Blue Room Poetry in Newcastle: TONIGHT!

Venue: Bridge Hotel, Newcastle upon Tyne
Organiser: The Blue Room
Start time: 20:00 Sun 7 Jan 2007
Website: www.blueroom.org.uk

Michael McCarthy's first collection, Birds' Nests and Other Poems, won The Patrick Kavanagh Award. He has also published two books of verse for children: The Story of Noah and the Ark, which has been translated into 16 languages, and The Story of Daniel in the Lion's Den. He lived in Durham during the 90s and last performed at The Blue Room in January 2006. He currently lives in North Yorkshire where he works as a priest, counsellor and spiritual director. He has just returned from a four-month writing residency at Charles Sturt University in Canberra, Australia.

In 2006, Sand published Nev Clay's first collection of words, The Leaf Collector (`a quiet gem', Terry Kelly). He also plays guitar and writes songs. Nev's currently working on a music/poetry project in Alnwick Garden with Mercury prize-nominated singer-songwriter, Kathryn Williams.

James Welsh has been writing for around nine years and has had short stories published in various magazines including Billy Liar, Liar Republic and Text Bear Bones. He writes mainly prose but also some drama and poetry. His is presently in the final stages of finishing a novel and lives in the east end of Newcastle.

Mark Ellis graduated from the MA in creative writing at Newcastle University in Sept 2005. Since then he has completed a play and a book called Liber Mundi for a commission by Harrogate Theatre, which was slashed to pieces, re-written and produced in its benign lesser-state in November 2006. Having (almost!) put this behind him and following successes in both the University of Plymouth and WRHammons.com writing competitions, he has set up his own publishing company, The Pumpleton Press, and vowed to complete and publish Liber Mundi in its original form. In the meantime, Faded Pictures, a collection of Mark's short stories, is Pumpleton's first release and will (hopefully) be available on the night, or by contacting pumpleton@hotmail.com.

Tickets: £3 (£2 concessions) on the door.

The Bridge Hotel
Castle Garth
Newcastle Upon Tyne
Tyne and Wear
NE1 1RQ