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Hometown Tales: Lancashire
Original tales by remarkable writers
Hometown Tales is a series of books pairing exciting new voices with some of the most talented and important writers at work today. Some of the tales are fiction and some are narrative non-fiction - they are all powerful, fascinating and moving, and aim to celebrate regional diversity and explore the meaning of home.
In these pages on Lancashire, you'll find two unique tales. 'After the Funeral, the Crawl' is an arresting portrait of a couple forced to confront a dark secret over the course of a pub crawl one night in Preston, by award-winning novelist Jenn Ashworth. 'JUDAS!' is a vivid, coming-of-age story that traces the political and cultural history of Manchester, from its industrial past to its eventual separation from the county, by Benjamin Webster.
Hometown Tales is a series of books pairing exciting new voices with some of the most talented and important writers at work today. Some of the tales are fiction and some are narrative non-fiction - they are all powerful, fascinating and moving, and aim to celebrate regional diversity and explore the meaning of home.
In these pages on Lancashire, you'll find two unique tales. 'After the Funeral, the Crawl' is an arresting portrait of a couple forced to confront a dark secret over the course of a pub crawl one night in Preston, by award-winning novelist Jenn Ashworth. 'JUDAS!' is a vivid, coming-of-age story that traces the political and cultural history of Manchester, from its industrial past to its eventual separation from the county, by Benjamin Webster.
192 pages, Hardcover
Published August 28, 2018
About the author
Jenn Ashworth
37 books175 followersJenn Ashworth is an English writer. She was born in 1982 in Preston, Lancashire. She has graduated from Cambridge University and the Manchester Centre for New Writing. In March 2011 she was featured as one of the BBC Culture Show's Best 12 New Novelists. She previously worked as a librarian in a men's prison.
She founded the Preston Writers Network, later renamed as the Central Lancs Writing Hub, and worked as its coordinator until it closed in January 2010. She has also taught creative writing at the Centre for New Writing at the University of Manchester, the University of Central Lancashire and the University of Lancaster.
Her first novel, A Kind of Intimacy, won a Betty Trask Award in 2010. An extract from an earlier novel, lost as a result of a computer theft in 2004, was the winner of the 2003 Quiller-Couch Prize for Creative Writing at Cambridge University.
She founded the Preston Writers Network, later renamed as the Central Lancs Writing Hub, and worked as its coordinator until it closed in January 2010. She has also taught creative writing at the Centre for New Writing at the University of Manchester, the University of Central Lancashire and the University of Lancaster.
Her first novel, A Kind of Intimacy, won a Betty Trask Award in 2010. An extract from an earlier novel, lost as a result of a computer theft in 2004, was the winner of the 2003 Quiller-Couch Prize for Creative Writing at Cambridge University.
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Displaying 1 - 4 of 4 reviews
March 3, 2019
A curate's egg. Do you know the story? It's from a Punch cartoon of 1895. A young curate (traditionally lowest in the pecking order in Church of England hierarchy, and required to defer to everyone, if he knew what was good for him) was breakfasting with the Bishop, who served him a bad egg. The Bishop noticed, and said, "I’m afraid you've got a bad Egg, Mr. Jones!" And Mr. Jones replied, "Oh no, my Lord, I assure you! Parts of it are excellent!"
Parts of this collection of two novellas, set in the Northwest of England, are excellent. The parts written by Jenn Ashworth. Her novella "After the Funeral, the Crawl," is set in the city of Preston. Characterization is subtle, and beautifully done. The plot is open enough to be intriguing, but gives a real sense that something is happening to these two 30-somethings, whose visit to their home town for the funeral of a friend, marks a moment when their relationship can never be the same again. Setting is vivid, and integral to the plot.
Full disclosure, I live 20 minutes from Preston. Reading a story set in a place you know (pretty) well can be ... a curate's egg. Too detailed and it's distracting, and feels like the author is showing off. Wrong, and it's distracting, because you lose the plot, thinking "There isn't a pedestrian crossing outside the train station ... (Actually, there is. That was just a hypothetical ...) But Ashworth uses local detail to chart the journey of of this no-longer-quite-so-young couple, as the death of their old hometown friend Simon -- was it an accident? Suicide? Cancer? Is there any answer to that question that isn't depressing? -- exposes all sorts of cracks in their relationship, and perhaps in their souls.
I want to read more by Ms Ashworth.
I'm afraid I didn't get beyond ten pages of the second story, "JUDAS!"by Benjamin Webster. I almost didn't get past the first page, but I forced myself. This is Webster's first published story, and it has an intriguing premise -- a time-slip story, in which the narrative voice time travels though the recent history of Manchester (one of the Northwest's two major cities, and the one I don't know well). This is Webster's first published work, and, for me, it's just overwritten. The old cotton mills and factories held his heart in a brick-brown cage ... It feels like "creative writing," for its own sake.
Parts of this collection of two novellas, set in the Northwest of England, are excellent. The parts written by Jenn Ashworth. Her novella "After the Funeral, the Crawl," is set in the city of Preston. Characterization is subtle, and beautifully done. The plot is open enough to be intriguing, but gives a real sense that something is happening to these two 30-somethings, whose visit to their home town for the funeral of a friend, marks a moment when their relationship can never be the same again. Setting is vivid, and integral to the plot.
Full disclosure, I live 20 minutes from Preston. Reading a story set in a place you know (pretty) well can be ... a curate's egg. Too detailed and it's distracting, and feels like the author is showing off. Wrong, and it's distracting, because you lose the plot, thinking "There isn't a pedestrian crossing outside the train station ... (Actually, there is. That was just a hypothetical ...) But Ashworth uses local detail to chart the journey of of this no-longer-quite-so-young couple, as the death of their old hometown friend Simon -- was it an accident? Suicide? Cancer? Is there any answer to that question that isn't depressing? -- exposes all sorts of cracks in their relationship, and perhaps in their souls.
I want to read more by Ms Ashworth.
I'm afraid I didn't get beyond ten pages of the second story, "JUDAS!"by Benjamin Webster. I almost didn't get past the first page, but I forced myself. This is Webster's first published story, and it has an intriguing premise -- a time-slip story, in which the narrative voice time travels though the recent history of Manchester (one of the Northwest's two major cities, and the one I don't know well). This is Webster's first published work, and, for me, it's just overwritten. The old cotton mills and factories held his heart in a brick-brown cage ... It feels like "creative writing," for its own sake.
May 8, 2019
The three stars are because I really liked the first story in the book a lot. The second story I had to abandon very quickly because the style of the writing wasn't to my taste.
November 12, 2022
A book of two halves to misquote a common sporting cliche. I enjoyed the Jen Ashworth story but just couldn’t get into Ben Webster’s contribution
November 7, 2024
2.5 stars.
I love Jenn Ashworth’s books and her story was the better of the two.
I love Jenn Ashworth’s books and her story was the better of the two.
Displaying 1 - 4 of 4 reviews