Huge thanks to Kaite Welsh, Books Editor at Diva Magazine for this superb review of The Night Brother!
Here’s the full text of the review…
Diva review October 2017
"A must for anyone missing Sarah Waters’ foray into the Victorian era, siblings Edie and Gnome explore the delights of 19th century Manchester in Rosie Garland’s third novel - he during the night, her during the day. The prose is lush and vivid as gender fluidity mingles with magical realism. Edie grows increasingly jealous of her brother’s freedom and exhausted by her double life and the restrictions society places upon her. In The Night Brother, Garland crafts a study in dualism that would make Henry Jekyll jealous, and establishes herself as one of Britain’s best new historical novelists."
Kaite Welsh
http://www.divamag.co.uk/
Thursday, 16 July to Sunday, 20 December 2015
I was honoured to receive and invitation from Liza Leonard to curate a case at this exhibition! I took as my theme Women and the Gothic. I could have chosen a hundred books, easily, but was limited to five.. The choice was very difficult, needless to say. It's been a great experience to work with the staff of The John Rylands Library. I am particularly grateful for the help and support I have received from Xavier Aldana Reyes and Linnie Blake of The University of Manchester.
The exhibition is running till the 20th December and is free to enter.
'Housed in the neo-Gothic grandeur of The John Rylands Library, Darkness and Light reveals how Gothic architecture and anatomy inspired and influenced a literary genre, and how the lasting legacy of Gothic can be found in art, films and subculture today.
From the fantastical to the macabre, this intriguing exhibition unearths Gothic treasures from the Library's Special Collections to investigate subjects as varied as the role of women in the Gothic movement, advances in medical science and classic literature.
Amongst the fascinating items on display is Horace Walpole's The Castle of Otranto (1764), the first Gothic novel. With a Gothic medieval castle, doomed love and restless spectres of the past, it sets the scene for the genre and sits alongside a whole host of Gothic bestsellers including The Monk, Udolpho and Jekyll and Hyde.'
Click to go to the John Rylands Library page
A stellar day in the neo-gothic pomp and circumstance of John Rylands Library's magnificent Historic Reading Room. It's been a dream of mine to read there... and dreams come true.
A delicious highlight of the event was the specially designed (and rather foxy) cake by the talented Annabel de Vetten of Conjuror's Kitchen.
Click to go to Manchester Gothic Festival page
Contemporary Gothic Reading Group
New Business School,
Ground floor cafe area,
Manchester Metropolitan University,
All Saints, All Saints Campus,
Manchester
M15 6BH
Free event – all welcome
17.30 – 18.30
Please join us for the first of the Modern and Contemporary Gothic Reading Group sessions for 2018/2019. We will kick-start the year with Rosie Garland's extraordinary Manchester-set Gothic novel The Night Brother (2017). We are also delighted to welcome the author herself, who is happy to answer your questions.
Attending this group is free and our approach informal - no prior knowledge is necessary, but a passion for the Gothic is essential! :) Tea, coffee and cake provided.
https://www.facebook.com/events/1963358480626178/
Sunday, 29 October 2017 at 6:00 pm
Location: Exchange Square,
Manchester City Centre,
M3 1BD
Join us for an extravagant exploration of what it means to have goth style!
Real-life goths, punks, steampunks and other assorted ‘weirdo mosher freaks’ will strut, stomp and parade their individual dress sense for the public of Manchester. Interspersed with the street style will be fashion looks from students and alumni of Manchester Met’s Manchester Fashion Institute, showing the pervasive influence of goth sensibilities in contemporary haute couture. Sound tracked by goth music, introduced by two queens of goth-dom - Rosie Lugosi The Vampire Queen and Manchester’s monochrome drag par excellence Liquorice Black – this will be a catwalk to remember and a brilliant way to round off your Halloween weekend in the city.
Featuring:
Comperes Rosie Lugosi and Liquorice Black
Border Morris from Stone the Crows
ArA DJS
Kiku Corsets
Fantastical make up competition winners from House of Fraser
In association with the Sophie Lancaster Foundation.
Part of Halloween in the City produced by Manchester BID.
FREE – Tickets available on Eventbrite
https://www.eventbrite.com/e/gothic-styles-streetfashion-show-tickets-36606979461
Location: John Rylands Library Historic Reading Room,
Deansgate,
Manchester M3 3EH
6-7pm
Free event
Introduced and chaired by Dr Xavier Aldana Reyes (Manchester Met).
Tagged ‘literary hero’ by The Skinny, Rosie Garland is an award-winning poet, novelist and singer with post-punk band The March Violets. With a passion for language nurtured by libraries, she started out in spoken word, garnering praise from Apples and Snakes as ‘one of the country’s finest performance poets’.
She is the author of Vixen, a Green Carnation Prize nominee. Debut novel, The Palace of Curiosities, won Book of the Year in the Co-op Respect Awards 2013 and was nominated for both The Desmond Elliott and the Polari First Book Prizes. Her latest novel The Night Brother (Borough Press) was reviewed in The Times as "A rich and ambitious tale set in late Victorian Manchester... Garland's prose is a delight: playful and exuberant. There are shades of Angela Carter in the mad world she creates... Full marks.'
Her most recent poetry collection, As In Judy, is out with Flapjack Press. She is half of The Time-Travelling Suffragettes. #gothfest17
https://www2.mmu.ac.uk/artshumanities/rah/gothic-manchester-festival/detail/index.php?id=6561
Thursday, 16 July to Sunday, 20 December 2015
I was honoured to receive and invitation from Liza Leonard to curate a case at this exhibition! I took as my theme Women and the Gothic. I could have chosen a hundred books, easily, but was limited to five.. The choice was very difficult, needless to say. It's been a great experience to work with the staff of The John Rylands Library. I am particularly grateful for the help and support I have received from Xavier Aldana Reyes and Linnie Blake of The University of Manchester.
The exhibition is running till the 20th December and is free to enter.
'Housed in the neo-Gothic grandeur of The John Rylands Library, Darkness and Light reveals how Gothic architecture and anatomy inspired and influenced a literary genre, and how the lasting legacy of Gothic can be found in art, films and subculture today.
From the fantastical to the macabre, this intriguing exhibition unearths Gothic treasures from the Library's Special Collections to investigate subjects as varied as the role of women in the Gothic movement, advances in medical science and classic literature.
Amongst the fascinating items on display is Horace Walpole's The Castle of Otranto (1764), the first Gothic novel. With a Gothic medieval castle, doomed love and restless spectres of the past, it sets the scene for the genre and sits alongside a whole host of Gothic bestsellers including The Monk, Udolpho and Jekyll and Hyde.'
Click to visit The John Rylands Library page
Saturday 15th November – Sunday 16th November
The Palace Hotel
Oxford St,
Manchester M60 7HA
Saturday 15th November, 5pm – 6.15pm
Writing poetry and writing lyrics – with Si Denbigh & Rosie Garland
What is the synergy between poetry and lyrics? Can one form feed and inform the other?
This workshop features practical exercises to get words on the page, plus time for discussion. Please feel free to bring your own lyrics / poetry to play with!
Sunday 16th November, 2.30pm – 3.45pm
Sub-culture (Gothic themed) panel, chaired by John Robb – with Rosie Garland, Natasha Scharf and David McWilliams.
The John Rylands Library,
150 Deansgate,
Manchester,
M3 3EH
12 noon – 1pm
Free
Click here to get your free ticket via Eventbrite
Following the phenomenal success of the Gothic Manchester Festival 2013, which launched the Manchester Centre for Gothic Studies, we are back with a new programme of events and activities designed to showcase MMU's academic expertise in the gothic and foreground Manchester's rich vein of gothic talent.
The stellar Rosie Garland (aka Rosie Lugosi) holds a place like no other in the dark firmament of Gothic culture.
Spanning careers in rock music (as singer with post-punk Gothic behemoths The March Violets), through performance, poetry, burlesque and cabaret and on into her current incarnation as an award-winning novelist, there are few creative dark alleys she has not dared venture down.
Rosie will be honouring us with readings from both her first novel The Palace of Curiosities and new release Vixen, and she might even treat us to a poem or two. In keeping with the theme of our festival, she'll also be regaling us with a few choice insights into her life in the spotlight (and dry ice) of show business.
All this amongst the neo-gothic pomp and circumstance of John Rylands Library's magnificent Historic Reading Room. And as if this weren't spoiling you enough, we'll also be having a book signing and reception featuring a specially designed (and rather foxy) cake by the incredible Annabel de Vetten of Conjuror's Kitchen.
Click to go to Gothic Manchester main website
I’m honoured – my essay ‘Don’t Fence Me In’ is included in this wonderful collection! (Nine Arches Press, ed Ian Humphreys)
‘What motivates poets in the 21st century? How do they find their voice? What themes and subject matters inspire them? How do they cope with set-backs and deal with success? What keeps them writing?
In Why I Write Poetry twenty-five contemporary poets reflect with insight, wit and wisdom on the writing life, each offering their distinctive take on what inspires and spurs them on to write poetry. Also - individual writing prompts to help you create your own new poetry.’
https://ninearchespress.com/publications/poetry-collections/why-i-write-poetry.html
A wonderful way to end a difficult year – ‘What Girls Do in the Dark’ selected by Pippa Hennessy as a Poetry Society Best Book of the Year!
https://poetrysociety.org.uk/poetry-news-best-books-of-the-year/
“Finally, Rosie Garland’s What Girls Do in the Dark (Nine Arches) – Garland is a true gothic polymath. This is reflected in her poetry, which roams through astrophysics, war zones, quantum theory, human biology, history, relationships and non-relationships, and more. The poems in What Girls Do in the Dark take this variety to extremes, yet somehow manage to bring concrete details and abstract ideas from all these areas together into a coherent, explosive, dazzling, gorgeous whole.”
– Pippa Hennessy is a bookseller at Five Leaves Bookshop, Nottingham.
Thank you Henry Normal for selecting What Girls Do in the Dark for Northern Soul’s Best Reads of 2021!
Books: Northern Soul’s Best Reads of 2021
Henry Normal, poet and writer
What Girls do in the Dark (Nine Arches Press) by Rosie Garland is my favourite poetry book of the year. Garland was a singer in the 1980s post-punk/goth band The March Violets. More recently, she’s established herself as a poet and novelist with several titles. I had the honour to read with her in Birmingham a while back, so when her new collection was released I was already interested. From the first poem I was captivated. She has a way of keeping one foot tentatively in the world we know with the other searching for a foothold in an unseen or imaginary world. I was inspired and transported by these poems in a way I’ve not experienced since first getting excited by the possibilities of poetry in my teens. I suspect it would not be good form to choose one of my poetry books for this feature but even if it was, I would choose Garland’s What Girls do in the Dark.
https://www.northernsoul.me.uk/books-northern-souls-best-reads-of-2021/
Thank you Vive le Rock magazine, for the great feature on The March Violets!
https://vivelerock.net/product/vive-le-rock-84-motorhead-girlschool-preorder/
Well, look at what happened on Record Store Day UK on July 17th 2021!
The March Violets ‘Big Soul Kiss’ - all the 1980s BBC Sessions in one place.
And PURPLE vinyl too #RSD21 #rsddrops
UPDATE – the entire pressing sold out in 24 hours. Jungle Records are releasing a CD version in 2022… plus more releases planned. Watch this space!
https://www.facebook.com/JungleRecords/