Charley Barnes’s debut poetry collection ‘Lore, Flowers, Foklore, and Footnotes’ will be launched on Valentine’s Day 2021 on Zoom. The Zoom room will be open at 3.45pm to give everyone chance to log in and settle down before a 4pm start. See the Facebook event page for details, the Zoom link will appear there on the day, or email Polly at Black Pear Press for more information.
Charley will read some of her favourite pieces from the collection, followed by a short interval and a question and answer session, too. Charley says, ‘In these strange times, it would be wonderful to welcome as many friendly faces as possible to launch Lore into the world. So please do pop the date in your diaries, and come along for an afternoon of poetry, footnotes and flower-lore.’
Get your copy direct from Black Pear Press £7.00 plus P&P:
Charley Barnes is already well known for her fiction,
publishing as C.S. Barnes. Writing, performing and
hosting spoken word events as Charley Barnes, she is
also very active in the West Midlands poetry scene. This
is her first poetry collection and celebrates her year as
Worcestershire Poet Laureate (2019-2020). She has a
BA (Hons) in English & English Language, and a
masters (Distinction) and doctorate in Creative Writing.
She lectures in Creative Writing at a number of West
Midlands universities.
‘In these pages, Barnes has shouted Boo at me, and I
am mute. Well, almost. These poems have the tender
touch of Naruder’s Love Songs and the bristling brutal
barb of Anne Sexton. In Lore, she guides us through a
veritable Pre-Raphaelite landscape—as deadly and
murky as it is full of life-giving sensuality. Ephemeral
folktales and folklore are grounded by the historical and
the place-specific, both aspects weaved together with
deft precision. These poems come in the form of howling
riptides and gentle splashes.’
R. M. Francis