London Literary Events - April
Discover exciting literary events to add to you calendar this April
London is bursting with incredible literary events. Here are some of the highlights which you should add to your calendar for April.
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Kell Woods, Lucy Holland and Tori Bovalino in conversation with Alwyn Hamilton
Thursday 10th April 2025
18:00 at Waterstones, London - Covent Garden
Kell Woods is an Australian historical fantasy author. She lives near the sea with her husband, two sons, and a writing cat named Juniper. Kell studied English literature, creative writing and librarianship, so she could always be surrounded by stories. She has worked in libraries, museums, communications and copywriting, all the while writing about made-up (and not so made-up) places, people and things you might remember from the fairy tales you read as a child.
Tori Bovalino (she/her) is the author of multiple YA horror novels, including My Throat an Open Grave, and the editor of the Indie-bestselling anthology, The Gathering Dark. Tori also writes adult fantasy as V.L. Bovalino, including The Second Death of Locke. She is originally from Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania and now lives in the UK with her partner and their very loud cat. She holds a PhD in English and splits her non-writing time between publishing and academia. Tori loves scary stories, obscure academic book facts, and impractical, oversized sweaters.
Lucy Holland is an author working across the fields of history, mythology and fantasy. Her current interest lies in re-imagining folktales and Celtic myth, with a view to re-situating the stories of queer people and uncovering the complex regional histories of early medieval Britain. Her novel, Sistersong, was a finalist for both the Goldsboro Books Glass Bell Award and the British Fantasy Award for Best Novel in 2022. Her second historical fantasy, Song of the Huntress, was published by Pan Macmillan in 2024. Both books are set in the West Country where she lives, and were inspired by its rich local folklore and history. Since 2016, Lucy has co-hosted the British Fantasy Award-winning podcast, ‘Breaking the Glass Slipper,’ with a focus on women in speculative fiction. She has given talks and workshops at various universities and venues, including the British Library, Science Museum London, Barcelona Festival 42 and Edinburgh’s Cymera Festival. Lucy created and currently leads Curtis Brown Creative’s flagship Writing Fantasy course, which runs twice a year. In June 2024, she was selected by UNESCO Cities of Literature as one of the ILX10: Rising Stars of UK Writing.
Alwyn Hamilton was born in Toronto and spent her early years bouncing between Europe and Canada until her parents settled in France. She moved to the UK when she was 18 and has been here ever since as an author/bookseller. Her first novel Rebel of the Sands was sold in 14 territories and won the Goodreads Choice Award for best debut. The Notorious Virtues is her latest book and the first in a duology. She lives in London. Follow @AlwynHamilton on TikTok and Instagram.
Book your tickets for Kell Woods, Lucy Holland and Tori Bovalino in conversation with Alwyn Hamilton here.
Mythica: Emily Hauser in Conversation with Jennifer Saint
Thursday 17th April 2025
18:30 at Waterstones, London - Gower Street
An evening with Emily Hauser, exploring the great myths and legends of the ancient world and the real women behind them, with Jennifer Saint.
Did you ever wonder who the real women behind the myths of the Trojan War were?
Now award-winning classicist and historian Emily Hauser takes readers on an epic journey to uncover the astonishing true story of the real women behind ancient Greece’s greatest legends – and the real heroes of those ancient epics, Homer's Iliad and Odyssey.
Because, contrary to perceptions built up over three millennia, ancient history is not all about men – and it's not only men's stories that deserve to be told . . .
In Mythica Emily Hauser tells, for the first time, the extraordinary stories of the real women behind some of the western world’s greatest legends. Following in their footsteps, digging into the history behind Homer’s epic poems, piecing together evidence from the original texts, recent astonishing archaeological finds and the latest DNA studies, she reveals who these women – queens, mothers, warriors, slaves – were, how they lived, and how history has (or has not – until now) remembered them.
A riveting new history of the Bronze Age Aegean and a journey through Homer’s epics charted entirely by women – from Helen of Troy, Briseis, Cassandra and Aphrodite to Circe, Athena, Hera, Calypso and Penelope – Mythica is a ground-breaking reassessment of the reality behind the often-mythologized women of Greece’s greatest epics, and of the ancient world itself as we learn ever more about it.
Dr Emily Hauser is an award-winning classicist and ancient historian and the author of an acclaimed trilogy of novels retelling the sroties of women of Greek myth, For the Most Beautiful, For the Winner and For the Immortal. She read Classics at Cambridge, where she received a double first with distinction and won the Chancellor's Medal for Classical Proficiency. She has a PhD in Classics from Yale, and was a Junior Fellow at the Harvard Society of Fellows. She is now a Senior Lecturer in Classics and Ancient History at the University of Exeter, and teaches and researches on Homer and women's writing, ancient and modern.
Jennifer Saint grew up reading Greek mythology and was always drawn to the untold stories hidden within the myths. She read Classical Studies at King's College, London where she is now a Visiting Research Fellow in the Classics Department. After thirteen years as a high school English teacher, she wrote Ariadne which was an instant Sunday Times bestseller. It was shortlisted for Waterstones Book of the Year in 2021 and was a Waterstones Book of the Month. Her second novel, Elektra, and third novel Atalanta, were number one Sunday Times bestsellers. Her latest mesmerising mythological retelling, Hera, will be published in May 2025.
Book your tickets for Mythica: Emily Hauser in Conversation with Jennifer Saint
Call Me Ishmaelle: Xiaolu Guo in conversation
Tuesday 22nd April 2025
18:30 at Waterstones, London - Islington
Call Me Ishmaelle is a landmark reimagining of the epic battle between man and nature in Herman Melville’s Moby Dick. Xiaolu Guo has crafted a dramatically different, feminist narrative that stands alongside the original while offering a powerful exploration of nature, gender and human purpose.
1843. Ishmaelle is born in a small village on the stormy Kent coast where she grows up swimming with dolphins. After her parents and infant sister die, her brother, Joseph, leaves to find work as a sailor. Abandoned and desperate for a life at sea, Ishmaelle disguises herself as a cabin boy and travels to New York.
As the American Civil War breaks out in 1861, Ishmaelle boards the Nimrod, a whaling ship led by the obsessive Captain Seneca, a Black free man of heroic stature who is haunted by a tragic past. Here, she finds protectors in Polynesian harpooner, Kauri, and Taoist monk, Muzi, whose readings of the I-Ching guide their quest.
Through the bloody male violence of whaling, and the unveiling of her feminine identity, Ishmaelle realises there is a mysterious bond between herself and the mythical white whale, Moby Dick.
Book your tickets for Call Me Ishmaelle: Xiaolu Guo in conversation here.
An Evening with Amal El-Mohtar in conversation with Sarah Shaffi
Tuesday 22nd April 2025
19:00 at Waterstones, London - Putney
A very special evening with Amal El-Mohtar in conversation with Sarah Shaffi to discuss her highly anticipated new novel, The River Has Roots.
From the co-author of the highly acclaimed This is How You Lose the Time War comes a beautifully realised and atmospheric slice of fantasy fiction centred on two inseparable sisters who live on the edge of Faerie.
'Oh what is stronger than a death? Two sisters singing with one breath.'
In the small town of Thistleford, on the edge of Faerie, dwells the mysterious Hawthorn family.
There, they tend and harvest the enchanted willows and honour an ancient compact to sing to them in thanks for their magic. None more devotedly than the family's latest daughters, Esther and Ysabel, who cherish each other as much as they cherish the ancient trees.
But when Esther rejects a forceful suitor in favor of a lover from the land of Faerie, not only the sisters' bond but also their lives will be at risk...
When it comes to storytelling, Amal El-Mohtar is like one of the grammarians of Thistleford, a magician capable of deftly transforming the familiar into the unfamiliar and the numinous into the humane. The River Has Roots is an utterly enchanting tale of love and longing, language and song, and the unbreakable bond of sisterhood - Fonda Lee, author of the Green Bone Saga
The River Has Roots is a beautiful, musical, and loving story, perfectly rendered in El-Mohtar's beautiful, musical, and loving prose. This novella has all the dark comforts of an old tale and all the light vigors of a new classic, and will inspire you to raise your voice in song with those you love - Emma Törzs, author of Ink Blood Sister Scribe
Half delicious murder ballad, half beguiling love story, Amal El-Mohtar transports us to Faerieland so seamlessly it seems as though she just stepped out of it - Holly Black, New York Times bestselling author of The Cruel Prince
Amal El-Mohtar is an award-winning writer of fiction, poetry, and criticism. She is co-author, with Max Gladstone, of the multiple award-winning This is How You Lose the Time War. Her articles and reviews have appeared in the New York Times, NPR Books and on Tor.com. She has been the New York Times's science fiction and fantasy columnist since February 2018.
Sarah Shaffi is a journalist, author, editor and interviewer, with more than a decade of experience working at newspapers, magazines and websites. She is also the author of the children’s books All About Eid, illustrated by Aaliya Jaleel, and South Asian Folktales, Myths & Legends.
Book your tickets for An Evening with Amal El-Mohtar in conversation with Sarah Shaffi here.
Kaliane Bradley in conversation with Daisy Johnson at Waterstones Piccadilly
Thursday 24th April 2025
18:30 at Waterstones, London - Piccadilly
Celebrate the paperback publication of her Waterstones Debut Fiction Prize shortlisted novel, The Ministry of Time. Revolving around the titular establishment set up to bring expatriates from the past to near-future London, this extraordinarily assured debut blends love story, time-travelling tale and state-of-the-nation commentary to terrifyingly clever and ferociously funny effect.
Kaliane Bradley is a British-Cambodian writer and editor based in London. Her short stories have appeared in Electric Literature, Catapult, Somesuch Stories and The Willowherb Review,among others. She was the winner of the 2022 Harper’s Bazaar Short Story Prize and the 2022 V. S. Pritchett Short Story Prize. Her debut novel, The Ministry of Time, was an instant Sunday Timesand New York Timesbestseller and a global sensation. It was chosen as one of the Observer‘s ‘Best Debut Novels of 2024’ and was aBarack Obama summer pick; it was shortlisted for the Waterstones Debut Fiction Prize, a Books Are My Bag award, the Everyman Wodehouse Prize for Comic Fiction and the Edward Stanford Travel Writing Award, and most recently, the Women's Prize for Fiction 2025.
Daisy Johnson was born in 1990. Her debut short-story collection,Fen, was published in 2016. In 2018 she became the youngest author ever to be shortlisted for the Man Booker Prize with her debut novelEverything Under. She is the winner of the Harper’s Bazaar Short Story Prize, A. M. Heath Prize and Edge Hill Short Story Prize. Her debut play,Viola’s Room, was produced in 2024 by the immersive theatre company Punchdrunk. She currently lives in Oxford by the river.
Book your tickets for Kaliane Bradley in conversation with Daisy Johnson at Waterstones Piccadilly here.
An Evening with Bella Mackie and Greg James at Conway Hall, London
Thursday 24th April 2025
19:30 at Conway Hall, 25 Red Lion Square, London, WC1R 4RL
A very special evening with Bella Mackie at Conway Hall, as we celebrate paperback publication of What A Way To Go. The bestselling author of How To Kill Your Family spins another gloriously funny and dark story about dysfunctional families in the shiny but cruel world of the extremely wealthy. Bella will be hosted by Radio 1 presenter Greg James.
Bella Mackie’s debut novel How to Kill Your Family was a #1 Sunday Times bestseller and spent 47 weeks in the top 10 in paperback. She is the author of the Sunday Times bestselling non-fiction Jog On, and has written for the Guardian, Vogue and Vice. In 2023 she judged the Women’s Prize for Fiction and her work has been shortlisted for the British Book Awards.
Book your tickets for An Evening with Bella Mackie and Greg James at Conway Hall, London here.
Seán Hewitt in Conversation with Mendez
Thursday 24th April 2025
19:00 at Foyles Tottenham Court Road
Hewitt launches his beautifully rendered debut novel, 'Open, Heaven', about young love and queer longing in a conversation at Foyles with 'Rainbow Milk' author Mendez.
Set in a countryside village, Open, Heaven traces the blooming bond between James and Luke as they contend with the desires and tensions of young adulthood. Lyrical, luminous, this is the debut novel from a virtuoso wordsmith and storyteller.
Seán Hewitt was born in 1990. He is the author of two poetry collections, Tongues of Fire and Rapture’s Road, and a memoir, All Down Darkness Wide. He collaborated with the artist Luke Edward Hall on 300,000 Kisses: Tales of Queer Love from the Ancient World. Hewitt has received the Laurel Prize and the Rooney Prize for Irish Literature and been shortlisted for the Sunday Times Young Writer of the Year Award. He lectures at Trinity College Dublin and is a Fellow of the Royal Society of Literature.
Mendez is a London-based Jamaican-British writer. Their debut, Rainbow Milk, was named one of the Observer's Top Ten Best Debuts for 2020, shortlisted for the Gordon Burn Prize, the Jhalak Prize, the Polari Prize, and for the LAMBDA Literary Award in Gay Fiction. They are also a regular contributor to the London Review of Books and has written for British Vogue, The Face, Attitude, Esquire, TLS, among others.
Book your tickets for Seán Hewitt in Conversation with Mendez here.
He Said, She Said: Charlotte Proudman in Conversation
Friday 25th April 2025
18:30 at Waterstones, London - Gower Street
an evening with author and women's rights advocate Dr Charlotte Proudman as she lifts the lid on women's struggles against the legal system.
If you and your family needed help, could you trust the law to be on your side?
Award-winning barrister Charlotte Proudman has dedicated her working life to representing women who find themselves in need of help from the family law courts. Time and again, she has watched as these women - many of whom have experienced the very worst traumas imaginable - are let down by the system that is supposed to protect them. Seeking only justice and safety, they have instead been met with cruelty and disdain, deemed unreliable witnesses compared to the men who abused them.
From family courts failing to protect victims from abusers to the misogynistic bullying Charlotte herself receives from senior members of her profession, the problem is clear: no matter their circumstances, women across the country are suffering at the hands of a legal system built by men.
But change is on the horizon. In He Said, She Said, Proudman gives voice to the women whose stories are all too often brushed aside in the name of giving abusers 'the benefit of the doubt'. Through real-life cases spanning forced marriage, domestic abuse, child abduction and female genital mutilation, Proudman highlights the troubling biases and shocking prejudice that underlie our legal system - and in a book that is at once thrilling, engaging and deeply compassionate, puts forward her own inspiring vision for long-term change.
‘Proudman is a fearless campaigner for women's rights, unafraid to tackle misogyny wherever she sees it. Her indictment of the inequalities in the legal system should be required reading by lawyers and lawmakers alike.' - Cathy Newman
Charlotte Proudman is an award-winning barrister. She won ‘Rising Star’ by the Women in Law Awards 2020, she was named ‘Hot 100’ by the Lawyer 2021, she was highly commended for ‘Junior Family Law Barrister of the Year’ and her case won ‘Case of the Year’ at the Family Law Awards 2021. She combines her legal career with academic work, as a Research Associate at the University of Cambridge, where she researches and teaches gender inequality under law in the UK. In 2022, she founded ‘Right to Equality’ a radical organisation campaigning to change the law for women and girls putting gender justice at the top of the agenda.
Book your tickets for He Said, She Said: Charlotte Proudman in Conversation here.
Like what you see? Help me keep creating bookish content by treating me to a coffee. You’ll get really good karma 😉😘