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I’m feeling something deeper too. A fizz in my stomach, a slight edge of fear. It suddenly doesn’t feel that long since my Dad died. I wonder —in the off way people who do not believe in the afterlife might wonder—if my Dad will hear me reading about him. If he’d be happy to fill the room with me, if our voice will carry.

I hope so. Because at the very least, I want him to be proud. The same way he was proud to see my first poem published in a school anthology. I remember him saying that he didn’t understand it but that it looked nice on the page, neat and important.

And, for those of us still alive, I hope this collection will help to start a conversation too. One about loss or addiction or fathers. I hope the poems will offer a small, collective invitation to peer into the dark things in life and talk about them.

For those interested, please do come along to one of my national launches, readings or events and say ‘hello’. Let’s get this conversation going.

'Moonlight washes across the entire, exposed landscape of this poetry collection. The ‘white eye’ orbits from the first page to the last, with a quiet, ancient glint amid the frail unfolding of melancholy lives. Swansea-born writer Natalie Ann Holborow levels the lunar gaze onto a sudden first kiss, violence at a party, memories of past love, wretchedly drunken taxi rides, and a bundle of other tender, inflamed moments. Each is conjured in imagery that aches.'

'And Suddenly You Find Yourself is somehow both meticulous and raw, as if Holborow has mulled infinitely on how best to describe the act of stripping us to our simplest selves.

[...]

'Shoot for the moon? Holborow has landed, roamed its face, dipped into the craters, and gathered an armful of stars while up there.'

Sophie Baggott reviews Natalie Ann Holborow's debut poetry collection And Suddenly You Find Yourself for Wales Arts Review.

  November 19th, 2016 saw Parthian Books launch Ugly, Lovely: Dylan Thomas’s Swansea and Carmarthenshire of the 1950s in picture, compiled by Ethel Ross, Edited by Hilly Janes. A brilliant compilation depicting Thomas’s favourite hangouts across Swansea and Carmarthenshire, Ross accompanies the pictures with quotes from Thomas’s poetry and her own comments. The book launch, held at the Dylan Thomas Centre, included a talk from Hilly Janes, our very own Richard Lewis Davies and Professor Dr John Goodby, Dylan Thomas expert. The trio discussed how the book came to be, where Hilly revealed that she discovered the album in her...

You are cordially invited to attend a poetry reading and short discussion on Thursday 1 December at the Latvian Embassy, 45 Nottingham Place, London, W1U 5LY, United Kingdom at 6:30pm.

In September 2016, Riga hosted a unique international project (Poetry Translation Workshop) in which eight poets from Latvia and Great Britain were translating each other's works. It proved to be very successful and now International Writers and Translators House of Latvia, along with the Latvian Embassy in the United Kingdom, are hosting a poetry reading of the work of Krisjanis Zelgis and Eduards Aivars.

Next year both poets will have poetry collections in English published by Parthian Books.

Join us for Collective – an evening celebrating poets who have recently published (or are due to publish) a new collection.  7.30pm, Thurs 1 December, The Little Man Coffee Co, Ivor House, Bridge Street, Cardiff CF10 2EE  Entertaining, amusing, thought-provoking, and surreal, this event will feature eight fantastic poets, representing six presses, including: MAB JONES (Indigo Dreams Publishing)MARK BLAYNEY (Parthian)TRACEY RHYS (Green Bottle Press)RHYS MILSOM (Accent Press) SUSIE WILD (Parthian)REBECCA PARFITT (Listen Softly London)NATALIE ANN HOLBOROW (Parthian)EMILY BLEWITT (Seren)Don't miss out on this incredible collection of poets! The event is FREE but there will be alcohol, coffee, tea, cake and books available to buy.