Julia Webb

“Many of the poems in the collection explore the theme of family and sisterhood in some way, I am interested in the everyday stuff of real life, how people relate to each other especially within families, the stories and myths that families generate about themselves and the mental games that people play.”

Previous Showcase Authors

Christine Laurenson

“The bird swooped down over them, landing a short distance away, near the dragon.…
READ MORE
Sai Murray

"They pick me up from the police station in the early morning. I am…
READ MORE
Leonardo Boix

“A leap away from becoming ghost. She stood erect, her bathing floral suit, sugared…
READ MORE
Jill MacLean

“Priest and wise-woman have left him alone with a man whose brothers are afeard…
READ MORE
Elliot Sweeney

“The day it happened was a black day. I’d had a good run of late,…
READ MORE
Kamala Jackson

“As arranged, I met with Satyan in a solitary shack found where the margins…
READ MORE
Vanessa Onwuemezi

“Routine was the word. I liked routine, a route to somewhere in time. A…
READ MORE
Lynne Hudson

Hello, my name is Scruffy, and I’ve lost my blanket. Where can it be?…
READ MORE
TLC Pen Factor Special – winner Adam Sharp

"The carpet on the stairs is thin and tattered. A thousand shuffling footfalls have…
READ MORE
Mike Wood

“On the road ahead a wagon was on its side. Two German soldiers were…
READ MORE
Sagheer Afzal

Sidra stepped forward and looked out again. She looked around apprehensively. She knew she…
READ MORE
Cherry Radford

"The horror of coming ashore for good. God. A punch in the gut, and…
READ MORE
Peter Wood

“Within a year I would not even look at Alec. I seemed hardly to…
READ MORE
Harun Rashid

“Wadud’s story was entangled in the story of his nation, bookended by the two…
READ MORE
Romalyn Ante

“This is the most important secret my father told me: Whenever you are lost,…
READ MORE
Maán Jalal

“Noor’s mother wore black and the air was scented with gardenias when they stepped…
READ MORE
Anne Goodwin

“I put my eye to the peephole and flick the switch on the wall.…
READ MORE
Bethan James

“Empress Cixi was a woman on a mission, but onlookers in the palace gardens…
READ MORE
Alice Burnett

“Over the previous few days, Leonie had asked Venus questions in bursts. Where was…
READ MORE
Alick Glass

“He had always felt more Scottish than Jewish. For his Barmitvah he had learned…
READ MORE
Henry Fry

“I looked at the ticket on my phone again, at the spirals spinning around…
READ MORE
TLC Pen Factor winner special – Neema Shah

"Asha walked out towards the vast water, stretching so far that it looked more…
READ MORE
Tia Williams

“Feet first. I supposed that would be the way to do it, the way…
READ MORE
Akeem Balogun

“She watched with her hands holding onto her knees and her legs tightly closed.…
READ MORE
Liz Coward

“For two years, we’d been meticulously drilled on how to respond when we were…
READ MORE
Maeve Clarke

“All their mother’s warnings about what a dangerous place it was and how they…
READ MORE
Bernard Hall

"Lorraine unlocked the car doors and they climbed in. A nervous passenger at best,…
READ MORE
Elizabeth J. Jones

“A small girl had darted out from the trees, made her way barefoot to…
READ MORE
Sheila Chapman

“Taksheel looked resigned. It was the conclusion he had reached himself but to have…
READ MORE
Sabo Kpade

“I hurried to the veranda and found him in a tangle with Amarya. I…
READ MORE
Jane Liffen

“I go to fetch more water but I am thinking about the picture. In…
READ MORE
TLC Pen Factor Special

“He’d check for signs of life in a moment. For now though, he just…
READ MORE
Anna Mazzola

“Miss Sowerton stopped before a black door and produced a large key. A rumbling…
READ MORE
Rhiannon Lewis

“William was called away by one of the crew before he could respond. For…
READ MORE
Andrew Malcolm

“I wanted to know if Martyn and Spry were involved at all. In a…
READ MORE
Deirdre Shanahan

"If it were not for the sun glinting on the pool of rainwater in…
READ MORE
Richard Buxton

“In the centre of the square, under the American flag, a loose halyard slapped…
READ MORE
Kelleigh Greenberg-Jephcott

“Truman wills himself awake, peacock-plume eyed, empty champagne bottle in his lap. He squints…
READ MORE
Michael Forester

“11.00pm glides on oil into midnight and 12.30 am, until Tolly finally finds the…
READ MORE
Jane Aitken

“The Prime Minister’s posture looks relaxed, but if you look closely he still has…
READ MORE
Béatrice Crawford

“Day after day, GM, the Great Wall lent me its ramparts in the grand…
READ MORE
Alan Evans

“She had been the centre of his life for many years but now she…
READ MORE
TLC Pen Factor Special

““I’ll get straight to the point”, said Dr. Mangan who proceeded to do no…
READ MORE
Emma Norry

““Sorry! Sorry – am I late?” The clock on the wall wobbles because the…
READ MORE
Jane Corbett

“She asked about life in Berlin before the fall of the Wall and he…
READ MORE
Dilys Daws and Alexandra De Rementeria

"Studies show that fathers experience the same physiological response to a baby’s crying as…
READ MORE
Liam Brown

“You’re writin your name now I see? Well good on ya. That’s all a…
READ MORE
James Cook

“Ever since writing my first callow lyrics aged 14, I’d been striving to develop…
READ MORE
Caroline Chisholm

“My birth was hailed not by a single star, but by many bright lights…
READ MORE
Michelle Wareham

“Eli wrote every week from the Western Front, until his letters stopped arriving two…
READ MORE
David Turner

“I marvelled at the vastness and flatness and emptiness of the parched red desert…
READ MORE
Pen Factor Special

"I turned about the room, toe to toe, making the smallest circle. What I…
READ MORE
Bernice Landry

“What I find interesting, he says, is that your clothing is all white, like…
READ MORE
Jennifer Makumbi

“Now the crowd was in control. Everyone clamoured to hit somewhere, anywhere but the…
READ MORE
Rebecca Swirsky

“Celia, on the other side of town, is kissing the tiny, sweet brown moles…
READ MORE
Daniel Pembrey

“The glade was peculiarly dense around Vogel’s ungated entranceway. Pine, maple, and scrub oak…
READ MORE
Amna Boheim

"I lay in darkness, unsure of what had stirred me. Sleep still clung to…
READ MORE
Jeremy Stafford-Deitsch

“Tristan did not consider himself brave. But then he did not consider himself a…
READ MORE
Stephen Chance

"This period he can picture. If he saunters down to the Thames after his…
READ MORE
David Spon-Smith

"A cold breeze blows over my face. Then something warm an’ wet, stinking of…
READ MORE
Ann Bone

"The back of the house beyond has already sunk into obscurity. I do not…
READ MORE
Rosanne Daryl Thomas

"The annual Christmas present debate was abruptly suspended. Their adored maestro, Walter Albero, PhD,…
READ MORE
Balvinder Banga

“Looking at the calendar of Ravidas, and the photograph beside it of the grandchildren…
READ MORE
Piers Bearne

"I should have been in London, not this Essex midden swirling with pigeon-chest men…
READ MORE
Tina Seskis

“In the end they settled on Caroline Rebecca, although Frances didn’t particularly like either…
READ MORE
Neamat Imam

Mass graves were discovered in different parts of the country. The buried were exhumed…
READ MORE
Damien Brown

“So I shrug. Again. No idea what to say. No idea even what to…
READ MORE
Julia Ross

“I remember tiny pin-points of calm when I looked into his eyes. There are…
READ MORE
Sarah Butler

“Time will catch up with you, she tells me – by which she means…
READ MORE
Pete Smith

“I was born south of the river in Brixton in the 1950s, well-before it…
READ MORE
Philip Makatrewicz

"Ibimina’s husband has come once again to call. He must want something - a…
READ MORE
Ruby Cowling

“Behind these fences are big houses; the houses of plump-skinned people who soften their…
READ MORE
Adam Courtenay

“In 1542, Spanish conquistadors travelled east from the Peruvian colony of Quito, over the…
READ MORE
San Cassimally

"I experimented with two pebbles in my mouth to puff my cheeks up a…
READ MORE
Nicholas Lim

Dudec nodded. He fluttered a hand. “This could be something new!” “Rafal, when you…
READ MORE
Suhel Ahmed

"‘That’s when I made the mistake,’ Amina exclaimed. ‘I should have taken the money…
READ MORE
Terry Cudbird

“I have now reached the age when I have to choose between sex and…
READ MORE