Waiting for Godden

Wednesday, 12 January 2022

Mrs Death Misses Death paperback arrives January 20 2022

HAPPY NEW YEAR!!

I start 2022 with the launch of the beautiful blue paperback edition of Mrs Death Misses Death - This version is a bit easier on the pocket than the hardback, thanks to all waiting for this edition. Thank you to everyone that has pre-ordered and is waiting so patiently with me for blue books to arrive next week. We have some delicious events and festivals planned and gorgeous radio and podcasts and more all coming up. So excited to see your faces again!!

This intoxicating, life-affirming, fire-starter of a novel publishes in paperback on 20 January 2022 with a brand new look and a stunning lapis-blue design and soft-touch cover. Shortlisted for the Gordon Burn Book Prize, nominated for the People’s Book Prize and also included in the Bad Form Books of the Year 2021 and Guardian Best Fiction of 2021

Belfast Telegraph, January 2022

LOVEREADING EXPERT REVIEW

OF MRS DEATH MISSES DEATH

A must-read if ever there was one! The story of Wolf and Mrs Death offers the most unique, powerful, and eye-opening view of the circle of life and death.

Excuse me while I rave about this book, it’s so different, so powerful, so fabulous that I’m experiencing reading elation after finishing it. When Wolf Willeford meets Mrs Death, he becomes her scribe and travels with her to view humanity as it circulates from life to death. A renowned performance poet, this is Salena Godden’s debut novel. In 2018 a BBC Radio 4 documentary was broadcast as it followed the novel as it was written over twelve months. Containing poetry, chants, commentary, recollections, moments in time, and all within the most wonderful story, this is a recognisable yet totally unique take on death. Her words entered my thoughts and made me see, search, examine, they entered my heart and made me feel. Small intimate and intricate moments sit alongside huge stories that are all linked by death. My feelings span from humour to heartbreak, from darkness to light, and all the while the story flows with strength and beauty. There may well be some emotionally difficult paths to explore along the way, and while uncomfortable reading in places this is as much about life, love, and hope as it is death. This is a reading experience I won’t forget and I just had to choose it as one of my Liz Picks of the Month and of course a LoveReading Star Book. Celebrating life and opening up questions on how we view death, Mrs Death Misses Death is a wake-up call of a book that I will be recommending far and wide. LIZ ROBINSON

January's paperback parties

16 Jan – Cunning Folk Book Club

Liberia, Brick Lane

https://www.cunning-folk.com

20 Jan – Paperback launch day

See you in the pub!

25 Jan - FANE Online

Join me and @FaneProductions on January 25 to celebrate

the paperback release of #MrsDeathMissesDeath

Excited to announce I’ll be in conversation

with supreme poet & author Nikita Gill @nktgill

For the unique 'stream and book' package

please sign up here: fane.co.uk/salena-godden

27 Jan – Printed Matter Bookshop,

St Mary's in the Castle, Hastings

I’m heading home to Hastings

Reading alongside brilliant writer Gareth Rees

I cannot wait to see the sea and see my friends and family down there...

 @PMBookshop @hackneymarshman

#Hastings #supportbookshops

C O M I N G U P

some dates for your 2022 diary

live, online & hybrid events

festivals & parties

bookshops & libraries

podcasts & radio

16 Jan – Cunning Folk Book Club, Liberia, Brick Lane

20 Jan – Paperback launch day

25 Jan - FANE online

27 Jan – Printed Matter Bookshop, St Mary's, Hastings

31 Jan – How To Academy with Yrsa Daley Ward

25-27 March – Laugharne Festival, Wales

4 March - Tubthumping, Leeds

6 March - Nutopia, Coventry Cathedral

23 March - Hastings Library

30 March - Wanstead Library

31 March –Boozy Book Club

29 April – Byline Festival, London

14 June – Crossing The Tees Festival

8-10 July - Also Festival

13 Aug – Big Little Festival

NEW episodes, coming soon, watch this page

Dead Darlings Podcast

Tom Brosseau, The Great American Folk Show

Across the Pond Podcast

Critics Choice Podcast

Little Atoms Podcast

BBC R4 Podcast Radio Hour

Feminist Book Club Paris

You're Gonna Die Podcast

Queer Death Stories

Roaring 20's Radio Show

Mrs Death Misses Death available now

Hardback | Paperback | Ebook

Audiobook – read by the author

Find MDMD in indie bookshops via www.bookshop.org

Monday, 6 December 2021

Mrs Death Misses Death: Highlights of 2021 and first shows of 2022 announced!

MRS DEATH MISSES DEATH

Salena Godden

This intoxicating, life-affirming, fire-starter of a novel publishes in paperback on 20 January 2022 with a brand new look and a beautiful deep lapis-blue design and soft-touch cover. Shortlisted for the Gordon Burn Book Prize, nominated for the People’s Book Prize and also included in the Bad Form Books of the Year 2021 and Guardian Best Fiction of 2021

Archive | A selection of MDMD 2021 highlights:

I want to end this year by sharing a selection of 2021 highlights, I share these as an archive of happy memories of the year we launched my debut novel. I share this with huge love and thanks to you all. Not every show or reading I did this year was recorded and saved so I cannot share and archive all highlights: For example I would love to share the amazing conversation I had with Evie Wyld at Brighton Festival, my first post-lockdown and first time away from home with that lovely introduction from my friend Lemn Sissay. I would also like to have recorded the show I did at Charleston - it was my first full Mrs Death solo show - and I am remembering now the beautiful night we all had at that magical house in midsummer this year. And then there was the good times down town at The Social with Heidi James and Octavia Bright and Baxter Dury. And the amazing Wigtown Book Festival and Push The Boat Out Poetry festivals in Scotland too. I was up in Scotland with Mrs Death three times in 2021! I really do love Scotland. And my time in Ireland too. So here's to more of this behaviour and these travels in 2022. Thank you!

I have so much to be grateful for. It has been a challenging time inside and out. I'm so proud of my friends and family - I see you healing and growing, making waves, making art and music and publishing books in the roaring 2020s, all during a global pandemic and in lockdown, whilst bombarded by uncertainties and navigating health issues and death and acknowledging a global mourning and eco grief. Shout out to every single capable soul and every bold heart ... what a time to be alive!

Thank you if you were at any of my shows in person or if you supported us online or tuned in on the radio. I have appreciated all your conversations and thank you for the good memories and all the connections I made this year, with book bloggers and book lovers, death workers and the death positive movement. Thank you for acknowledging this time and space, this universal loss and grief and hurt. Thank you for your powerful empathy. Thank you for your big and open hearts. Thank you for being kind. Thank you for every letter and message of support and every instagram post and tweet, for every review and blog, every booking and every gig - from our funny lockdown zoom gigs in our pyjamas at home to the first tentative live events and readings at book and poetry festivals. Thanks for inviting me on your podcasts and radio shows too.

I will never forget this year. 2021 was a tough year. It was a tough year to publish a debut novel. It was a tough year to publish a book about life and death. However looking back over the last 12 months and as I sit here writing this blog post and picking some highlights to make this archive and as I look back at these magic moments we shared, you all make my heart glad, in a year of fear and uncertainty, mourning and horror, so many of you remained so calm and clear, so beautiful and creative, colourful, inspiring, courageous and resilient. I see you and thank you. Onwards and upwards comrades. Have a beautiful restful festive season, merry Christmas times and happy holidays. Stay safe! Thank you my lovelies xxsg

'Red Tower'

Mrs Death Misses Death

performed at Gordon Burn Prize ceremony

as part of Durham Book Festival

'I know a lot of dead people now'

Mrs Death Misses Death

performed on Life & Rhymes, Sky Arts

Bringing Death to Life:

in conversation with Paula Akpan

Edinburgh International Book Festival

Author profile & interview with John Siddique

- with 3 pieces of new writing