Last-minute Christmas shopping

I have a vested interest, it's true, but if you're still looking to buy poetry presents for your loved ones and friends, then have a good look at the Nine Arches Press website.

There are single poetry collections, anthologies, the Primers series, and the 52: Write A Poem A Week book for those in need of inspiration. Oh, and the latest issue (no18) of Under The Radar, as well as subscriptions to the magazine.

That phrase, "loved ones", incidentally, always makes me think of a particular place. Loveden Hill, near Grantham in Lincolnshire, gets its name from it – it means "the hill of the loved ones". There was a huge, early Anglo-Saxon cemetery there, and the spot retained its importance throughout the Dark Ages, being the centre of one of the wapentakes of Kesteven (itself one of the ancient divisions of Lincolnshire).

52 - the book

It provided a year's worth of poetry writing prompts, hints and tips, and now you can get it in book form.

52 was a project that ran throughout 2014, and the new volume from Nine Arches Press anthologises those prompts, from Jo Bell and a team of guest poets, including myself, alongside some fine poetry ranging from John Donne to Kei Miller.

Read more about the making of the book here, or order it here.

Two readings at Stratford

Last year, I was lucky enough to be asked to get involved in 52, Jo Bell's online poetry group. Along with a number of other poets, I supplied one of the weekly prompts for the thousands of writers taking part.

There's now a book out, gathering together some of the best of the work that resulted, and a number of the poets will be reading their work as part of the Stratford-upon-Avon Poetry Festival, a week on Saturday (July 11th). Full details of where and when, and how to get tickets, are here.

The previous day, Jo will be launching her own new Nine Arches collection Kith as part of the Festival, reading with Sally Goldsmith. You can find full details here.

So, two good reasons to travel to the town of the Bard next week. Don't miss out.

Jo Bell on 52's success

Nice piece here about the success of Jo Bell's 52 project, which aims to get poets writing a poem a week in response to a series of prompts. The Facebook group now has 560 members, and they're really producing some fine work, much of which is now getting published in mags, etc.

Poetry prompts at 52

Now might be a good time to mention that you can still sign up at 52, a blog that encourages writers to write a poem each week, inspired by 52 different prompts. Many of these come from Jo Bell, who runs the blog, but there have also been a number of guest poets, including David Morley and, for the last week, myself.

I was truly staggered by the enthusiasm of the response to my own prompt, by the quality of the poems that resulted, and by the willingness of the participants to offer constructive criticism to their fellows. A number of poets produced several excellent pieces of work, and several more who said they'd found the prompt difficult managed to come up with some superb work, proof perhaps that the best poetry has to involve a little bit of pain in the writing process. There are a number of much-published poets on there, as well as beginners and everything in-between.

So, if you fancy giving it a go, take a close look - you can always catch up on the older prompts as you go along. There's a closed Facebook group linked to it, which you're invited to once you join.

Here we go again...

Two days in and not a single New Year's resolution has fallen by the wayside, mainly because I never got round to making any. 2013 was so hectic (largely in a good way, I should add) that it was a relief to stumble drowsily over the line at the end.

I don't really go in for resolutions, anyway, but I do have a few plans for my writing that I intend to put into motion, starting this weekend. If you want to get energised and inspired about writing yourself, in the company of a lot of fine writers, then Jo Bell's new blog 52 is the place to be, with weekly exercises and prompts and an aim of producing a poem every week.