Line-up and tickets announced for Damian Barr's Literary Salon 18th October 2019
Damian Barr’s Literary Salon has announced the line-up for the next Salon on Friday 18th October 2019; Kerry Hudson, Jeanine Cummins and Maggie O’Farrell!
Kerry Hudson attended nine primary schools and five secondaries living in B&BS and council flats as her and her mum were forced to move again and again by poverty and its associated evils. Now Kerry is a rightly acclaimed novelist, activist and columnist and her life is unrecognisable. But how did she get from there to here and is her journey complete? What of the places she left? Lowborn is a memoir like no other and essential for our times.
American Dirt is the first novel to explores the perilous journey some migrants must make across the US-Mexico Border on top of freight trains known as la bestia. Lydia Quixano Perez is forced to leave her beloved bookshop and her comfortable life in Acapulco with her eight-year-old son Luca. Soon Lydia realises everyone is running from something. But what are they running to? American Dirt is an astonishing work of fiction is inspired by a truth that urgently needs to be told. Jeanine Cummins joins us for her UK premiere.
Maggie O’Farrell returns to Salon for another world premiere with Hamnet, the novel she’s wanted to write for over thirty years. Her first foray into historical fiction takes us back to a summer day in 1596. A young girl in Stratford-upon-Avon takes to bed with a fever. Her twin brother, Hamnet, is distraught. Their mother, Agnes, is a mile away, in the garden where she grows medicinal herbs. Their father is working in London. His name is William. This is the heart-stopping story behind Shakespeare’s most famous play.
As ever, Ella Berthoud, author of the Novel Cure, will be offering complementary bibliotherapy!
The Salon will be returning to The Lancaster Ballroom at The Savoy Hotel and tickets will be on sale from noon Friday 6th September.