 Manchester derby win, it feels great.
You can buy the book from here. And here’s the latest review:
paintthistownred 