Dead Ink Books: Adam S. Leslie and Lucy McKnight Hardy in conversation

Dead Ink Books

Dead Ink began life in 2011 as one of the first digital-only independent presses. Started by Wes Brown in Leeds with a grant from Arts Council England, Dead Ink established itself as an innovative new publisher with an eye for creative projects and spotting emerging new talent. It was at this time that Nathan Connolly came on board to help with publicity and then as an Editor when Dead Ink released its first print titles in 2014 and experimented with crowdfunding.

In 2023 it was announced that Dead Ink would be joining Arts Council England’s National Portfolio. Though we’ve grown over the last decade, our DIY roots persist and feed our ambitions. We’re based in Liverpool these days and operate out of our office on Hope Street. Every year brings us new challenges, but it also brings us new rewards as we bit by bit get bigger and bigger and better and better.

Lost in the Garden

Heather, Rachel and Antonia are going to Almanby. Heather needs to find her boyfriend who, like so many, went and never came back. Rachel has a mysterious package to deliver, and her life depends on it. And Antonia - poor, lovestruck Antonia just wants the chance to spend the day with Heather. So off they set through the idyllic yet perilous English countryside, in which nature thrives in abundance and summer lasts forever. And as they travel through ever-shifting geography and encounter strange voices in the fizz of shortwave radio, the harder it becomes to tell friend from foe. Creepy, dreamlike, unsettling and unforgettable - you are about to join the privileged few who come to understand exactly why we don't go to Almanby.

Water Shall Refuse Them

The heatwave of 1976. Following the accidental drowning of her sister, sixteen-year-old Nif and her family move to a small village on the Welsh borders to escape their grief. But rural seclusion doesn’t bring any relief. As her family unravels, Nif begins to put together her own form of witchcraft – collecting talismans from the sun-starved land. That is, until she meets Mally, a teen boy who takes a keen interest in her, and has his own secret rites to divulge.

Reminiscent of the suspense of Shirley Jackson and soaked in the folk horror of the British landscape, Water Shall Refuse Them is an atmospheric coming-of-age novel and a thrilling debut.

Lucie McKnight Hardy grew up in rural West Wales, the daughter of London immigrants. She grew up speaking Welsh and her education was in Welsh. She studied English at the University of Liverpool, studied creative writing with the OU, and has just completed the MA in Creative Writing at Manchester Metropolitan University.

This event is free to attend and will take place on the 3rd floor in the Benjamin Henry Room.

Host or Publisher Blackwell's, Broad Street Oxford