I'm delighted that two of my pictures have been accepted for the County Durham Open Art Exhibition 2009. The theme of the exhibition is People, Lives and Places. I'm showing a pencil drawing of Upper Weardale Show, and a mixed media painting of the River Wear near Bishop Auckland. Both pictures are for sale.
The exhibition runs from 9th to 28th February 2009 at Bishop Auckland Town Hall, Co Durham.
Tuesday, 27 January 2009
Tuesday, 3 June 2008
VOTE FOR ME!!!!
Throughout the month of June, you can vote for the cover art of "wormwood, earth and honey" here. The mere act of voting gives you a chance to win a free copy of the book - so go on! What are you waiting for?
Wednesday, 6 February 2008
wormwood, earth and honey
wormwood, earth and honey is my first solo poetry collection, and has just been published by Circaidy Gregory Press ISBN 9781906451042
The poems are accessible but never trivial: warm, earthy, intelligent and – just when you begin to snuggle into the intimacy of it – spiked with fire and venom.
mary
yesterday
she walked between trees
from chapel to ruin
followed a path of sorrel
where the ground dips
into a muddy trap
raced past garden walls
neat bricks, secret delights
peaches,
stolen on a whim
remembered, too late
that sorrel poisons
the unwary
wormwood, earth and honey may be purchased from amazon, or directly from the publisher here.
Friday, 5 January 2007
The Plough Prize 2006
Yes! I got a 'highly commended'. Here's what Matt, the adjudicator said:
I don't mind admitting I'm still trying out different ways of reading this, but that was one of its appeals, along with its reminder that sound is every bit as important to a poem as sense. I liked the playing around with repeptition and elision, and the surprise of "laugh" in the last line, which can still be read several ways.
I don't mind admitting I'm still trying out different ways of reading this, but that was one of its appeals, along with its reminder that sound is every bit as important to a poem as sense. I liked the playing around with repeptition and elision, and the surprise of "laugh" in the last line, which can still be read several ways.
Friday, 1 December 2006
topical haiku
From time to time I send a topical haiku here. These are the ones that have been published so far.
Casino questions
remain unanswered. Odds are,
dice will have to roll…
(6 July 06)
Killer kangaroos
and demon ducklings of doom.
Scary place, old Oz.
(12 July 06)
“Yo, Blair,” he said. Yo?
I don’t know ‘yo’. Yoyo; yes.
But this is no game.
(18 July 06)
“Grievous bodily
Harmison,” he chuckled, with
perfect line and length.
(27 July 06 )
Fold A4 to fit
C5. Fit four in that way.
Eh? Forfeit? What for?
(22 August 06)
the Blair departing
from platform number ten is
not running on time
(7 September 06)
BAE goes green,
makes friendly lead-free bullets.
Less harmful, they say…
(18 September 06)
"Greetings, pop pickers!"
Thus spake Fluff to the angels,
his countdown complete.
(28 November 06)
Casino questions
remain unanswered. Odds are,
dice will have to roll…
(6 July 06)
Killer kangaroos
and demon ducklings of doom.
Scary place, old Oz.
(12 July 06)
“Yo, Blair,” he said. Yo?
I don’t know ‘yo’. Yoyo; yes.
But this is no game.
(18 July 06)
“Grievous bodily
Harmison,” he chuckled, with
perfect line and length.
(27 July 06 )
Fold A4 to fit
C5. Fit four in that way.
Eh? Forfeit? What for?
(22 August 06)
the Blair departing
from platform number ten is
not running on time
(7 September 06)
BAE goes green,
makes friendly lead-free bullets.
Less harmful, they say…
(18 September 06)
"Greetings, pop pickers!"
Thus spake Fluff to the angels,
his countdown complete.
(28 November 06)
Sunday, 26 November 2006
The Sand in the Painting
The Sand in the Painting is my first novel, available from amazon and all online bookstores.
Many thanks to Kay Green from Earlyworks Press for the following review:
The Sand in the Painting
By Catherine Edmunds
Review by Kay Green
This is a startling and intriguing book. The framework is a familiar one – to tell the story of a group of friends as a series of overlapping tableaux, changing viewpoints with each new chapter. Previous examples I’ve read have been promising at the start, but became tedious or repetitive at some point. The Sand in the Painting gave completely the opposite experience. I was a bit dubious when I saw what was ahead, and a bit impatient when I saw that chapter 3 would reiterate things I’d seen in chapters 1 and 2 – but by then I’d been drawn in. My doubts forgotten, I was hooked and the book maintained its grip right to the last page.‘What was she thinking of?’ we so often cry, and, ‘What on earth do they talk about when they’re together?!’ On its lighter level, this book exploits that predatory curiosity: The reader finishes each chapter at a gallop, burning with the desire to open the next and find out what the other one was really thinking, and what he said to her when they left the room.But there is more. Author Catherine Edmunds has presented complex, believable characters in a well-realized setting and created – what? – something between an intelligent romance and a suspense novel. I found myself continually having to change my mind about which characters I was in sympathy with, because I met each one as you do in life: First as someone on the edge throwing in comments, then as the friend, spouse or colleague of someone I cared about – and then suddenly as themselves, with all their motivations and perceptions laid out before me. It’s an object lesson in empathy.The Sand in the Painting, rather like the seed in the oyster shell, is the irritation which stimulates greatness and terror, and the factor which makes human affairs so unpredictable and so creative. With impressive craftsmanship and control, Edmunds develops small actions and reactions between her characters and consistently produces surprising and yet believable revelations right up to the final pages. I approached the last page feeling – briefly – that a trite happy ending might be coming along. Well, as Richard Bach once pointed out, if you’re still alive, your story can’t be finished. And this book demonstrates that. We get a happy ending – but one in which the snags and seeds of future challenges leave the reader busily writing the sequel even as the book is put down.Have you ever walked out of a conversation smugly sure that you understand everyone present better than they understand themselves? Have you ever wisely and capably treated someone in an emotional state or with a mental condition in ‘the right way’? Have you ever washed your hands of a clichéd situation, knowing exactly how it will come out? Well, I guarantee you won’t get through this novel without kicking yourself more than once for your blindness and assumptions.What struck me as the most original feature of this book was the way the complexity of the social interactions it portrays builds up progressively without ever withdrawing to an impersonal, gods-eye-view. The result is that towards the end, when all the friends you now know so well converge in one place, you are so aware of the tender wounds in each of their beings, so mindful of what self-obsessed little despots human beings can be, that the rash chanciness of a roomful of friends hoping to survive a coffee and a chat is terrifying.If you are interested in people, if you want to understand human communication and perception, I wholeheartedly recommend this book. But don’t read it on the train. If you get past the first chapter you will almost certainly miss your stop and have to finish the book in the terminus.
Many thanks to Kay Green from Earlyworks Press for the following review:
The Sand in the Painting
By Catherine Edmunds
Review by Kay Green
This is a startling and intriguing book. The framework is a familiar one – to tell the story of a group of friends as a series of overlapping tableaux, changing viewpoints with each new chapter. Previous examples I’ve read have been promising at the start, but became tedious or repetitive at some point. The Sand in the Painting gave completely the opposite experience. I was a bit dubious when I saw what was ahead, and a bit impatient when I saw that chapter 3 would reiterate things I’d seen in chapters 1 and 2 – but by then I’d been drawn in. My doubts forgotten, I was hooked and the book maintained its grip right to the last page.‘What was she thinking of?’ we so often cry, and, ‘What on earth do they talk about when they’re together?!’ On its lighter level, this book exploits that predatory curiosity: The reader finishes each chapter at a gallop, burning with the desire to open the next and find out what the other one was really thinking, and what he said to her when they left the room.But there is more. Author Catherine Edmunds has presented complex, believable characters in a well-realized setting and created – what? – something between an intelligent romance and a suspense novel. I found myself continually having to change my mind about which characters I was in sympathy with, because I met each one as you do in life: First as someone on the edge throwing in comments, then as the friend, spouse or colleague of someone I cared about – and then suddenly as themselves, with all their motivations and perceptions laid out before me. It’s an object lesson in empathy.The Sand in the Painting, rather like the seed in the oyster shell, is the irritation which stimulates greatness and terror, and the factor which makes human affairs so unpredictable and so creative. With impressive craftsmanship and control, Edmunds develops small actions and reactions between her characters and consistently produces surprising and yet believable revelations right up to the final pages. I approached the last page feeling – briefly – that a trite happy ending might be coming along. Well, as Richard Bach once pointed out, if you’re still alive, your story can’t be finished. And this book demonstrates that. We get a happy ending – but one in which the snags and seeds of future challenges leave the reader busily writing the sequel even as the book is put down.Have you ever walked out of a conversation smugly sure that you understand everyone present better than they understand themselves? Have you ever wisely and capably treated someone in an emotional state or with a mental condition in ‘the right way’? Have you ever washed your hands of a clichéd situation, knowing exactly how it will come out? Well, I guarantee you won’t get through this novel without kicking yourself more than once for your blindness and assumptions.What struck me as the most original feature of this book was the way the complexity of the social interactions it portrays builds up progressively without ever withdrawing to an impersonal, gods-eye-view. The result is that towards the end, when all the friends you now know so well converge in one place, you are so aware of the tender wounds in each of their beings, so mindful of what self-obsessed little despots human beings can be, that the rash chanciness of a roomful of friends hoping to survive a coffee and a chat is terrifying.If you are interested in people, if you want to understand human communication and perception, I wholeheartedly recommend this book. But don’t read it on the train. If you get past the first chapter you will almost certainly miss your stop and have to finish the book in the terminus.
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