From 18 October until 22 November, Ink Slingers: Farsley Literature Festival will see over 30 book-related events, and some familiar names and faces – Esme Young (star of The Great British Sewing Bee), Robin Ince (BBC Radio 4’s The Infinite Monkey Cage) and famed explorer and TV presenter Benedict Allen.
The Festival is the result of a collaboration between local bookshop Truman Books and Trouble at Mill Events, who run Farsley venues the Old Woollen and The Constitutional. Sunny Bank Mills and Leeds Libraries are providing generous support, providing more venues for the Festival’s events.
Both Truman Books and the Old Woollen opened in the wake of the Covid pandemic, confirming as regulations eased that local readers were keen to meet face to face and share their love of literature. Organisers are hoping the Festival will help to establish the village on the literary map.
Certainly, the scheduled events are tantalising, providing an eclectic and entertaining range of authors and publishers – from an evening with Dr Kate Lister (Wed 9 Nov), offering “A Curious History of Sex” to Rivers of London and Doctor Who writer Ben Aaronovitch (Tues 1 Nov), as well as a spooky evening of candle-lit MR James ghost stories told by Robert Lloyd Parry (Thurs 27 Oct), who has appeared as the author on Mark Gatiss’ BBC2 documentary.
There’ll be some engaging and high quality book banter at the author panels. For The Best is Yet To Come (Fri 28 Oct) best-seller Milly Johnson (The Woman in the Middle), is joined by two fellow Yorkshire fiction writers, Alexandra Potter (Confessions of a Forty-Something F**ck Up) and Caroline Bond (Thea and Denise) to chat about their books, inspirations and future projects. Meanwhile Why Place Matters (29 Oct) sees Bradford-based crime writer AA Dhand (the Harry Virdee books) in conversation with Frances Brody (The Kate Shackleton novels) and Chris Nickson (the DI Tom Harper serries).
Other highlights include An Evening with Jill Liddington (Thu 10 Nov), whose book Female Fortune inspired the BBC series Gentleman Jack; Untold Stories (Sun 6 Nov) with Jennifer Saint (Ariadne) and Elodie Harper (The Wolf Den) discussing their retellings of ancient history; and even a Book Lover’s Quiz (Sun 6 Nov) with Gary Wigglesworth, author of The Book Lover’s Quiz Book.
Amanda Truman, owner of Truman Books: “We’ve put together a fantastic range of events for our first Festival. There’s something fun and exciting for everyone, with famous names and a whole range of events from women’s stories to urban fantasy to family workshops. We hope this will be another thing that puts Farsley on the map.”
Dick Bonham, Director of Trouble at Mill Events: “We can’t wait to get started. Tickets for all the events are already flying out of the door, so we’re so excited to hear what people think about the programme we’ve put together. We’re hoping it will be the start of an annual event. If it’s successful we’ll bring it back bigger and better next year!” (Editor note: Let us know, Dick, when you’ve set the 2023 dates!)
Tickets are now on sale for all of the events. Full listings and booking details can be found at www.farsleylit.co.uk.
Cover photograph: Dick Bonham and Amanda Truman.
