With full details of their online events and more:
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Birmingham
Lit Fest Presents....
Monthly
Writers' Blog: May 2021
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May 2021: Maisie
Chan
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We asked Maisie Chan, a children's writer from the
Midlands, now living in Scotland, to write this month's blog as her
debut novel is
published.
"I’ll start this blog in a very British way
and talk about the weather. May is usually ‘the summer’ in
Glasgow, which is where I now live, and the hottest month of the
year for us. But not this year. It’s been damp and grey. I’m
feeling a little grey myself. I haven’t been able to travel to
Birmingham to see my friends and family since 2019. I feel
discombobulated.
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"However, I have to live in the present
moment and May has been up and down, I won’t lie. I’m trying to
work on multiple writing projects at once which is great as I’m
now a full-time writer. I am learning to juggle, however, as I
have around four book projects on the go at once and I’m pitching
for a children’s TV show, hoping to get my first screenwriting
credits in children’s animation. I feel split down the middle
with one part of me in ‘debut author’ mode and the other in
drafting mode.
"I’m writing a new novel, which is going very
slowly and like pulling teeth. And at the same time, I am
promoting my debut novel, Danny
Chung Does Not Do Maths, a
children’s book out in June. It’s an exciting thought to know a
book I started writing in 2018 is going to hit the shelves. And
I’m feeling both elated and a little scared that my first novel
will be out there, for people to read and judge. It’s not lost on
me that my book will be one of the very few with a British
Chinese boy on the front cover, there aren’t many even in 2021.
Hate crimes against East and Southeast Asians (ESEA) all over the
world have increased massively and I hope that my small
contribution can help make people like me more visible in the
world of children’s publishing. If we aren’t seen at all, then
are we real? Are we human?
"I am in ‘second novel syndrome’ which
according to many published authors is very real! I definitely
feel it. When you write your first novel, it’s not usually under
contract, so you can take your time. For the second one, however,
you have a smaller time scale in which to write it (mainly for
children’s novelists who churn out a novel a year it seems). It’s
not been the most inspiring year, my creative well has not been
filled. I’ve spent a lot of time stuck inside.
"As I bid a farewell to the month of May and
prepare to welcome June, with my book launch and birthday around
the corner and the hope of sunny skies, I give thanks as I am
going to get my first vaccination this month. Perhaps that is the
most prized thing of all?
"Signing off. A true Gemini."
What I'm Reading:
The
Race by Roy Peachey, published in June 2021
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Birmingham
Lit Fest Presents.... Live Online Events
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Caleb
Azumah Nelson: Open Water
Thursday 24 June, 7pm
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Caleb
Azumah Nelson’s debut
novel, Open
Water, is at
once an achingly beautiful love story about two young artists who
met at a pub, and a potent insight into race and masculinity
exploring what it means to be a person in a world that sees you
only as a Black body.
Described
by the New York Times as "Sally Rooney meets Michaela Coel
meets Teju Cole", join us as we discuss first love, art,
music and the vulnerability of being a young Black man in the UK.
This
event is delivered in partnership with the Black
British Book Festival and Legacy
Centre for Excellence.
Thursday
24 June 2021
7pm -
8pm
Online via Zoom Webinar
Ticket holders will then be sent a link to
the recording of the event which they can watch for 7 days after
the event has taken place.
Tickets: £5 per household
Live
captioning and Q&A available
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Podcast: new episodes
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Before we return for full-length podcast episodes
in the autumn, we're delighted that the monthly blogs we've so
far commissioned this year have now been recorded and are
available on our podcast feed.
January (Thomas Glave); February (Abda Khan),
March (Michael Amherst, read by Ceri Morgan), April (Sue Brown)
and this month's by Maisie Chan are on the podcast feed now
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Birmingham Literature Festival | a
project of Writing West Midlands
Writing West Midlands is an Arts
Council England NPO.
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Writing West
MidlandsStudio 130,
ZelligGibb StreetBirmingham, B9
4AT United Kingdom
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