Join us for the Manchester launch of MILK TEETH - the new novel from Jessica Andrews, winner of our 2020 Portico Prize.
We're thrilled to be working with Blackwells Manchester to host the Manchester launch of MILK TEETH - the eagerly anticipated second novel from Jessica Andrews, author of the best-selling SALTWATER. Jessica will be in conversation with host Lara Williams (The Odyssey, Supper Club)
About the book:
A girl grows up in the north-east of England amid scarcity, precarity and a toxic culture of bodily shame, certain that she must make herself ever smaller to be loved.
Years later, living in tiny rented rooms and working in noisy bars across London and Paris, she fights to create her own life. She meets someone who cracks her open and offers her a new way to experience the world. But when he invites her to join him in Barcelona, the promise of pleasure and care makes her uneasy. In the shimmering heat of the Mediterranean, she faces the possibility of a different existence, and must choose what to hold on to from her past.
How do we learn to take up space? Why might we deny ourselves good things? Milk Teeth is a story of desire and the body, shame and joy. In vivid and lyrical prose, and with deep compassion, Jessica Andrews examines what it means to allow ourselves to live.
About the author:
Jessica Andrews grew up in Sunderland. She writes for the Guardian, the Independent, BBC Radio 4, Stylist and ELLE magazine, among others. Her debut novel, Saltwater won the Portico Prize in 2020. She co-runs The Grapevine, a magazine which aims to give a platform to under-represented writers and co-presents literary podcast Tender Buttons. She lives in Bristol and teaches Creative Writing at Roehampton University.
Lara Williams is the author of Treats and Supper Club. Treats was shortlisted for the Republic of Consciousness Prize, the Edinburgh First Book Award and the Saboteur Awards and longlisted for the Edge Hill Short Story Prize, and Supper Club won the Guardian 'Not the Booker' Prize, was named as a Book of the Year 2019 by TIME and Vogue, and has been translated into six languages. Lara Williams lives in Manchester and is a contributor to the Guardian, Independent, Times Literary Supplement, Vice, Dazed and others. In 2021 she was longlisted for the BBC National Short Story Award. Her latest novel The Odyssey was published in April.
Doors 6.00, Event starts 7.00. Book tickets here.
This event is being held at The Bank which is situated below the Portico Library and will only be open to ticket holders. Drinks will be available to purchase at the bar before and after the talk and your ticket also allows you access to the library until close at 6.30*.
Tickets are £3.00 or free when pre-ordering a copy of the book. MILK TEETH will also be available to purchase on the night and Jessica will be signing copies after the talk. If you would like a signed copy but cannot make the event, please contact us on 0161 274 3331 or manchester@blackwell.co.uk and we can arrange this for you.