Sugar Hall Archives

Posted on October 19, 2017 by Simon appleby

What to read on Halloween

You can’t beat a chilling tale to read as darkness creeps ever earlier into the evening. From classics with haunted houses and man-made monstrosities to modern physological terrors, these books are at the top of our list of what to read on Halloween.

The Haunting of Hill House
Shirley Jackson’s slow-burning psychological horror sees four paranormal enthusiasts explore a brooding, mid-Victorian mansion in the hope of finding indisputable evidence of the psychic phenomenon called haunting. As they begin to cope with horrifying occurrences beyond their control or understanding, they cannot possibly know what lies ahead. For Hill House is gathering its powers – and soon it will choose one of them to make its own.

Sugar Hall
Easter 1955 and Britain waits for a hanging. Dieter Sugar finds a strange boy in the red gardens of crumbling Sugar Hall – a boy unlike any he’s ever seen. As Dieter’s mother, Lilia, scrapes the mould and moths from the walls of the great house, she knows there are pasts that cannot be so easily removed. Sugar Hall has a history, buried, but not forgotten.
Based on the stories of the slave boy that surround Littledean Hall in the Forest of Dean, this is a superbly chilling ghost story from Tiffany Murray.
Enter to win a hardback copy of Sugar Hall with this month’s Seren book giveaway.

The Woman in Black
Few attend Mrs Alice Drablow’s funeral. There are undertakers with shovels, of course, a local official who would rather be anywhere else, and one Mr Arthur Kipps, a solicitor from London. He is to spend the night in Eel Marsh House, where the old recluse died. Young Mr Kipps expects a boring evening alone sorting out paperwork and searching for Mrs Drablow’s will. But when the high tide pens him in, amidst a sinking swamp, and a blinding fog, what he finds – or rather what finds him – is something else entirely.

Frankenstein
Composed as part of a challenge with Byron and Shelley to conjure up the most terrifying ghost story, Frankenstein narrates the chilling tale of a being created by a bright young scientist and the catastrophic consequences that ensue. Considered by many to be the first science-fiction novel, the tragic tale of Victor Frankenstein and the tortured creation he rejects is a classic fable about the pursuit of knowledge, the nature of beauty and the monstrosity inherent to man.

Ritual, 1969
What are little girls made of? What will they become? From the playground to adulthood the path is beset with misunderstandings, missed dates and hidden traps for the unwary.
This darkly gothic collection of stories explores the unsettling borderland between reality and the supernatural. Not all is as it seems in a world where first impressions may only conceal disguises and false trails – and there’s no going back. Shortlisted for Wales Book of the Year 2017.

The Call of Cthulhu and Other Weird Stories
Credited with inventing the modern horror tradition, H.P. Lovecraft remade the genre in the early twentieth century. Discarding ghosts and witches, and instead envisaging mankind at the mercy of a chaotic and malevolent universe. Experience the extraterrestrial terror of ‘The Call of Cthulhu’, which fuses traditional supernaturalism with science fiction, which features here alongside early tales of nightmares and insanity, and grotesquely comic stories.

Slade House
Turn down Slade Alley – narrow, dank and easy to miss, even when you’re looking for it. Find the small black iron door set into the right-hand wall. No handle, no keyhole, but at your touch it swings open. Enter the sunlit garden of an old house that doesn’t quite make sense; too grand for the shabby neighbourhood, too large for the space it occupies. A stranger greets you and invites you inside. At first, you won’t want to leave. Later, you’ll find that you can’t.

Save

Posted on October 27, 2016 by Simon appleby

Halloween tips for book lovers: have a spooktacular night in

halloween tips for book lovers spooktacular night in

If the thought of venturing outside gives you a fright, then why not stay in for the night? All Hallow’s Eve is right around the corner, and that means frights, delights, and a healthy dose of Halloween literature.

What could be better than a cosy night at home, candles flickering, the wind howling outside, and a good book in your hands? Staying in is the new going out, and we’re here to tell you how to make the most of Halloween from home.

1. Set the scene
It’s all in the detail – hang up some spooky decorations, dim the lights and set some tall candles ablaze.

2. Play that spooky music
Some gorgeously gothic music will set you up for a night of horror. This Best of Dark Classical Music playlist should do the trick.

3. Choose your Halloween reading
Ghost stories, gothic, true crime or thriller – choose your poison. Take a look below for our spooktacular selection of dark and chilling literature…

Masque, Bethany W. Pope
£9.99
This richly gothic re-telling of Gaston Leroux’s The Phantom of the Opera takes us to 19th Century Paris, where aspiring opera singer Christine is trapped between theatre owner Raoul’s ‘romantic’ vision of her as a bourgeois wife, and the mysterious Phantom’s murderous pursuit of artistic perfection.
Love, lust, adventure, romance, and the monstrous nature of unfulfilled creativity await you here. Everyone wears a mask. Look beneath it, if you dare…

Sugar Hall, Tiffany Murray
£8.99
Easter 1955. As Lilia Sugar scrapes ice from the inside of the windows and rust from the locks in Sugar Hall, she knows there are pasts she cannot erase. The red gardens of Sugar Hall hold a secret, and Lilia and her children must confront a history that has been buried but not forgotten.
This superbly chilling ghost story (named by David Mitchell as one of his six favourites) will have you on the edge of your seat.

Ritual, 1969, Jo Mazelis
£9.99
What are little girls made of? What will they become? From the playground to adulthood the path is beset with misunderstandings, missed dates and hidden traps for the unwary.
This darkly gothic collection of stories explores the unsettling borderland between reality and the supernatural. Ranging from early twentieth-century France to 1960s South Wales and contemporary Europe, Jo Mazelis’ stories portray characters caught up in events and feelings they do not fully understand or control. Not all is as it seems in a world where first impressions may only conceal disguises and false trails – and there’s no going back…

Seán Tyrone: A Symphony of Horrors, Mark Ryan
£8.99
The brilliantly evoked valleys town of Aberuffern (the mouth of hell) becomes the central motif of this short novel, inspired by the Mexican novel Pedro Paramo by Juan Rulfo.
This is lively, blackly humorous and intelligent storytelling.

Witch, Damian Walford Davies
£8.99
With the narrative pull of a novel and the vibrancy of a play for voices, Damian Walford Davies’s Witch offers a thrilling portrait of a Suffolk village in the throes of the witchcraft hunts of the mid-seventeenth century. The poems in this collection are dark spells, compact and moving: seven sections, each of seven poems, each of seven couplets, are delivered by those most closely involved in the ‘making’ of a witch.

Murder at the Star, Steve Adams
£9.99
The murder of God-fearing, bible-quoting, partially deaf Thomas Thomas at the branch of Star Stores he managed in Garnant, South Wales has remained an unsolved mystery since it happened in 1921. Over £126 was missing from the store safe, yet there were oddities about the attack which suggested this was more than a robbery that went tragically wrong.
In classic cold case fashion, journalist Steve Adams’s extensive researches have finally identified the killer, and the almost century-old case can finally be closed…

Happy Halloween one and all, we hope you have a frightfully good evening.

Save

Posted on December 17, 2015 by Simon appleby

Santa Baby, Slip a Story Under the Tree

Christmas is on its way, and we have some recommendations for you whether you’re looking for a present for someone else, or you’re looking for something to ask Santa for this Christmas!

For Thriller Lovers:

If you or someone you know loves a good crime story, why not try Jo Mazelis’ Jerwood Fiction Uncovered Prize-winning Significance, or Anne Lauppe-Dunbar’s debut Dark Mermaids?

For Historical Fiction Lovers:

Francesca Rhydderch’s debut, The Rice Paper Diaries, which won the 2014 Wales Book of the Year Award and Tiffany Murray’s chilling Sugar Hall are perfect for readers who like their stories old school. So old school they’re practically history.

For Sci-Fi/Fantasy Lovers:

If you’re after something weird and wonderful for you or a friend this festive season, then you can’t go wrong with one of our New Stories from The Mabinogion; The Meat Tree is a brilliantly bizarre sci-fi retelling of the Blodeuwedd myth, perfect for readers who love stories that are literally out of this world. But if you’re after something a little closer to home, why not pick up a copy of Mary-Ann Constantine’s fable-esque debut, Star-Shot? This novel is a real treat for readers who are familiar with Cardiff.

For Short Story Lovers:

For lovers of the oft forgotten art form that is the short story, why not pick up New Welsh Short Stories, an anthology featuring a wide range of Welsh authors from Carys Davies to Jo Mazelis, or Graham Mort’s latest collection, Terroir. These two look quite charming together, so if I were you I’d get both.

For Non-Fiction Lovers:

Jasmine Donahaye’s memoir, Losing Israel, has been stunning readers since its publication earlier this year; part memoir, part travel writing, part nature writing, it’s the perfect gift for any non-fiction connoisseur. Mike Rees’ Men Who Played the Game is the ideal book for any sports fan, and as we commemorate one hundred years since the First World War there’s no better time to read it than right now.

For Poetry Lovers:

Here at Seren we’d be nothing without our poetry, so why not pick up a copy of Kim Moore’s hugely popular debut collection, The Art of Falling, or Jonathan Edwards’ Costa Award-winning debut collection, My Family and Other Superheroes – we promise they won’t disappoint you! Or if someone you know likes to keep on top of the latest poetry, a subscription to Poetry Wales magazine would make for a fine Christmas present, if you ask me. And I suppose you must be asking me if you’re reading this…

You can find all these books and more on our website, so treat the readers you know to some well-chosen words this Christmas!

Posted on October 22, 2015 by Simon appleby

Our Recommended Reads for Halloween!

Start carving your pumpkins and stocking up on sweets, because Halloween is on the way!

What do you mean it’s too early? It’s never too early, and here at Seren we have even more reason to celebrate, because the earliest roots of Halloween date back to the harvest festivals in the Celtic nations, like Wales.

Okay, okay, maybe it’s a tad early to dig those skeletons out of your closet and dangle them from your wall, but it’s never too early – or too late, for that matter! – to read something that will put you in the mood for the spookiest time of the year…

Sing Sorrow Sorrow
ed. Gwen Davies

Sing Sorrow Sorrow is a chilling collection of supernatural myth and otherworldly horror stories from some of Wales’ most exciting new and established authors.

From the dark waters of the Styx to the circling birds of the Mabinogion, from the lonely house to cities of the mind, the contemporary stories in Sing Sorrow Sorrow grow out of European folk, fable, fairy tale and legend – all tales which belong to the domain of the underworld. There are ghosts, murderesses, blood-soaked enchantment, black humour and stories with the darkest twists of the imagination – draw the chair nearer the fire and enjoy.

With contributions from Niall Griffiths, Maria Donovan, Deborah Kay Davies, Gee Williams, Richard Gwyn, Tristan Hughes, Cynan Jones, Matthew Francis, Anne Lauppe-Dunbar, Mary-Ann Constantine, Zillah Bethell, Dai Vaughan, Imogen Herrad, Lloyd Jones, Euron Griffith, Jo Mazelis Glenda Beagan, Alan Bilton, Roshi Fernando, Christine Harrison, Jon Gower, Charlotte Greig.

Witch
by Damian Walford Davies

With the narrative pull of a novel and the vibrancy of a play for voices, Damian Walford Davies’ Witch offers a thrilling portrait of a Suffolk village in the throes of the witchcraft hunts of the mid-seventeenth century. The poems in this collection are dark spells, compact and moving: seven sections, each of seven poems, each of seven couplets, are delivered by those most closely involved in the ‘making’ of a witch. The speakers – from Thomas Love the priest, the villagers who slowly succumb to suspicion and counter-accusation, the ‘discoverer of witches’ Francis Hurst, and the ‘witch’ herself – authentically conjure a war-torn society in which religious paranoia amplifies local grievances to fever pitch. Witch is a damning parable that chimes with the terror and anxieties of our own haunted age.

Sugar Hall
by Tiffany Murray

Easter 1955. As Lilia Sugar scrapes the ice from the inside of the windows and the rust from the locks in Sugar Hall, she knows there are pasts she cannot erase. On the very edge of the English/Welsh border, the red gardens of Sugar Hall hold a secret, and as Britain prepares for its last hanging, Lilia and her children must confront a history that has been buried but not forgotten.

Based on the stories of the slave boy that surround Littledean Hall in the Forest of Dean, this is a superbly chilling ghost story from Tiffany Murray.

You can order all of these books and more from our website!

Posted on September 30, 2015 by Simon appleby

Sugar Hall Read-a-Long!

Throughout October our Marketing Officer, Rosie, and Marketing Assistant, Jess, will be reading Tiffany Murray’s Sugar Hall – and you’re invited to join them!

Based on the stories of the slave boy that surround Littledean Hall in the Forest of Dean, this is a superbly chilling ghost story from Tiffany Murray.

[youtube https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KTQTL7_S-Wk]

Autumn is the perfect time to immerse yourself in a ghost story, and throughout the month Rosie and Jess will be sharing their reading progress on Twitter, Instagram and this blog – they may even dip their toes into YouTube if you can entice them there with treats, which you probably can. They like treats.

As with most things in life, the more the merrier! Rather than simply sitting back and watching the two of them scare themselves, why not join in? Update your reading progress on Twitter and Instagram with the hashtag #SugarHall (so inventive) and get in the mood for Halloween!

You can order Sugar Hall from our website.

Posted on September 3, 2015 by Simon appleby

What is Literary Fiction?

Our Marketing Assistant, Jess, has a little chat about the difference between literary and genre fiction.

Here at Seren we primarily publish literary fiction as opposed to genre fiction, and many a time I’ve been asked what the difference is. This is a fair question – I didn’t know the answer myself until I went to university!

The simple answer is that literary fiction is much more focused on the quality of the writing style – on the way the book is written – rather than on the plot and the way the plot satisfies a certain genre. Genre fiction is full of fast page-turners and plots that try to blow your socks off, whereas literary fiction tends to be a little slower, a little quieter, but no less enjoyable.

In the realms of literary fiction we’re more likely to regularly encounter characters who feel like people we might pass in the street, rather than characters who fit a mould; crime fiction is brimming with grumpy detectives, each with their own dark and dangerous past – even Sherlock Holmes isn’t squeaky clean! In literary fiction, on the other hand, we’re just as likely to encounter the next Patrick Bateman as we are the next Atticus Finch.

Literary fiction isn’t ‘better’ than genre fiction in much the same way that genre fiction isn’t ‘better’ than literary fiction. There’s no need for competition here, because if you’re a reader – whether you read regularly or sit back with a handful of books each year – you’ll have already read both types of fiction, and chances are you’ll have liked and disliked books in both categories in equal measure.

So if literary fiction and genre fiction are equally valid, why is our focus on literary fiction?

First and foremost, it’s writing we want to promote and celebrate. We want a good story – of course we do! – but if we had to choose between an action-packed story written in a mediocre fashion or a subtle, stunningly written story, I’m sure you can guess which story we’d pick every time.

Not only that, but literary fiction gives us a lot of freedom. Something I’ve yet to mention is that literary fiction and genre fiction are not entirely separate from one another; it’s common for a book to be considered literary fiction while also fitting into a particular genre. That’s one of the reasons we love literary fiction so much!

Francesca Rhydderch’s award-winning debut The Rice Paper Diaries is literary fiction, but it’s historical fiction, too; Jo Mazelis’ prize-winning debut Significance is literary fiction, but it’s also a thriller; Tiffany Murray’s haunting Sugar Hall is literary fiction, but it’s also a ghost story. We are able to publish a wide variety of fiction by a plethora of authors, all because we love stories that are beautifully told.

That’s why we love literary fiction, and that’s why we publish it.

Posted on May 21, 2015 by Simon appleby

Seren at The Hay Festival

Today marks the beginning of The Hay Festival 2015, and this year there are plenty of events involving some of our very own authors.

Paul Henry and Jonathan Edwards will be reading from their latest collections, Boy Running and the Costa Poetry Prize-winning My Family and Other Superheroes respectively. If you’re a fan of poetry, T.S. Eliot Prize-winning poet Philip Gross and visual artist Valerie Coffin Price will also be discussing their collaborative collection, A Fold in the River, and Damian Walford Davies will be discussing and reading from his latest collection, Judas.

We’re also going to be celebrating the centenary of Alun Lewis at Hay this year, with two events dedicated to the WW2 writer. Juliet Aykroyd, Owen Sheers and John Pikoulis will be discussing Lewis’s time in India, in particular how he met and fell in love with Juliet’s mother, Freda Aykroyd, while Owen Sheers reads some of his poems.

Another event will see Gillian Clarke, the National Poet of Wales, do a close reading and discussion of Lewis’s poems.

Our prose is also getting some attention at Hay this year. Jasmine Donahaye will be talking to Francesca Rhydderch, author of the 2014 Wales Book of the Year The Rice Paper Diaries and co-editor of New Welsh Short Stories, about her upcoming memoir, Losing Israel, a moving and honest account of nature writing, travel writing and family history exploring the displacement of Palestinians in 1948.

For those of you who are fiction lovers, Tiffany Murray will be doing a late-night reading from her acclaimed ghost story, Sugar Hall, where she will be joined by David Mitchell, author of Cloud Atlas and the upcoming Slade House.

With so much to see this year at Hay, you’d be a fool to miss out! Buy your tickets online at www.hayfestival.com, or check out our Events Page for more information.

Posted on April 2, 2015 by Simon appleby

Prepare Yourself for Indie Book Day!

This Saturday is Indie Book Day – hooray!

What is Indie Book Day?

Indie Book Day is an entire day dedicated to supporting and celebrating our independent publishers and bookstores.

Great! How can I get involved?

Simple! To take part in Indie Book Day all you have to do is visit your local independent bookstore on March 21st and buy yourself a book that has been published by an independent publisher – the genre doesn’t matter! Then post a picture of your new book, its cover, or, even better, you with the book and post it on any social media site of your choice using the hashtag #indiebookday.

So, will you take up the challenge?

Look out for some Seren titles in your local independent bookstore this Saturday. Until then, here are some recommendations to whet your appetite!

My Family and Other Superheroes introduces a vibrant and unique new voice from Wales. The superheroes in question are a motley crew. Evel Knievel, Sophia Loren, Ian Rush, Marty McFly, a bicycling nun and a recalcitrant hippo – all leap from these pages and jostle for position, alongside valleys mams, dads and bamps, described with great warmth. Other poems focus on the crammed terraces and abandoned high streets where a working-class and Welsh nationalist politics is hammered out. This is a post-industrial valleys upbringing re-imagined through the prism of pop culture and surrealism.

When Tessa’s best friend organises a surprise TV makeover, Tessa is horrified. It’s the last thing she needs – her business is on the brink of collapse, her marriage is under strain and her daughter is more interested in beauty pageants than student politics. What’s more, the ‘Greenham Common angle’ the TV producers have devised reopens some personal history Tessa has tried to hide away. Then Angela gets in touch, Tessa’s least favourite member of the Greenham gang, and she’s drawn back into her muddy past.

The Fauverie of this book is the big-cat house in the Jardin des Plantes zoo. But the word also evokes the Fauves, ‘primitive’ painters who used raw colour straight from the tube. Like The Zoo Father, Petit’s acclaimed second collection, this volume has childhood trauma and a dying father at its heart, while Paris takes centre stage – a city savage as the Amazon, haunted by Aramis the black jaguar and a menagerie of wild animals. Transforming childhood horrors to ultimately mourn a lost parent, Fauverie redeems the darker forces of human nature while celebrating the ferocity and grace of endangered species. Five poems fromFauverie won the 2013 Manchester Poetry Prize and the manuscript in progress was awarded an Arts Council England Grant for the Arts.

A light-hearted novella exploring the strange case of a Swansea woman who is apparently possessed by the spirit of Dylan Thomas. Naturally all is not as it seems. The woman, who works in the Dylan Thomas Centre, meets a rather different Dylan from the one she knows by repute, one who doesn’t really fit in with the ghosts of other poets in heaven and is desperate to train himself to join the fitter shades of the long distance runners instead. Her own life, which has been lonely and sad, is completely transformed by the encounter.

Lucy Swann is trying on a new life. She’s cut and dyed her hair and bought new clothes, but she’s only got as far as a small town in northern France when her flight is violently cut short. When Inspector Vivier and his handsome assistant Sabine Pelat begin their investigation the chance encounters of her last days take on a new significance.

Lucy’s death, like a stone thrown into a pool, sends out far-reaching ripples, altering the lives of people who never knew her as well as those of her loved ones back home.

Posted on October 15, 2014 by Simon appleby

Win a signed Sugar Hall paperback

To celebrate the launch of the paperback edition of Sugar Hall, we’re giving away three copies signed by the author, Tiffany Murray.

To be in with a chance all you have to do is tweet us your most spine tingling, heart stopping, goose bump raising ghost stories in 140 characters or less using the hashtag #SugarHall.

We’ll be retweeting the ones that give us nightmares and Tiffany will pick the winners on Halloween.

To get you started here’s ours:
“I told you there are strange noises here didn’t I? Ma say’s it’s the forest behind us, but it isn’t because trees don’t scream…”

Sign up to our newsletter

Sign up to our newsletter