#author-panel — Public Fediverse posts

Go all in… but how far dare you go?

For our third event this August, we were again in Knaresborough for another FEVA event, this time at Knaresborough Library and a slightly more ‘adult’-themed topic on how far do you go in writing your intimate scenes in romance?

With capable hosting assistance from librarian Deborah, authors Lesley Field and our own Sue Williams shared their thoughts about writing intimacy: how far to go, whether to stop at the door, and can they stop laughing enough to actually write it?

https://youtu.be/MKrh_w5sZEA?si=WVkPj-22pjANH14q

From the library’s review:

It was a fantastic evening filled with lively discussion, laughter and inspiration. We’re delighted that so many of you enjoyed the session as much as we did.

Some of your lovely feedback says it all:

“Best event ever put on by FEVA.”

“Great fun, thank you! Love our fabulous library.”

Special thanks to our friends at Books and Beverages for organising such a wonderful event.

An truly engaging and entertaining evening of ghost stories excellently presented by all three guest authors.

If you prefer, you can also watch our videos on YouTube @booksandbeveragesUK where you can support us by liking and subscribing!

FEVA is Knaresborough’s summer Festival of Entertainment and Visual Arts and is a constituted community not-for-profit organisation run by a team of volunteers.

Books and Beverages UK showcases independent authors, storytellers, and creative voices through live events recorded at Harrogate Library and shared online for readers everywhere.

O horrible! Most horrible! An Evening of Ghostly Happenings

Knaresborough’s FEVA 2026 saw local author Daniel Ingram-Brown, author of Bea’s Witch, Mark Wells of Cambridge Gothic fame and para-normalist, Paul Forster, author of Haunted Harrogate, come together to read and tell ghost stories, and to talk about the ghostly world just a breath away from where you are sitting.

https://youtu.be/eY0dxIvSUPU?si=_w89632y6oBTlKjy

An truly engaging and entertaining evening of ghost stories excellently presented by all three guest authors.

If you prefer, you can also watch our videos on YouTube @booksandbeveragesUK where you can support us by liking and subscribing!

FEVA is Knaresborough’s summer Festival of Entertainment and Visual Arts and is a constituted community not-for-profit organisation run by a team of volunteers.

Books and Beverages UK showcases independent authors, storytellers, and creative voices through live events recorded at Harrogate Library and shared online for readers everywhere.

Life in the Ice Age. Live at Library!

Elle Clifford began by talking about herbackground as a university lecturer in social psychology which took an unusual turn into archaeology and prehistory some years ago. Since then, she has been privileged to visit over fifty of the best decorated caves in Europe.  She has found that children, especially, are fascinated by the Stone Age, and ask her amazing questions about what life was like for our ancestors who lived so long ago. She wanted to portray them as humans just like us, with jobs to do and mouths to feed. Their personalities and behaviour would be as varied as our own, and during the last Ice Age they had major problems to cope with, especially climate change.

https://youtu.be/FUwkNn28QA8?si=JwV7XwDqn9JX-qOc

Elle explained that there have been several Ice Ages and that the ice cap in the north would vary its reach depending on warm currents in the seas and oceans.  Habitation would be found on the edges of the polar ice cap where there would be vegetation, water, fish and animals.  Exploring the decorated caves had an enormous impact on Elle, not only in the amazing drawings which she saw but the difficulty of access to some of the caves.  As a modern-day explorer, she had protective gear and torchlight, but she wants her readers to image what it must have been like for people of the Ice Age in total darkness. The unknown would have been far more intimidating for people of long ago that it is for today’s explorers.

Ice Age families would live in caves, not deep into the cave but just in the opening to provide shelter but open enough to allow for lighting fires to cook and be warm.  Their clothes and shoes would have been made from animal skins.  Evidence of tents made from Mammoth bones and animal skins have also been found.

Elle’s exploration of caves in Nerja and Pileta provided her with ideas for her book, The Telos.  The vastness of Nerja cave is breathtaking, with its huge galleries festooned with stalactites and stalagmites that have formed over millions of years. It must have appeared magical to our ancestors. Deep inside the cave it’s always dark – unless dimly lit by torches or small fires. Nerja has a very inaccessible place called the ‘sanctuary.  This is central to the story.

La Pileta cave is located in the mountains. It is a labyrinth of narrow passageways, twisting and turning as if made by a giant serpent. Beyond its internal lake is ‘the chamber of the fish’ where, on the wall, there is a painting of a huge fish. This image is not hidden away like the one in Nerja, and one can easily imagine the artist or a storyteller explaining its powerful meaning to whoever was allowed to see it.

At the beginning of the Telos, we meet a boy who feels different and misunderstood; he finds friendships tedious, preferring to pursue his own interests, and the companionship of his wolf. He resists authority and never puts others’ needs before his own. Kurisan looks at the world differently to others; he sees a pattern of life in the natural world.  He challenges the clan’s myths and supernatural beliefs, but the elders fear that the disruption his behaviour causes will lead to chaos. 

Kurisan persuades another boy to return to Ur cave after the Gathering — on the pretext of looking for bear bones.  While they explore, a heavy rain-storm causes the cave’s passageways to flood and the boys nearly drown. They argue and become separated. Luka escapes to get help, but Kurisan crawls deeper into the cave and finds footprints and a long-forgotten sanctuary with strange paintings of fish. When he attempts to leave the ‘sanctuary’ he falls and becomes trapped. 

After he is rescued, he tells the elders what he found. They had no knowledge of the sanctuary’s existence. 

When old Ma, the clan matriarch, shows young Iya her amulet, it stirs her childhood memories of a time when women were not just confined to the hearth and raising children. The carved images on the amulet tell of a different myth to their clan’s origin story. The elders realise something is wrong with their beliefs, and the many rituals that have been passed down to them. They are unsure what to do. The women are still not told the truth about the discovery in Ur cave, but whisperings and strange disruptions cause them to challenge the men’s authority.

Old Ma remembers Tarak – an animal spirit-master who is old enough to recollect the ‘time before.’ Two of the elders set out on a difficult journey to see if he is alive and can help them; Kurisan travels with them. They encounter Tarak and his clan on the edge of survival in an isolated and uninviting cave in the mountains. They learn a very different ‘Beginning’ story. Tarak shows Kurisan a painting that helps him understand the relevance of what he found in the sanctuary in Ur cave. In his vision quest, Tarak reveals even more: that Kurisan must make another journey, to the land of ‘the bear, the wolf and the eagle,’ where he will discover what has happened to the fish. Tarak tells Kurisan he will learn a great deal on his journey which will help him save many clans from the natural disasters that a changing climate will bring. But can his life-changing experiences transform him from a self-centred boy to someone committed to helping others? He accepts that this is his telos – his purpose.

Kurisan has discovered the truth — in ‘the time before,’ women were the clan elders.  Women are now determined to regain their power and make decisions about the clan’s future; end the dangerous initiation ritual that boys have to endure; and allow their young to decide for themselves many aspects of their lives.  However, Kurisan has to accept that his people still need stories that help them understand the meaning of life. Finally, he leaves his home with his wolf, Ochi. Overnight in a rock shelter, his dream reveals what is happening to the rivers and where he will find the fish.

The themes explored in the Telos have resonance with the issues that are being grappled with today. Climate change, and the resistance to changing beliefs despite the realisation that it’s necessary. The roles of men and women, and the division of labour – very relevant today, as in many parts of the world men and women’s rights are being eroded. If democracy is undervalued and not protected, what we take for granted can easily be lost. 

This was a wonderful and informative conversation about romance, magic, creating supernatural worlds and the inspiration behind two very different Romantasy stories.

If you prefer, you can also watch our videos on YouTube @booksandbeveragesUK where you can support us by liking and subscribing!

Books and Beverages UK showcases independent authors, storytellers, and creative voices through live events recorded at Harrogate Library and shared online for readers everywhere.

Romantasy. Live at…the Spiegeltent!

The Books & Beverages event for July had a truly mystical feel to it.  Not just because the topic was Romantasy, but because it took place in the Spiegel Tent as part of the Harrogate International Festival.  The tent which takes its name from the mirrors which circle the upper walls was colourful, highly decorated and light and airy.  Thank you to Harrogate Library for offering this opportunity to us.

https://youtu.be/Avy8JEUVd5s

Our two authors, Natalie Horner and Kate Kenzie, write books which combine romance with magic and imagination.  Natalie’s book, Wings, is set in Manhattan and tells the story of a girl, Charlie, from a dysfunctional family who longs to escape her abusive and controlling father but as a result of an attack she also loses her mother.  Natalie manages to combine a story which reflects many aspects of modern life with the supernatural introduction of a Guardian Angel. The story swings from Charlie’s despair with her loss of family to a longing for more than friendship with Michael, her all-seeing, protective savour and Angel.  There promises to be more books tracking this relationship in the future.

Kate’s book, A Blend of Magic, is set in the atmospheric town of Whitby, a place of ginnels and hidden buildings which lend themselves to the idea of witchery.  Kate’s white witch, Willow, has had a disturbing background and is looking for somewhere to set up on her own and use her skills to help people.  She makes different concoctions of tea to treat the ills of the local people.  Her discovery of an old cottage which the local estate agents have failed to sell is just perfect and she moves in immediately to share it with the ghosts that have already taken up residence and her familiar, Vincent.  The arrival of Nate, a city businessman, at first irritates her but then as they become attracted to one another her life seems to be changing for the better.  In the midst of this her assistant Amber thinks that Willow should marry her widowed father and uses her magical skills to try and bring the two together.  However, the course of true love never did run smoothly but with a bit of patience, perseverance and a little bit of magic it all comes out well in the end.

This was a wonderful and informative conversation about romance, magic, creating supernatural worlds and the inspiration behind two very different Romantasy stories.

If you prefer, you can also watch our videos on YouTube @booksandbeveragesUK where you can support us by liking and subscribing!

Featuring:
📚 Natalie Horner – Wings (https://www.nataliehornerauthor.com/)

📚 Kate Kenzie – A Blend of Magic (https://katekenzie.com/)

🎤 Hosted by Kate Swann (https://www.kateswannwriter.com/)

Books and Beverages UK showcases independent authors, storytellers, and creative voices through live events recorded at Harrogate Library and shared online for readers everywhere.

Does Crime Ever Pay? Live at the Library

At Harrogate Library, an afternoon of crime fiction brought together Geoff Major, Roshan Pitteea, John Saxton, and host Sue Williams for a lively discussion exploring one intriguing question: does crime ever pay?

https://youtu.be/ZAo-ow1Tc8k

The event opened with readings from each author, offering a taste of the very different worlds they create. From cybercrime and blackmail schemes to safeguarding investigations, psychological suspense, and grisly murders in Yorkshire market towns, the audience was treated to a diverse range of stories united by a common fascination with mystery, justice, and human nature. The readings quickly set the tone for a conversation that moved beyond whodunnits to explore why crime fiction continues to be one of the most popular genres in publishing.

As the discussion unfolded, the authors shared their perspectives on what draws readers to crime stories. From the satisfaction of solving puzzles and uncovering secrets to the opportunity to explore difficult real-world issues in a safe fictional setting, each writer brought a unique viewpoint shaped by their own experiences. The panel also delved into the realities of researching crime fiction, from police procedures and forensic investigations to the challenges of portraying victims, criminals, and investigators with authenticity.

The session closed with audience questions, reflections on writing and publishing, and plenty of good humour. With books signed, conversations continuing around the room, and readers eager to discover new mysteries, it was a fitting end to an engaging afternoon celebrating crime fiction in all its forms.

If you prefer, you can also watch our videos on YouTube @booksandbeveragesUK where you can support us by liking and subscribing!

Featuring:
📚 Geoff Major – The Debt (https://www.geoffmajor.info/)
📚 Roshan Pitteea – The Voodoo Room (https://roshanpitteeaauthor.com/)
📚 John Saxton – In Blood Stepped Deep (https://www.instagram.com/johnsaxtonwriter/)
🎤 Hosted by Sue Williams (https://www.suewilliamswriting.com/)

Books and Beverages UK showcases independent authors, storytellers, and creative voices through live events recorded at Harrogate Library and shared online for readers everywhere.

World Book Night in Knaresborough: Live at the Library

Our first Knaresborough Library Books and Beverages of the year brought together three very different but equally engaging writers, Susanna Lewis, Tony Bunnell, and Tom Sibson for an evening that moved easily between music, poetry, fiction, and real-life experience. The event was hosted by local crime writer Tom Sibson, who kept things lively with humour, thoughtful questions, and the occasional glimpse into his own writing process.

https://youtu.be/1Jd3XT2VoOA

Susanna writes across a wide range of genres, from poetry and memoir to fiction, but her reading from Finding Joy in the Everyday was firmly rooted in real life. Inspired by the loss of her mother, the book grew out of her daily journaling practice and focuses on gratitude, even during difficult times. Her extract, set on Bridlington beach as she scatters her mother’s ashes, was both heartfelt and quietly uplifting, showing how writing can help make sense of grief and find moments of light in the everyday. She spoke about drawing inspiration from real people and conversations, often quite literally overheard, and weaving those observations into her work.

Tony, by contrast, brought a more unusual mix of music and storytelling to the evening. A long-time singer-songwriter, she performed several songs alongside readings from her fiction, much of which explores the supernatural and parallel worlds. Her novel The Nameless Children, inspired by unmarked graves in Haworth, imagines forgotten children returning to claim their place in the world, and her performance gave the story an eerie, almost folkloric quality. Tony explained that her ideas often come from small moments—something seen, heard, or half-remembered—and develop naturally without much planning, whether she is writing songs or novels.

Alongside the readings, Tom guided the conversation into the craft of writing itself, drawing out how each author approaches storytelling. Susanna spoke about weaving messages of wellbeing and resilience into her fiction, while Tony described her instinctive, almost dreamlike way of writing without a fixed plan. Tom offered his own perspective as a crime writer, talking about structure, pacing, and keeping readers hooked.

As always, it was a lively and wide-ranging evening, with something to interest both readers and writers alike, and a reminder that stories can come from almost anywhere if you’re paying attention.

If you prefer, you can also watch our videos on YouTube @booksandbeveragesUK where you can support us by liking and subscribing!

Spring into Poetry: Live at the Library

by Kate Swann

Four poets met at Harrogate library on Friday 10th April to inform and entertain the audience about writing poetry. Peter Burgham, Steve Singleton, and Peter Donnelly were led in the discussion by Kate Swann.

https://youtu.be/wZ4kBNdDX2Q

The session began with a reading from each of the poets, followed by discussion about where they get their inspiration and ideas from, and how long it takes for these to be transformed into a poem. The consensus seemed to be that, although it varied, there was generally some weeks or months between the initial idea being formed and the finished poem, if it is ever finished, being committed to paper.

Following another reading the discussion moved on to how these poems were brought together in a book and whether or not independent publishing was preferred to going through a publisher. Small local publishers were preferred but on the whole independent publishing was the most common.

A further reading rounded off the session followed by questions from the audience and a good round of applause in appreciation. One-to-one discussion with the poets and some book sales completed the afternoon.

If you prefer, you can also watch our videos on YouTube @booksandbeveragesUK where you can support us by liking and subscribing!

https://guides.wake.gov/horror/authors Nightmares Not Included. Why I Love Horror: author panel. Featuring Stephen Graham Jones, Alma Katsu, Hailey Piper, and Paul Tremblay discussing all things horror. 19:00 EST on October 11. Free! #Horror #AuthorPanel #Bookstodon