6-8 MAY
www.ullapoolbookfestival.co.uk
WELCOME
Welcome to Ullapool Book Festival 2016!
I sometimes think that clocks tick louder in writers’ homes,
reminding us of poems unwritten, stories untold, half-finished
novels. The knowledge that we should be working adds an edge
to moments when we escape our desks. You should be writing,
should be writing, should be writing . . . whispers a small voice
in our head. Writers can be difficult people to pin down, keener
to re-enter worlds of our own making than to answer telephone
calls or reply to emails. But there are certain occasions that draw
novelists and poets out of their lairs, blinking into the daylight.
Ullapool Book Festival is top of my list.
Literary festivals abound across Britain and beyond, but
Ullapool is unique in its combination of local and international.
The quality of the writers involved is clear from a glance at the
programme. Ullapool’s reputation extends to Canada; a country
the festival has developed a relationship with over more
than a decade. This year Lynn Coady and Lisa Moore join the
distinguished list of Canadian authors who have appeared at
Ullapool. Authors Fiona Rintoul and Merryn Glover are visiting
the festival for the first time. Bernard MacLaverty and Kevin
MacNeil are already favourites of the Ullapool audience. Janice
Galloway, one of the first authors to appear at the festival is
back, with her new book of short stories.
Ullapool offers a superb combination of fiction, non-fiction
and poetry. Raja Shehadeh, winner of the 2008 Orwell Prize for
Political Writing, will share a stage with Professor Avi Shlaim
and Penny Johnson.
So what draws these writers here? The incomparable
countryside, warm welcome and superb food (including an
impressive array of tray bakes) undoubtedly play a part. But
the draw is more than that – remember writers are not easily
extracted from their pages. Ullapool Book Festival offers the
opportunity for a high level, continuing conversation between
writers of different backgrounds and genres and an intelligent,
involved audience. It’s the lively discussions that pull me back
to Ullapool and which I will miss most this year when I am in
New Zealand on a Scottish Writers’ Fellowship.
I will be following the festival via social media from afar and
feeling jealous of Chris Dolan who will be doing a superb job
as honorary president in my stead. I will be writing but a small
voice in my head will be whispering you’re missing Ullapool,
missing Ullapool, missing Ullapool . . .
Silence the voice in your head. Give yourself a treat and join
in the conversations at Ullapool Book Festival 2016!
Louise Welsh
1
GUESTS
Jim Carruth
Lynn Coady
Helen Fitzgerald
Janice Galloway
Merryn Glover
James Hunter
Penny Johnson
Doug Johnstone
Martin Macintyre
Bernard MacLaverty
Norman Maclean
Norma MacLeod
Kevin MacNeil
Lisa Moore
Tom Pow
Fiona Rintoul
Raja Shehadeh
Avi Shlaim
J. David Simons
Malachy Tallack
Moniack Mhor Prize-winners
Kin and The Community Project
2
FRIDAY 6 MAY
DIHAOINE 6 CÈITEAN
10am WELCOME by CHRIS DOLAN
followed by
JANICE GALLOWAY
Janice Galloway’s latest book, Jellyfish, is a return to short stories after
some years. Published by Freight and shortlisted for the Saltire Fiction
Award 2015, the collection is inspired by notional place of sex and the
actual place of raising children. There is no such thing as an ordinary life.
Chaired by Faith Liddell Sponsored by Ullapool Bookshop
£8
11.30am MALACHY TALLACK
Malachy Tallack’s travelogue Sixty Degrees North was a Book of the
Week on Radio 4 and was shortlisted for the Saltire First Book Award.
Chaired by Ruth Wishart
Sponsored by Ullapool Harbour Trust
£8
2pm J. DAVID SIMONS
J. David Simons’ first two novels – The Credit Draper (2008) and
The Liberation of Celia Kahn (2011) - are based in Glasgow’s Jewish
community in the 1920s, while the third part of his Glasgow to Galilee
trilogy – The Land Agent (2014) – is set in Palestine during the same
period. He has also written about contemporary and 1950s Japan in
his best-selling novel An Exquisite Sense of What is Beautiful (2013).
Chaired by Chris Dolan
£8
3.30pm JIM CARRUTH
Jim Carruth’s book Killochries - a verse novella, tracking the
relationship of two very different men working a remote sheep
farm over the course of twelve months, came out in 2015 and was
shortlisted for the Saltire Scottish Poetry book of the year and the
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Fenton Aldeburgh first collection. In 2014 Jim was appointed Poet
Laureate of Glasgow. “Killochries is storytelling and poetry cut to
the bone. Austere territory of both the soul and landscape.” Bernard
MacLaverty
Chaired by Stuart Kelly
An Open University in Scotland event
£8
6.30pm MERRYN GLOVER AND FIONA RINTOUL
Two debut novelists. Merryn Glover’s A House Called Askival is
set in northern India and the story stretches from Partition to the
modern day. Fiona Rintoul’s The Leipzig Affair was published to
coincide with the 25th anniversary of the fall of the Berlin Wall. It
was serialised on BBC Radio 4’s Book at Bedtime and shortlisted for
the 2015 Saltire first book of the year award.
Chaired by David Robinson
£8
8pm
HELEN FITZGERALD AND
DOUG JOHNSTONE
Two leading thriller writers whose books are often labelled ‘domestic noir’.
Helen Fitzgerald’s latest novel Viral was published to critical acclaim in
February. “a nuanced and perceptive look at social media and misogyny.”
The Guardian. Doug Johnstone’s seventh novel is The Jump – the jump
being a teenaged boy’s suicide from the Forth Road Bridge. “Not always
easy to read, and I’m guessing not easy to write either, The Jump again
proves that the dramas that matter most are more often found in family
life and few writers understand that better.” Scots Whay Hae
Chaired by Faith Liddell
£8
9.30pm KIN AND THE COMMUNITY
Kin and the Community was an education project supported by
the Highland Youth Arts Hub and Fèis Rois in partnership with
Duncan Chisholm, one of Scotland’s most outstanding fiddle
players and composers. Inspired by Duncan’s ground breaking
multimedia production, Kin, 6 young people from the Highlands
had the opportunity to explore their cultural heritage whilst
developing skills in research and ethnology, music, film. The project
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combined archive footage with contemporary traditional music
composed by them to celebrate the life of Alexander ‘Sandy’
Murdie, a drover from Lochbroom who had been recorded in the
1950s by the School of Scottish Studies. We are joined tonight by
Duncan Chisholm, Joseph Peach from Achiltibuie who was one
of the 6 young musicians and Catriona Martin, Sandy Murdie’s
granddaughter. A performance of Kin and the Community was
filmed at Blas Festival; we are delighted to show this film (that
includes the archive footage) as part of this session.
On the way in enjoy a taste of finest Ross-shire malt whisky from
Glen Ord Distillery and a taste of local food. Smoked salmon from
Wester Ross Fisheries, smoked cheese from Ullapool Smokehouse,
oatcakes from Ullapool Bakery.
£8
SATURDAY 7 MAY
DISATHAIRNE 7 CÈITEAN
9.15am – 9.45am committee room
MONIACK MHOR PRIZE-WINNERS
Our friends at Moniack Mhor, Scotland’s creative writing centre,
have established several writing awards. Reading today are some of
their prize winners. Vicky MacKenzie - Winner of the Bridge Award;
Angela Hughes - Winner of the Work in Progress Award: Emily Illett
- Winner of the Writing for Children Award
Free
10am
JAMES HUNTER
James Hunter, Emeritus Professor of History at UHI discusses his
latest book Set Adrift Upon the World: The Sutherland Clearances
and looks at one of he most controversial periods in Highland
history. He examines the destruction caused by the forced evictions
of thousands in Sutherland during the nineteenth Century. The book
also reconstructs their remarkable journeys to North American and
their struggle for survival in the face of tragedy and disaster.
Chaired by Mark Wringe
£8
*Free coffee and morning roll will be served from 9am until
9.30am in the marquee beside the hall.
5
credit Robert Twigger
Jim
Carruth
Helen
FitzGerald
Janice
Gallowa
Martin
MacIntyre
Kevin
MacNeil
Bernard
MacLav
Fiona
Rintoul
Raja
Shehadeh
credit Chris Scott
Lynn
Coady
Doug
Johnstone
credit Mariana Cook
credit Margaret Salmon
Tom
Pow
Avi
Shlaim
Merryn
Glover
James
Hunter
Penny
Johnson
d
verty
Norman
Maclean
Norma
MacLeod
Lisa
Moore
J. David
Simons
Malachy
Tallack
Duncan
Chisholm
credit Nathalie Marsh
ay
11.30am
TOM POW
Primarily an award-winning poet, he has also written young
adult novels, picture books, radio plays and travel books. He has
held various writing posts, including that of Scottish/Canadian
Writing Fellow. His latest poetry collection At The Well of Love,
poems written while a Robert Louis Stevenson Fellow last year,
appeared in February 2016
Chaired by Stuart Kelly
£8
12.45pm – 1.15pm
NORMAN MACLEAN
Norman Maclean who is best known as a stand-up comedian,
singer and piper is also an accomplished writer in both English
and Gaelic. In Eavesdropping on Myself he chronicles his
boyhood in Glasgow and explores the push-pull of two cultures:
working-class Glaswegian and first-generation Hebridean.
Chaired by Mark Wringe Free but ticketed
2.30pm
KEVIN MACNEIL
Kevin MacNeil, who was born and raised in the Outer Hebrides,
has won numerous literary awards, performed internationally,
and taught creative writing at universities such as Edinburgh,
Kingston and Uppsala. His new novel The Brilliant & Forever
features a talking alpaca as one of its main characters. It has
been described as “Laugh-out-loud funny. It’s so refreshing to
read a book that isn’t like anything else.”
Chaired by David Robinson £8
4pm
MARTIN MACINTYRE AND NORMA
MACLEOD
An acclaimed author, bàrd and storyteller, Màrtainn Mac an t-Saoir /
Martin Macintyre has worked across these genres for many years now.
Cala Bendita’s a Bheannachdan (Cala Bendita and its Blessings), his latest
collection, was shortlisted for The Saltire Literary Book of The Year in
2014. Norma MacLeod is from the Isle of Lewis. She has written four Gaelic
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novels, the first three being a trilogy. Her latest novel An Dosan won the
Donald Meek award in 2014 and was shortlisted for a Saltire award in 2015.
This session will be in Gaelic. Non-Gaelic speakers will not miss
out as there will be simultaneous translation into English through
individual headsets.
Translation by Morag Stiùbhart (Morag Stewart)
Chaired by Mark Wringe A Bòrd na Gàidhlig event
£8
7pm
LISA MOORE
Lisa Moore is from Newfoundland. Her novels Alligator and Caught,
and her short story collection Open were nominated for the Scotiabank
Giller Prize. Her novel February was long-listed for the Man Booker
Prize and won CBC Canada Reads in 2013. She is also the winner of the
Commonwealth Writers’ Prize for the Canada/Caribbean region.
Chaired by David Robinson
£8
Sponsored by Canadian studies at the University of Strathclyde
8.30pm
PENNY JOHNSON, RAJA SHEHADEH AND
AVI SHLAIM
Penny Johnson, editor and writer, and her husband Raja Shehadeh, writer
and lawyer, who live in Ramallah, co-edited Shifting Sands, The Unravelling
of the Old Order in the Middle East. Professor Avi Shlaim, an Emeritus
Fellow of St Antony’s College and Emeritus Professor of International
Relations at the University of Oxford, is one of the contributors to this
book. The collection arose out of discussions on the past, present and
future of the Middle East at the 2014 Edinburgh International Book
Festival. “It’s a book that’s full of valuable insights and perspectives on a
continuously developing topic.” Rosemary Goring, The Herald.
Chaired by Ruth Wishart
Sponsored by The Ceilidh Place
£8
10.30pm – 11.30pm
READ IN THE PARLOUR
The Ceilidh Place Parlour
Bring some of your own writing (poems or prose) for the Read
in the Parlour open mic session (without the mic). Names will be
pulled from the hat. 5 minutes is your limit.
9
SUNDAY 8 MAY
DIDÒMHNAICH 8 CÈITEAN
10am
LYNN COADY
Lynn Coady is a Canadian novelist, journalist and TV writer. Her
short story collection Hellgoing won the 2013 Scotiabank Giller
Prize, for which her novel The Antagonist was also nominated
in 2011. She has published six books of fiction and her work has
appeared in the US, UK, Germany, Holland and France.
Chaired by Stuart Kelly
£8
Sponsored by Canadian studies at the University of Strathclyde
11.30am
BERNARD MACLAVERTY
Bernard MacLaverty was born in Belfast and lived there until 1975
when he moved to Scotland. He now lives in Glasgow and is a
member of Aosdana. He has published five collections of short
stories and four novels and written versions of his fiction for other
media - radio plays, television plays, screenplays. In recent years he
has written a number of libretti for short operas.
Chaired by Faith Liddell
10
£8
TICKETING INFORMATION
TICKETS GO ON SALE AT 9AM ON FRIDAY 25 MARCH
WEEKEND TICKET
TIOGAID DEIREADH-SHEACHDAIN
A small number of weekend passes are available for £95.
These give admission to all events.
Available only until 5 April – or earlier if sold out.
TICKETS ON SALE
TIOGAIDEAN GAN REIC A-NIS
From Friday 25 March 2016
ONLINE
www.ullapoolbookfestival.co.uk
OR
IN PERSON ONLY AT:
Ullapool Bookshop, Quay Street and The Ceilidh Place Bookshop,
West Argyle Street.
OR
BY POST FROM:
Ullapool Book Festival, PO Box 27, Ullapool IV26 2WY (cheques
made payable to Ullapool Book Festival. Please enclose s.a.e.)
IMPORTANT – PLEASE CHECK THE START TIME ON
YOUR TICKET
LATECOMERS
Latecomers cause disruption to authors and audience members
and will not be admitted after the start of the session. Please make
sure you arrive in time to be seated by the start time on your ticket.
No refunds will be given to latecomers.
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CONTACT US
CUIRIBH FIOS THUGAINN
Ullapool Book Festival, 33 Seaforth Road, Ullapool IV26 2UY
[email protected]
tel: 07754 835935
INFORMATION FIOSRACHADH
* There will be no books for sale at the festival. However our sponsoring
bookshops will stock the writers’ books. Buy them there and bring them
along for signing. Support independent bookshops.
* All sessions last approximately 1 hour unless indicated otherwise.
* And you know when you are at a spoken word event and you can’t stop
coughing? Well, thanks to the makers of Jakemans Marvellous Menthol
Confections, there will be bowls of their soothing sweets around the hall.
So help yourself to stop your cough.
ACCOMMODATION ÀITEAN-FUIRICH
For places to stay in Ullapool and for any other information on the area,
visit the website of Welcome Ullapool www.ullapool.com
FOOD BIADH
Ullapool Fairtrade Group will be in the marquee alongside the Village Hall.
During the daytime on Friday and Saturday they will be selling Fairtrade tea,
coffee and Fairtrade baking. Between the two sessions on Sunday morning
Ullapool Book Festival will be serving coffee, tea and their own homemade
cakes to raise funds for the festival.
ACCESS COTHROM
Ullapool Village Hall has disabled access and toilets. It also has a hearing loop
system. If anyone requires assistance please speak to one of the committee/
stewards. If you think you will need any other help contact us beforehand.
THANKS TAPADH LEIBH
Ullapool Book Festival is grateful to the following for their support –
FUNDERS LUCHD-MAOINEACHAIDH
Creative Scotland, The Highland Council, Bòrd na Gàidhlig
SPONSORS URRASAIREAN
Ullapool Harbour Trust, The Open University in Scotland, The Ceilidh Place,
Ullapool Bookshop, Achins Bookshop, The Ullapool News, The Arch Inn,
Canadian studies at the University of Strathclyde
SPONSORSHIP IN KIND URRASACHD NEO-MHAOINEIL
Wester Ross Fisheries Ltd, Glen Ord Distillery, Ullapool Smokehouse, Ullapool
Bakery, CNAG, Jakemans (Confectioners) Ltd
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Ullapool – The Book Festival that Makes a Difference
The opposite of a book festival
Love is an us, Love shows us
is not a book-burning,
life is an us. Listen, may this always
it is indifference. Let them hear
be the festival that loves
us sing the difference. Love’s words
to make a difference. This festival
are louder, brighter than flames. Listen
reminds us we belong with Love’s words
I have watched Love’s sweat-earned words
which, like village halls and ceilidh
plunge readers’ hands into
places, are physical and inwardly
soft sweatpalmed lyrical hugs,
permanent parts of an us. Let us give
become part of an always us.
thanks to that which brought us to an us,
I have seen words introduce someone
let us never forget that the opposite
to Love. Love is a work of art.
of a book festival is not a book-burning,
Novel. Novella. Epic. Poem. Story.
it is indifference. Let us make a difference.
Love is an inveterate writer of letters,
emails and txts. I love Love, whose hair
is cut like a haiku, whose mind is epic
as a novel, whose hands are bright and
restless as a bookmark. I love Love.
Kevin MacNeil