Just a reminder that AJ Ashworth’s new collection of speculative short stories will be published on August 19th 2025 – but you can pre-order here! Maybe the Birds | Goldsmiths Press
The Edge Hill Fiction Writer’s Network will also be holding a launch event for AJ Ashworth on Tuesday October 21st – you can book tickets for that event here: Book Launch Event: A. J. Ashworth – Maybe the Birds – Edge Hill University
Maybe The Birds is a collection of 14 speculative and realist short stories that explore female lives and experiences and are set in either the postapocalyptic future, the paleolithic past or the dark north of the present. All are interested in what it means to be alive in very difficult times. In this event, there will be readings from members of the Fiction Writer’s Network followed by Andrea, who will read from her new collection and also take part in a Q&A with Dr Kim Wiltshire, and you will have the opportunity to get your copy signed!
Ashworth’s work has won a number of prizes and been featured in Best British Short Stories. The Times Literary Supplement said of her first book, Somewhere Else, or Even Here (shortlisted for the Edge Hill Prize), that her work ‘displays impressive versatility’ and that her stories ‘do not progress so much as accrue, collecting incidental detail that enriches the scenarios without pointing towards their resolution’. This event will be an opportunity to hear the author read and speak about her writing, as well as answer your questions on the writing process and getting published.
