Tim Relf, "Not Even October"

 

Tim Relf, photo by MadMann photography

Tim Relf is a Leicestershire-based poet, novelist and journalist. His debut poetry collection, Not Even October, is out soon with Salt Publishing. His poems have been published in most of the UK’s leading poetry journals, including Poetry London, The Rialto, Stand, Under The Radar, Poetry Wales, The Dark Horse, Acumen, Banshee and Bad Lilies. He is a former poet-in-residence at Leicester Botanic Garden. His most recent novel, published by Penguin, was translated into more than 20 languages and turned into an audiobook starring Emilia Clarke and Charles Dance. You can find out more about his writing on his website here.  

About Not Even October, by Tim Relf
Not Even October is a collection about the easy-to-miss moments that shape lives. Moments in hotel rooms, petrol stations, cafes and vets. In suburban gardens and city parks. In small-town streets and country lanes. Evoking love lost and found, nights of excess, threads of friendship, the rip of grief and the flickering, beautiful absurdities of life in a digital, distracted age, the poems trace how we make sense of memory, mortality, place and home. Not Even October vaults from humour to heartache – then back again – in a breath, attuned both to the anxiety-inducing barrage of turbulent times and the calming comforts offered by the natural world. In this tender, relatable debut, Relf navigates contemporary Britain, finding everyday magic in everyday places, while asking readers: How do we hold on to what matters – and let go of what doesn’t?

You can read more about Not Even October on the publisher's website here. Below, you can read a sample poem from the collection. 

From Not Even October

Windfall

It was going to be about how, if you sit in an orchard

in September, it surrounds you:

falling.

It was going to be about the soft drop of decades as you rest

between Ribston Pippins. But now I see – hear –

this poem isn’t about that, after all.

It’s about waiting for the word

for the sound apples make

landing:

the exact right word for the noise they make

as they hit the ground.

Anne Charnock, "Alston Moor"

Anne Charnock studied Environment Science and Fine Art, and her latest novel, Alston Moor, is a work of eco-fiction. She won the Arthur C. Clark Award 2018 for Dreams Before the Start of Time, and the British Science Fiction Association Award 2017 for her novella, The Enclave. Her debut novel, A Calculated Life, was a finalist for the 2013 Philip K. Dick Award and the 2013 Kitschies Golden Tentacle Award. Anne’s writing career began in science journalism, and her articles appeared in The Guardian, New Scientist, International Herald Tribune among others. Lancaster University recently awarded her an honorary DLitt for her novels "on key topics including near-future environmental collapse."

About Alston Moor, by Anne Charnock
In an epic novel set on the North Pennine Moors, Elizabeth has abandoned avalanche science to restore desolate peatlands. She treks in the footsteps of Isabel who, five centuries earlier, herds her cattle to remote summering grounds. 

Both are reeling from the overwhelming crises of their day. In 1548, Isabel and her father, together with the priest in this poorest of parishes, grapple with the chaos of the Protestant Reformation. Today, a grieving Elizabeth fights to save an invaluable ecosystem, one that is threatened by wilful fire-raising and arson.

The entwined stories are told through multiple voices creating a rich portrait of England’s most remote landscape. At its heart, this deeply moving novel interrogates how society confronts crisis whether through science, faith or superstition.

You can read more about Alston Moor on the publisher's website here. Below, you can read an excerpt from the novel. 

From Alston Moor

Christopher - May 2022

He scans across the moor, unsure exactly where they found the ruin. It stands a few stones high, he recalls, and he’ll know it when he sees it. From the ruin, they saw a single tree, so he heads towards the only one that’s visible from the path. And he smiles as he remembers that Abi could not believe a tree could survive out here through winter, seeing how blustery it felt even in May. If she were that tree, she said, she would pick up her roots and let the wind blow her somewhere warmer. 

He stumbles across the ruin, which squats in a slight hollow on the hillside, a few minutes scramble from the track. Clumps of reeds, which he does not remember from before, partly obscure what remains of the walls. Only now does he question what the hell he is doing here. Why come back? He hates himself for staying so angry. 

Isabel – May1548

Isabel knows the moment that changed her. Not the moment when she sat with a basket holding eight perfect eggs laid by their eight ordinary hens, when it dawned on her: these hens do the work and we take the profit. No, the moment that changed her occurred three years past at the Michaelmas fair in Hexham – the one time she travelled so far with her father. She stood before a stall selling cheeses. She stood transfixed by the sight of a single exotic fruit, an orange, on display – not for sale, mind. In that moment she gleaned that a world existed beyond these northern moors and valleys. A world where such a thing, this extraordinary orange, grows on trees or bushes or springs from the soil like cabbages, she knew not how. But she grasped that a place exists in the world where oranges are as ordinary as eggs.

Elizabeth – August 2022

When she switched her research from the Alps to working in peat bogs in the Pennines, she instantly drew looks of disappointment, bemusement, even from her sister. After the switch, Elizabeth received fewer invites to dinner. She supposed that her traveller’s tales became less riveting. No more derring-do. However, in some ways, Elizabeth feels that peat bogs suit her better, not so much in terms of the day-to-day research or the inherent dangers, but in terms of her as a person. She is introspective by nature – she accepts that – and she looks back on her days in the Alps as though she were accidentally caught up in a role bigger than her personality. In the movies, they would describe her as ‘cast against type’ as an avalanche scientist. Now she comes to think about it, her son is similarly cast against type. He is outgoing, extrovert, more like his father, and yet he works in insurance.

Mati Shemoelof, "Bagdad | Haifa | Berlin"

Mati Shemoelef, photo by Ali Ghandtschi

Mati Shemoelof is a Berlin-based writer, poet, curator and creative writing educator, originally from Haifa, Israel. He has published sixteen books of poetry, fiction, essays and drama in Israel and Germany, and his work moves between Hebrew, German, Arabic and English.

He is the co-founder of ANU – Jews and Arabs Writing in Berlin and the initiator of the Poetic Hafla, a literary and cultural series that brought together Hebrew, Arabic and German-speaking writers and artists in Berlin. He has also worked as a curator and editor and teaches Creative Writing in English, German and Hebrew.

His books published in Germany include the poetry collection Bagdad | Haifa | Berlin (AphorismA Verlag, 2019), Das kleine Boot in meiner Hand nenn ich Narbe (Parasitenpresse, 2023), and the novel Der Preis (PalmArtPress, 2025). His latest book, Fünfzehn Narben: Jüdisch-arabische Texte zu Politik und Poesie, a collection of essays and political and poetic texts, will be published by AphorismA Verlag in 2026. His first book written originally in German, Jiddische Sounds, Deutsche Wörter, will be published by Elif Verlag in 2027.

 

About Bagdad | Haifa | Berlin, by Mati Shemoelof, translated from Hebrew into German by Jan Kühne, Arabic translation by Nael Eltoukhy, Afterword by Jan Kühne

Bagdad | Haifa | Berlin brings together 40 poems from Mati Shemoelof’s Hebrew poetry books and presents them for the first time in German translation. The bilingual edition places the original Hebrew poems alongside Jan Kühne’s German translations, creating a dialogue between the language in which the poems were written and the language of Shemoelof’s new life in Berlin.

The three cities in the title mark three connected but very different worlds: Bagdad, the city from which Shemoelof’s Iraqi-Jewish family came; Haifa, where he was born and grew up; and Berlin, where he has lived since 2013 as a Hebrew-language writer.

The book brings these places together through questions of migration, memory, Mizrahi and Arab-Jewish identity, Jewish history, belonging and language. The poems move between family memories and contemporary political realities, between Israel and Germany, and between the experience of home and the experience of being a stranger.

Rather than presenting identity as something fixed, Bagdad | Haifa | Berlin shows it as something formed through movement. The three cities are not simply geographical locations. They become different layers of memory and belonging, carried by the poet from one language and country into another.

You can read more about Bagdad | Haifa | Berlin on the author's website here. Below, you can read two sample poems from the collection. 

From Bagdad | Haifa | Berlin 

Luca Serra, "This Is Home"

Originally from Northern Italy, Luca Serra has been living in Scotland for thirteen years. From an early age, he has been interested in creative activities such as writing and painting. He has dedicated himself to writing for about fifteen years and has so far written four novels and various short stories in Italian and English. In January 2020 he received the Scottish Book Trust New Writers Award for Fiction. Since early 2021 he became a literary editor and mentor at Product Magazine, where he mentors emerging writers as part of the "Write Here, Write Now" programme. He currently teaches literacy and Creative Writing at HMP Glenochil.

Luca is particularly interested in contemporary social issues such as immigration, identity, and the divisive politics of today. Through his writing, he aims to explore the challenges and experiences that come with moving to new, unfamiliar places and how the characters establish their identity and purpose in those places. His characters are often misfits and minorities who pull out the remarkable and, sometimes, absurd in ordinary, day-to-day lives.

This Is Home, his debut English novel, was published by Leamington Books in January 2026.

About This Is Home, by Luca Serra 
This Is Home is a vivid, multivoiced story cycle that follows characters forging new lives far from where they began. Serra’s novel moves between London and Glasgow, tracing the emotional landscapes of migration, friendship, and the fragile search for belonging.

You can read more about This Is Home on the publisher's website here. Below, you can read an excerpt from the novel. 

From This Is Home
A Friday stroll on Sauchiehall street is never just a stroll. Brunilda had got used to it. You might exchange a smile with perfect strangers, often locals, carrying amicable manners in their blood, well proud of the definition "Scotland’s friendliest city," well proud of being one of those "People Make Glasgow" people. Then, a block away, you might witness the first puke of the weekend, vile fruit of a 2pm football drinking session. 1.6 miles of buskers, beggars, reckless youths, hen parties, leaving parties, stag dos, today’s neds and punks, tomorrow’s artists. It’s home of immigrants young and old, hipsters, rebels, people with no tribe, everyone belonging to a huge, infinite family: the Glaswegians. It’s a street of no structure, a street of pure, erratic life. 

Brunilda often wondered what her role was on those 1.6 miles of walking stories. She watched and absorbed, taking in words, phrases and scenes to share with mum and grandma, one day, back in Brazil, home: the only place where she felt that unique, visceral sense of belonging. Brazil was everything she had been so far, her foundation and youth. Glasgow was the present, the moment, and although it was growing in her, it retained the shapes, lights and colours of an unfamiliar place. She didn’t see herself chatting away with a busker or consoling a kid who’s fallen off the bike: she felt like she’d be stepping on somebody else’s toes. As consequences of actions were unpredictable, she simply attended that daily march of pure, erratic life, rather than participated. She was a passive spectator.

Alexandra Corrin-Tachibana, "Skinship" (スキンシップ)

 

Alexandra Corrin-Tachibana is author of two poetry collections: Sing Me Down from the Dark and Skinship, both published by Salt Publications. This year, she won the Frome Festival Crysse Morrison Poetry Prize, as well as Verve's February Poem of the Month competition, was placed third, by Mimi Khalvati, in the Kent and Sussex competition, and shortlisted for the Wolves Lit Festival competition. She is shortlisted for the 2026 Forwards Prize for Best Single Written Poem, for her poem, "Madam Gout," originally published by Magma.

Alexandra lived in Japan for ten years and has Master's degrees in Japanese Language and Culture and in Writing Poetry. She is based in Newcastle-upon-Tyne and teaches for The Poetry School and The Poetry Business. Her most recent work is published or forthcoming in Pennine Platform, The North, Vervacious anthology (Verve Poetry Press), The Alchemy Spoon, and online in And Other Poems.

About Skinship, by Alexandra Corrin-Tachibana
Returning to Japan after a 15-year absence, our narrator is told she hasn’t changed. Yet everything has changed. Skinship examines our public and interior selves, the seen and the unseen, probing the complexities of relationships with lovers, kin, other women, and across cultures. These ideas are often explored through Japanese forms, including award-winning zuihitsu and haibun, and 2026 Forward Prize shortlisted "Madam Gout."

You can read more about Skinship on the publisher's website here. Below, you can read two sample poems from the collection. 

From Skinship

ふさわしくないもの

Unsuitable Things

           (after Sei Shōnagon) 

An obasan saying futota na to a foreigner: 

haven’t you put weight on? An old woman questioning 

the Japanese character, based on a competitive 

game of bridge. Pyramid tea bags that rip. On threads 

that twist around your index finger. A mother who twists 

words, shutting down conversation with her daughter: 

did you ring for a reason? A father telling his son he’s a quitter, 

because he leaves taekwondo. A son remonstrating 

with his mum, when she unplugs his gaming PC: 

are you a fucking moron? Chewing pellets of Rock Jaw gum, 

for better facial aesthetic. A father who won’t let him win 

arm wrestling. And a mother who sees a rival 

in her daughter, who, as I bend to kiss her cheek, 

says, I thought you were going to eat me.  

Michael M. Brownstein, "Paperbacks & Baguettes"

Michael M. Brownstein is a writer of fiction and poetry. His work has appeared in The Interstitial, Catharsis Chronicles, and The Lark, among other online journals. He is an editor for Scrittura and New Choices. Paperbacks & Baguettes: Stories Between Us is his debut novella-in-flash. Michael lives with his family in Massachusetts and can usually be found making coffee and easing into the day.

About Paperbacks & Baguettes: Stories Between Us, by Michael M. Brownstein
Paperbacks & Baguettes is a novella-in-flash set in an independent bookstore café. Across forty interconnected stories, booksellers, baristas, managers, regulars, and passersby move through the rhythms of early mornings, busy afternoons, and late closings.

The stories focus on the small exchanges that gradually give the place its character: a mug left warm, a playlist shared across the counter, a scarf caught on a shelf, or a familiar customer acknowledged from across the room. Running quietly through the book is a developing relationship between a woman who frequents the store and the man behind the counter.

Together, the stories explore how attention, routine, and small acts of care can turn an ordinary place into somewhere people feel they belong.

Below, you can read one of the flashes from the book. 

From Paperbacks & Baguettes

The Folded Page

And the bell stammered once.

The aisle was narrow, just wide enough for two people to pass if neither lingered. Shelves leaned in, jackets pressed close when a hand pulled one forward. A cart bumped in the back and went quiet.

He bent the cover back, not much. A corner page still showed a fold.

From the other end, a woman slowed at the shelf. She pulled the same book from lower down, her copy stiff, his already worn. Their eyes moved between the two.

“You should take that one,” he said.

She turned it once in her hand. “Yours has history.”

He looked at the fold again. “Someone marked a place.”

She pressed her thumb there without opening it. “Maybe that’s where I’d stop too.”

A boy passed behind them, dragging his sleeve across the spines, the sound faint as paper brushing paper. Near the front, the register opened and shut, coins shifting in the drawer. The bell stammered once, then stopped.

The woman slid her copy under her arm, shifting her bag to make space. He kept his a moment longer, then pushed it back until the row leaned straight again.

When he looked up, she was already at the counter. His finger stayed on the folded page before he let go.

Light from the high window stretched over the jackets, then slipped away. The aisle was empty, except for the book pressed back into place. 

"Across the Universe: What Can We Learn from the Beatles' Extraordinary Creativity?"

By Steve Taylor

The Beatles were astonishingly prolific. Although their recording career lasted less than seven years, they recorded and released 213 songs –– a rate of more than 30 songs per year. They released 13 albums and 22 singles (many of which were not included on albums). Nowadays it’s normal for bands or musical artists to release an album every two or three years.  

Another remarkable aspect of the Beatles was the speed of their creative evolution. At the end of 1964, they were still in their initial pop phase, recording mostly up-tempo love songs, such as "Eight Days A Week" and "No Reply," with simple beat-group arrangements. 18 months later they were recording Revolver, which many people (including me) regard as their greatest achievement. The album is full of radical innovation, in terms of music, recording technology and lyrical content. For example, the song "Tomorrow Never Knows" contains a sitar drone, a single repeating bass note, a hypnotic syncopated drumbeat, multiple tape loops, backwards guitar solos and lyrics adapted from The Tibetan Book of the Dead.

Just a few months after Revolver came the psychedelia of "Strawberry Fields Forever," Sgt. Pepper and Magical Mystery Tour. During this phase, the Beatles created sophisticated experimental pop that stretched the limits of contemporary technology even further. By mid-1968, they had already progressed beyond psychedelia to songs of spiritual sustenance such as "Hey Jude" and "Let it Be," and the mature creative riches of The White Album and Abbey Road.

What were the secrets of the Beatles’ prolific and progressive creativity? It’s true that they were innately gifted to a rare degree. But there are certainly some creative lessons we can learn from the way that they applied and realised their gifts. 

Firstly, the Beatles show us the importance of apprenticeship, of a long period of learning and training. Innate gifts express themselves fully after years of practice and discipline, like precious minerals that undergo a long process of extraction. It was only during their Hamburg residencies – where they played for several hours a night for weeks on end – that the Beatles cohered as a group, learning and honing their craft, and uncovered their authentic style. As Paul McCartney admitted, "We were pretty bad at the beginning … But with all the time we had in Hamburg, we just got good."

Another lesson from the Beatles’ story is the importance of remaining curious and open, and choosing growth over stability. Creative development is an attitude and a choice. It’s up to us whether we settle for comfort and success, repeating tried and tested creative formulae, or whether we keep exploring. Climbing up to the higher rungs of the ladder (as Paul McCartney described the Beatles’ approach) involves risks and expends more energy, but is always worthwhile, as an alternative to creative inertia.  

Finally, the Beatles teach us that we don’t have to be massively proficient or theoretically knowledgeable. On the contrary, too much proficiency and technical knowledge can be an obstacle, cluttering our minds with concepts. The Beatles had very little formal musical knowledge and were far from virtuosos. They demonstrate that naivety aids creative development, freeing us from the restriction of rules and conventions, so that we can endlessly explore our creative field without boundaries or borders.

Ultimately, though, perhaps the greatest lesson from the Beatles is that the most inspirational creativity comes through rather than from us. John Lennon and Paul McCartney often described how their best songs were "received" rather than created. Paul woke up one morning with the melody of "Yesterday" running through his head; the lyrics to "Across the Universe" came to John while he was the verge of sleep. "Nowhere Man" also came to John when he was dozing; while Paul’s "Let it Be" was the result of a dream in which he encountered his deceased mother. 

Ideas and insights are always floating around us, and will eventually enter our mental space, like seeds that are carried by the wind and land in soil. We just need to be patient, while keeping our minds alert and open. 

About the author

Steve Taylor, photo by Remy Steiner

Steve Taylor PhD is senior lecturer and researcher in Psychology at Leeds Beckett University, and also a poet and musician. He is the author of Across the Universe: the Magic and Mystery of the Beatles’ Creativity (Scribe, September 2026). Find out more here.