Join us for the launch of the eagerly awaited new collection by Festival Director Zoe Brooks.

Something In Nothing (published by Indigo Dreams) is a narrative sequence of poems with echoes of Angela Carter. The collection weaves together the lives of various fairytale characters in a contemporary setting to explore universal issues, in particular the denial of evil – the “something in nothing” of the collection’s title. 

At the heart of the sequence is the story of the serial killer Bluebeard and the Luminous Girl. Other characters include the elderly couple Beauty and Beast, the Slavic witch and ex-goddess Baba Yaga, a non-magical Godmother and a useless angel. By using fairy tales, these poems allow us a safe place to study the darkness.

The poems are elemental and yet personal, out of time and yet terribly current. We are not part of Bluebeard's and Baba Yaga's world, but we could be. Zoe Brooks’ poetry has been described as “a dive into the uncanny: into that rich heritage of myth” (Fiona Sampson), “s_o unlike anything else - strange, visceral, and like stepping into a completely other place and time_." (Shazea Quraishi) and “truly
compelling” (Alison Brackenbury).

Something in Nothing is Zoe’s third collection. Owl Unbound was published in 2020 by Indigo Dreams Publishing and the award-winning Fool’s Paradise was published in 2022 by Black Eyes Publishing.

Zoe will be joined by a number of poetry friends, who will also read, full details to be announced.

If you want to buy a copy of the collection, there is an option to do so when you buy your ticket (for British buyers only), or you can buy from Zoe https://zoebrookspoetry.bigcartel.com/product/something-in-nothing or from Indigo Dreams on https://indigodreamspublishing.com/zoe-brooks

The Poetry Festival receives no grant aid and so is entirely reliant on donations and ticket sales. While this event is free, tickets are pay-what-you-want, so you can change the figure in the relevant box when you book your ticket. Please be generous.