A wonderful BookJam on the 6th May 2019, when we heard from Joshua Idehen, Jim Bob, Greg Chivers, Naomi Foyle, Ian Maleney, Hanna Jameson, Emma Grae, Maximilian Hawker, Zelda Rhiando, Mark Bowsher, Will Eaves and Gaar Adams …presented by crack librarian Glenda Read.

THE WRITERS

Joshua Idehen is a mercurial poet, spoken word genius and leader of ‘fro-funk band Benin City and founded renowned poetry/music magazine Poejazzi. As a poet, he has performed at most major festivals, appeared in anthologies alongside Linton Kwesi Johnson. He has taught as Roehampton University among other schools, and was a poet in residence for Wimbledon Festival and the Free Word Centre. @BeninCitizen

As singer with Carter USM Jim Bob had a number one album and headlined Glastonbury. He has released eight solo albums and written songs for Ian Dury and a West End pantomime. He made his Edinburgh Fringe debut in 2010 in the musical ‘Gutted’. Jim has written four novels –‘Storage Stories’, ‘Driving Jarvis Ham’, ‘The Extra Ordinary Life of Frank Derrick’ and ‘Frank Derrick’s Holiday of a Lifetime’ (as J.B. Morrison). Jim’s memoir ‘Goodnight Jim Bob’ was published in 2004. The sequel ‘Jim Bob from Carter – In the Shadow of My Former Self’ was published in March 2019. @mrjimBob

Greg Chivers is a writer and television producer. He’s a Brixton native  – and possibly the only one ever to refer to himself as an alumnus of Loughborough Primary school. For most of the last twenty years he’s been making documentaries about science and history for US cable TV networks. His show ‘What on Earth?’ is the most successful series of all time on the Science Channel, while ‘NASA’s Unexplained Files’ made global news headlines and became a viral phenomenon, with the first youtube clip getting a million hits within two hours. The Crying Machine is his first novel. www.gregchivers.com | I @defnotscifi

Naomi Foyle is an award-winning poet, SF novelist, verse dramatist and essayist. Her poetry collections include The Night Pavilion, a 2008 PBS Recommendation, The World Cup and the forthcoming Adamantine, which contains poems about women warriors, Palestine and her 2016 cancer treatment. Her debut novel, cyberchiller Seoul Survivors, was followed by The Gaia Chronicles – Astra, Rook Song, The Blood of the Hoopoe and Stained Light – an eco-science fantasy quartet set in a post-fossil fuel Mesopotamia. Born in Islington the night Jimi Hendrix played the Roundhouse, Naomi grew up in Canada, and now lives in Brighton and teaches Creative Writing at the University of Chichester. @naomifoyle

Ian Maleney is a writer based in Dublin, Ireland. Born and raised in the Irish midlands, he works as a freelance arts journalist in print and audio, and as the online editor at The Stinging Fly. His essays have been published by Winter Papers, gorse, Esquire, and The Dublin Review. He is the founder of Fallow Media, an interdisciplinary publication for music, photography, and long-form writing on the internet. His debut essay collection, Minor Monuments, was published by Tramp Press in March 2019. @ianmaleney

Hanna Jameson wrote her first book which was shortlisted for a CWA Dagger Award, at the age of seventeen. Paul Rees of Q Magazine described her as writing like ‘an angel on speed’. She has worked for the NHS and travelled the USA, Japan and Europe, developing a particular interest in the US, which led to her studying North American history. The Last is her first novel for Penguin. @Hanna_Jameson

Emma Grae is a writer and journalist from Glasgow. She graduated in April 2017 with an MPhil in Creative Writing from Trinity College Dublin and currently works as a journalist and editor at the London-based media house Jungle Creations. Her first novel, be guid tae yer mammy, was selected for publication by Unbound in January 2019. She has previously published in a number of journals including From Glasgow to Saturn, The Attic and The Open Mouse. @EmmaGraeAuthor

Maximilian Hawker works in frontline children’s social care in Croydon, where he lives with his wife and two children; he also studies for an MA in Social Work at the University of Greenwich and does work in partnership with the charity OCD Action. He has been a sufferer of Obsessive Compulsive Disorder (OCD) since he was a child and explores the diagnosis in his latest venture, Rory Hobble and the Voyage to Haligogen, a sci-fi children’s book currently crowdfunding with Unbound. is debut novel Breaking The Foals was published in April 2018. @MaxHawker

Will Eaves is a poet and novelist. For many years he was Arts Editor at the Times Literary Supplement and now teaches English and Creative Writing at the University of Warwick. He has been shortlisted twice for the Goldsmiths Prize. His most recent novel, Murmur (CB Editions), has also been shortlisted for the Wellcome Book Prize, and is the joint winner, with Lucia, by Alex Pheby, of the Republic of Consciousness Prize for Fiction 2019. @WillEaves

Mark Bowsher was the last child to be born in Gravesend Hospital in 1983. The journalist there at the time was only interested in the first baby born in 1984 (where is he now, eh?). He has since moved to London to earn some pennies making films professionally. His first three shorts won Best Short awards at festivals in the UK and the US and gained praise from the Huffington Post and the BFI. He’s previously written for Den of Geek, Cult TV Times and Lionsgate’s Fright Club ezine. The Boy Who Stole Time is his first novel but he’s threatening to write more. He is not married and does not live in Surrey but did once climb a mountain dressed as Peter Pan. https://www.amazon.co.uk/Boy-Who-Stole-Time/dp/1912618648/

Zelda Rhiando lives and works in Brixton, and has written two novels (Caposcripti and Fukushima Dreams). When she’s not writing she makes digital things and runs after her kids. She will be reading from her third book, Good Morning Mr Magpie. @badzelda | http://www.badzelda.com

Gaar Adams is an American writer and longform journalist. His writing and photographs on art, culture, and environmentalism in the Middle East and South Asia have been featured in outlets including The Atlantic, Foreign Policy, Slate, VICE, Al Jazeera, and Rolling Stone. His essays have been anthologized in numerous collections including the celebrated Uncommon Dubai and his work from Yemen to Bangladesh has been translated into six languages. After a decade in the Middle East, Gaar recently relocated to Brixton where he is completing a nonfiction book on queerness and migration.  @gaaradams

Brixton BookJam is at Hootananny Brixton (95 Effra Road, London SW2 1DF) – a large pub with a performance space that can hold 600 people. It also provides cooked food. The closest tube station is Brixton (Victoria line) and buses 2, 3, 415, 432 and 196 will transport you very near to the venue.