This week sees the publication of Mostly Welsh , a collection of poems by Chris Armstrong. The collection blends the historic with mythological and personal themes and deals with love, loss and his relationship with Wales and Ceredigion. 

The process of writing the collection began over 15 years ago: 

“After losing my wife, nearly all of the poems I wrote were focussed on her and losing her – things I wished I had expressed while she was still alive, or at least said better, said more or more often. Poetry – both reading and writing – developed into some sort of catharsis or release for me. It wasn’t present at the time she died, as coping with the remains of family life and work took all my energy and time. Now it’s an ever-present pleasure, and I don’t think a single day goes past without some thought of my wife,” said Chris Armstrong. 

Chris Armstrong has lived in Wales for most of his life, and moved to the Tregaron area, mid Wales in 1972. The landscape surrounding him has always inspired him, as he feels a strong link to the countryside around him. 

“Wales and the local countryside has been a great influence, as is the sea. The sea is probably the next most important theme [after love and loss] as I have always lived near or on it. It often finds its way into the poems of love as some sort of allegory or symbolisation,” said the author. 

The collection has received praise from Ffrangcon Lewis:

“At their best, these poems have a directness, honesty and crispness of diction which enables the poet to communicate the most raw of experiences with a degree of sureness, restraint and power.” 

Mostly Welsh is a collection of poetic forms rooted in the Anglo-Welsh tradition that explores the poet’s life and mind after a loss, and follows his life journey. 

“In essence, this collection is a man’s life experience finding expression through verse.” 

Chris Armstrong was born in Sussex and has lived in Wales since he was 10 years old. He spent more than a decade in the merchant navy before working on a Ceredigion farm and then taking a degree which led to ten years working as a research officer before he set up his own consultancy, research and training company in the information and libraries sector.  

Mostly Welsh by Chris Armstrong (£6.99, Y Lolfa) is available now.

The crisis of plastic in our oceans has been exposed on television in recent months. Now a Welsh author is introducing the importance of marine life and its conservation to children in a new wonderfully illustrated book. 

The book is called The Grimpots , about a family of fun-loving umbrella octopuses and has a strong ecological message is published by Y Lolfa. Author Gilly John is fascinated by the natural world and its lesser-known inhabitants, and takes a keen interest in conservation. 

“Encouraging children to be curious about the world around them can only be positive for them and the planet. Primarily I want my book to entertain children but raising awareness about the diversity in our oceans is important to me,” says Gilly John, adding: 

“Marine conservation has had a boost in recent years, with the extent to which plastic is impacting our oceans being well documented as in David Attenborough’s Blue Planet II series. Children need to learn that the sea is full of living creatures and that we all have a responsibility to keep our seas clean.” 

Twenty rhymed verses tell the story of Gus’ adventures in Barnacle Bay where he escapes from a shady shark intent on making him a snack and then helps a big blue whale named Dave. Umbrella octopuses are unusual in that they don’t have ink sacs like other octopuses and so have to use other defensive methods to escape predators. 

The book is full of Janet Samuel’s beautiful illustrations which bring to life the underwater world images of cuttlefish, krill, sea snails and eels to name but a few of the creatures illustrated. 

Gilly John was born in Gwent but now lives in Caerphilly. She trained as a children’s nurse before turning to write children’s poetry. 

Janet Samuel enjoys working with colour and texture and bringing characters to life and has illustrated a number of children’s books. 

The Grimpots by Gilly John (£4.99, Y Lolfa) is available now.  

Gilly John will be attending the Spread the Word Festival(organised by The Stephens and George Charitable Trust) in Merthyr Tydfil on 11 April with a storytelling and book signing.

Packed with lively double-page illustrations, a new book starring a small dragon has been hailed as the Welsh  Where’s Wally?  However,  Find the Dragon!  has an obvious Welsh slant, with every double page showing an iconic Welsh location, including Mount Snowdon, Caerphilly Castle and Portmeirion. Other scenes include the Red Wall at a Wales football match, a Gower beach and a farm full of disobedient sheep. 

As well as searching for the little dragon, the pictures can also be used to search for many other bizarre objects and characters listed at the back of the book. The book is guaranteed to provide hours of discussions and fun for all the family! 

Find the Dragon!  is by the well-known cartoonist and illustrator Huw Aaron. Huw is based in Cardiff and he’s illustrated a number of children’s books and comic strips as well as being a regular contributor to  Private Eye ,  The Oldie  and  The Spectator . 

Speaking about his new book, Huw Aaron said:

“Between finding the little dragon, evil dragon-hunting baddies, funny characters and bizarre items hidden within the scenes, there are over 250 individual things to search for, so plenty to keep any child amused during a long car journey or rainy (screen-free!) afternoo. I love designing busy scenes and hiding funny details in the pictures, so it was a lot of fun creating this book... and a lot of work too! Good luck with the dragon-spotting!” 

Find the Dragon!  features Boc the dragon, a face familiar to many Welsh children as one of the characters of the popular Welsh-language children’s comic  Mellten , which began in 2016.  

Huw Aaron will be at the Cardiff Children’s Lit Fest on 7 ^th  of April at Cardiff City Hall at 3pm with a session entitled  Drawing Myths and Monsters  and will be talking and doodling his new book  Find the Dragon!  Cost of session is £5. For more information, please see  www.cardiffkidslitfest.com .  

Find the Dragon!  by Huw Aaron (£4.99, Y Lolfa) is available now.

The timeless story of the search for a better life is the inspiration behind and message of Rob Gittins’ new novel, Hear the Echo , which is set around an Italian café in a vividly portrayed South Wales Valleys community.

The critically acclaimed novelist has also won awards for his screenwriting, and has written for numerous top-rated television drama series, including EastEnders, Casualty, The Bill, Heartbeat, Vera and Stella as well as many original plays for Radio 4. In 2015 he received an Outstanding Achievement Award in recognition of his work as EastEnders’ longest-serving writer.

The novel weaves together two contrasting stories, both of Welsh-Italian women in the same Valleys community but living 80 years apart. Chiara is a first-generation immigrant and has to deal with religious bigotry and prejudice in the close-knit mining community in which she lives in the run-up to and during the Second World War. The other thread follows present-day Frankie, who has her own struggles to keep the wolf from the door.

Hear the Echo reveals unexpected connections and commonalities:

“Going back into history sometimes makes clear just how relevant seemingly old stories can be,” says Rob Gittins, before adding:

“The women are different, the historical period is different but the trials and challenges they face are exactly the same. Each is seeking to escape a world that is at one and the same time a home and a prison, each is trying to work out the opposing claims of duty and desire, each struggles to navigate hugely difficult economic circumstances.”

The story was partly inspired by a love of the old Italian cafés of the Valleys, which Rob Gittins started frequenting after moving to Wales in the 1970s, and their unique character and tradition:

“They are extraordinary places, steeped in history and character, a far cry from the homogenised chain cafés that had already begun to appear by then and supplant them – a process that’s intensified over the years. There was always a magic about them – as well as a powerful sense of tradition – that I loved. They’ve brought so much to the Valleys, and really seem to represent the coming together of two very warm and welcoming cultures.”

But there was a second inspiration too:

“I’ve always been fascinated by the notion of ‘echoes’, the idea that – and despite all logic tells you – thoughts, emotions and characters can somehow reach you from across time. Sitting in some of those Italian cafés back in the 1970s, looking at all the pictures on the walls of the people who used to live and work there – it wasn’t difficult to imagine them still there somehow.

Out of that came the idea of two women intimately connected to one such café – the fictional, Carini’s, in this story. They’ve never met, they can never meet – but as the story progresses each becomes real to the other in ways neither quite understand.”

As one of the stories is set in the 1930s and 1940s, there was a fair amount of research to be done. As the author researched the era, mining communities, the high number of Italians who first moved to Wales in the 1930s and the xenophobia and religious bigotry that many faced, a clear message became apparent – similar issues have been affecting people throughout history:

“Both Chiara and Frankie are to some extent refugees. And refugees, in one form or another, are such a massive modern story. Modern day refugees have to undertake journeys and trials my two fictional characters could only wonder at, but the desire is exactly the same.

What Chiara and Frankie are celebrating is an impulse that beats even more strongly in the modern age in a sense; somewhere, out there, is something better and I want to find it.”

Hear the Echo will be launched Waterstones in Carmarthen at 6.30pm, on Thursday 19 July 2018. Free entry – a warm welcome to all!

Hear the Echo by Rob Gittins (£8.99, Y Lolfa) is available now.

In a new book titled Finding Wales , author Peter Daniels writes in praise of the Welsh and what drives Welsh exiles such as himself to return to Wales.

Mark Easton, BBC News’s Home Editor, has recently enlightened us with the results of his study into English identity, The English Question Project, in which he claims that ‘interlaced English and British identities remain an important part of how the people of England see themselves. For many it seems the two are almost interchangeable’. ‘Britishness’ means Shakespeare, the House of Commons, idyllic English country villages, the stiff upper lip, being conservative and traditional.

According to Llanelli born and Llantwit Major based author Daniels, “This doesn’t sound like the talkative, passionate, warm, open hearted Welsh. So perhaps we should remind Mark Easton and the world at large what the Welsh are like, and how we actually differ from the English.”

As a Welsh exile in England, Peter had a successful career in market research, but the strong ties he retained with his homeland through the London Welsh RFC and the London Welsh Association led to a fascination with his own national identity. And in his first book, In Search of Welshness, published in 2011, he charted the ways in which exiles living in England attempted to hang on to their Welsh characteristics and values in a London dominated social and cultural scene.

In Finding Wales he delves into the reasons why such exiles, including himself, have returned to Wales. Some admittedly have been forced to return because of family responsibilities or economic necessity. And others speak of a value for money ‘good life’ that is to be had in Wales, against a backcloth of its scenic beauty. But many yearned for more, for the friendlier community spirit that they feel exists in Wales, or an even deeper hiraeth for either the Welsh language and culture, or for a less class ridden way of life than they had encountered in England.

These returning exiles need however not only to sing the praises of the Welsh, but also to raise their voices in an attempt to wrestle back from Westminster a far greater degree of self determination in their everyday lives. But for the moment let’s just wallow in Welsh character, friendliness and humour as we follow the exploits of Peter Daniels’s returning band of Welsh exiles.

And what better time to study Welsh personality and culture than in National Eisteddfod week. Both books will be available at the stall of publisher, Y Lolfa, throughout the week.

Iolo Morganwg is an enigmatic historical figure in the Vale of Glamorgan and beyond. Gareth Thomas' novel I, Iolo , published this week by Y Lolfa, uses research and evidence recorded by his contemporaries and academics to recount his prodigious and astounding story. Iolo Morganwg had many faces: stonemason, self-taught scholar, poet, hymnist, politician, patriot, revolutionary, druid, failed businessman, drug addict, campaigner for human rights and perpetrator of the greatest act of literary forgery in European history.

The closing years of the 18th century were, in Iolo Morganwg's words, an age of 'unparalleled eventfulness' and he was in the thick of it; a young man of prodigious talent and boundless energy, drunk with words, outraged by injustice and in thrall to the spirit of liberty sweeping across Europe. The scene moves from Cowbridge to the grand drawing rooms of Mayfair, from Gorsedd ceremonies on inhospitable hillsides to the luxurious bordellos of Covent Garden, from his cottage in Flemingston to a hearing before the Privy Council in Downing Street.

Having been inspired by Iolo's story whilst at the National Eisteddfod in Llandow, Gareth Thomas set about learning more. As well as visiting places associated with the bard, such as his memorial at the Church in Flemingston, Gareth also researched the historical figure, reading the work of Gwyneth Lewis, former National Poet of Wales, Geraint Jenkins, Dr Mary-Ann Constantine, an academic specialising in Romantic-era Welsh literature and others. He came to the conclusion that here was a story with real contemporary significance, "the more I learnt, the more I marvelled at his story. It's a tale that needs to be told".

Here is a novel to introduce Iolo Morganwg, his opinions, adventures and the events which gained him a reputation as trickster and forger, to the world. A Welsh version of the novel, Myfi, Iolo, was published at the end of 2017 and has received enthusiastic reviews by the press and was described as ‘a fascinating novel about a fascinating person’ by Dr Mary-Ann Constantine.

Cowbridge History Society, Cowbridge Library, Cowbridge Bookshop and Y Lolfa have teamed up to organise the launch of I, Iolo as a special celebration of the town's most famous - or most notorious - son. Carys Whelan will chair and ask the questions. Two well known actors, Danny Gregan (Stella, Casualty) and Eiry Palfrey (Pobl y Cwm, Poncho Mamgu) will provide a reading, taking the parts of Iolo Morganwg and his long suffering wife Peggy.

Gareth Thomas’ roots are in Cwm Rhondda. He studied drama at Barry and London and worked in England as an actor, teacher and director. At fifty he learnt Welsh and seven years ago he moved to the Vale of Glamorgan and currently lives in Cowbridge.

I, Iolo will be launched at Cowbridge Library, Old Hall Gardens at 6.45pm, to start at 7pm on Monday 30 April 2018.

I, Iolo by Gareth Thomas (£9.99, Y Lolfa) is available now.

A long-awaited new volume has been praised as a ‘masterpiece’ by Professor Deri Tomos.

The volume Flowers of Wales published this week by Y Lolfa is the life work of botanist Goronwy Wynne, a leading Biology lecturer and life long member of the British Botanic Society.

The book, which spans almost six hundred pages, covers all known Welsh plants in an ambitious hardback volume.

‘This volume is the fruit of a lifetime’s labour’ said Professor Deri Tomos, ‘As well as being a prestigious catalouger, Goronwy Wynne is one who is passionate about what is behind the romantic facade of nature.’

Twm Elias was also amazed by the book.

‘The book is presented in a compact, easy-to-understand style and is a pleasure to read. Goronwy is one of the best Welsh botanists, and is a great communicator and writer,’ he said, ‘We see the expert's authority at its very best here, in a volume that has clearly taken a lot of years of careful research and writing’.

This is the first Welsh volume to try to present the history of every single Welsh plant.

The volume discusses their names, distribution and habitats. The ecology of plants is cited – from the ordinary to the rare. The reader is given a tour of all of the old counties of Wales describing ten sites in each county, with their special features and flowers, and how to find them flowers and appreciate them.

After graduating in Agriculture and Botany at Bangor University, Goronwy Wynne taught at his old school at Holywell, then became Principal Lecturer in Biology at the North East Wales Institute. He received a doctorate degree from the University of Wales and Salford University and is a Fellow of Bangor University and the London Linear Society. He has been a cataloguer for the British and Irish Botanic Society for forty years and editor of Y Naturiaethwr for the Edward Llwyd Society for ten years. In 2014 he received the National Eisteddfod's Science Medal.

The book will be launched Friday 1 December at 7.30pm at Stamford Gate Hotel in Holywell with Ieuan ap Sion, Bethan Wyn Jones, Austin Savage and Goronwy Wynne.

Blodau Cymru – Byd y Planhigion by Goronwy Wynne (£39.99, Y Lolfa) is available now.

A new novel published this week has brought to light a forgotten atrocity perpetrated against the Welsh by English Roundhead soldiers, where over a hundred Welsh women were brutally murdered.

Dark Territory by American-born and Wales-based author Jerry Hunter is set in the seventeenth century around the period of the English Civil War, and highlights the fact that the violence associated with religious extremism is not a new issue.

‘It is relatively well known that during his bloody military campaign in Ireland Oliver Cromwell approved the wholesale slaughter of civilians in Wexford and Drogheda because they were Catholics,’ said Jerry Hunter, ‘but less attention has been given to another massacre suffered at his forces’ hands.’

‘This is the story of the Women of Naseby, a dark episode of Welsh history which has been surprisingly absent from popular histories,’ he said.

After the Battle of Naseby in June 1645 the Parliamentarian cavalry, in pursuit of fleeing Royalists, came upon the Royalist camp and a large group of women. Hearing them screaming in an unknown tongue, the English soldiers assumed they were Irish Catholics, and cut them down in cold blood.

But in fact these women were crying out in Welsh – most of Wales had declared for the King, and these were the wives of soldiers in Welsh Royalist regiments who had followed their husbands to war to cook and wash for them, as was the custom at that time. Despite over a hundred of them being killed on the spot, and the faces of others mutilated, their fate has largely been forgotten.

Dark Territory ’s protagonist is a zealous Welsh Puritan whose beliefs initially lead him to embrace Parliament’s cause and the violence of Cromwell’s New Model Army, but whose conviction is tested by these atrocities.

Described as ‘an epic historical adventure set during one of the most turbulent periods in history’, the novel also poses questions about violence, power, religious extremism and rejection of difference which are chillingly relevant to our world today.

Jerry Hunter was born in Cincinnati, USA and is now is a Professor of Welsh and Pro Vice-Chancellor at the University of Bangor, and lives with his family in North Wales.

‘With this novel I also wanted to cross-examine the ideological foundations of “American Exceptionalism”,’ he explained. ‘For centuries politicians in the USA have referred to the nation as a “shining light” for the rest of the world to follow. Through the prism of fiction, this work examines the dark realities at the foundations of those beliefs.’

‘Particularly now in the age of Trump, when the old myths of exceptionalism are being invoked once again in an attempt to “make America great again”,’ he added.

The novel has already received acclaim, with literary critic and author Jon Gower praising it as ‘the work of a master... nothing less than a classic’.

Jerry Hunter is best known as a Welsh-language author and has won prestigious literary awards including Welsh Book of the Year for his academic work Llwch Cenhedloedd , and the National Eisteddfod Prose Medal for his first novel, Gwenddydd .

Dark Territory by Jerry Hunter (£9.99, Y Lolfa) is available now.

The memoir and inside story of BBC Wales by a former controller has raised ‘questions about the role of the BBC in today’s Wales’ according to a prominent broadcaster.

The Broadcasters of BBC Wales, 1964–1990 by Gareth Price, published this week by Y Lolfa, is the inside story of an exceptional period in Welsh broadcasting when an eclectic collection of characters emerged both in front and behind the microphone.

Gareth Price, a former Controller of BBC Wales (1986-90), worked for the Corporation between 1964 and 1990, during the most exciting period of growth in the history of Welsh broadcasting. He spent ten years (1964-74) as a radio and television producer and 16 years (1974-90) appointing, enabling and leading production teams in all their varied activities at the BBC.

‘Gareth Price has produced an admirably readable account of three exhilarating decades in Welsh broadcasting, an account which tracks his rise to the Controller’s office of BBC Wales,’ said broadcaster Huw Edwards,

‘His story is full of absorbing insights into BBC culture, and along the way he profiles some of the biggest names in the business. It also raises pertinent questions about the role and status of the BBC in today’s Wales.’

His memoir is the human story of those individuals who worked through the most exciting period of growth in the history of Welsh broadcasting.

‘Many were an extraordinary mix of creative and often eccentric people making music and writing drama; celebrities in the world of sport and entertainment; or inquisitive journalists reporting on daily events and producing in-depth documentaries’ said Gareth.

‘The memories remain of an eclectic group of people who were attracted to an institution which, in the words of Head of Programmes Hywel Davies in 1962, ‘must be a debating chamber, an exhibition centre, a publishing house, a theatre, a concert hall, a centre which, if near to its audience, can develop the national identity in English and in Welsh.’’ added Gareth.

In just six years, between January 1977 and November 1982, two national radio stations (Radio Wales and Radio Cymru) and S4C were launched, leading to the simultaneous relaunch of a BBC Wales TV service devoid of the Welsh language.

By 1982, BBC Wales had grown to become the largest BBC operation outside London.

Gareth recalls the tensions between BBC Wales and S4C in the run-up to S4C’s launch as well as the difficulties in selling programmes with Welsh content to London controllers.

As well as recounting the work of high profile and creative colleagues, Gareth Price recalls events which shaped Wales and the BBC during this time, such as the anguish of Aberfan in 1966; a surge of national pride created by great Welsh rugby teams of the 1970s and the sadness and suff ering as King Coal died a slow death during and after the last great strike of 1984–5.

‘Mine is a social history of a specific era and the personalities who enlarged and revolutionised the broadcasting landscape of Wales.’ added Gareth.

Gareth Price was educated in Aberaeron and at University College of Wales, Aberystwyth, before becoming an assistant lecturer at Queen’s University, Belfast. He joined BBC Wales in 1964 and during the next 26 years spent ten years as a producer before joining the management team as Head of Programmes and Controller, BBC Wales. In 1990 he left the BBC to join the international Thomson Foundation. Gareth is a Fellow of Aberystwyth University and was awarded the Commonwealth Association Medal for Services to International Public Broadcasting in 2006.

The Broadcasters of BBC Wales, 1964–1990 will be launched at Tŷ Oldfield, Llandaf on Thursday the 16 ^th of November at 6pm in the company of Gareth Price, Roy Noble and Frank Lincoln.

The Broadcasters of BBC Wales, 1964–1990 by Gareth Price is available now (£12.99, Y Lolfa).

Retired Welsh international rugby union player Lee Byrne has spoken publicly for the first time about the treatment he suffered under Robert Howley in his new tell-all autobiography, The Byrne Identity , out now. Lifting the lid on his toxic relationship and refusal to play under Robert Howley, Lee gives a damning verdict on the former Welsh rugby union player turned coach.

‘I was eased out of the Wales team; subjected, in my view, to bullying treatment; dragged back and forth from Clermont to squad training in Wales without WRU reimbursement for travel expenses, just to hold tackle bags’ says Lee, ‘By the end of 2013, there’d been no communication with the management for two years, but here was a man – a man who I felt had tried to humiliate me in front of my teammates – ringing up and expecting me to come running because he’d clicked his fingers’.

The Byrne Identity charts Lee’s meteoric rise from a childhood on a tough estate in Bridgend through teenage years on building sites across Europe to rugby stardom at the very top of world rugby, earning forty-six caps for Wales and securing his place as one of the nation’s best-ever full backs and one of the brightest talents to grace the Welsh game.

Lee talks frankly about the joy of playing at the highest level for the Scarlets, the Ospreys, Wales and the Lions, and gives an insider’s glimpse into Welsh rugby under Warren Gatland and the tactics and psychology employed.

The autobiography has already been dubbed ‘rugby book of the year’ by Wales on Sunday .

In this candid, no-holds-barred autobiography, Lee Byrne reveals all for the first time about the gambling habit he managed to kick, how he’s come to terms with dyslexia, and how he struggled with depression after his enforced early retirement due to injury. He also gives an insight into players’ and coaches’ hilarious off-field antics, the rugby drinking culture that exists within Welsh rugby, and opens up about how the death of his good friend Jerry Collins affected him.

‘After two somewhat tough years following my forced retirement from the game, I felt the time had come to tell my story,’ explained Lee. ‘Despite my unconventional route into rugby, I managed to make it to the pinnacle of the game, playing nearly fifty times for Wales and representing the British and Irish Lions. I had talent, perhaps, but it also required an awful lot of hard work.’

‘There’s also much about the sheer joy of playing rugby at the highest level, and the fun I had off the field,’ he added.

The book includes a foreword written by his friend and Welsh International, Shane Williams.

‘Straight away you could tell [Lee] was a good player. Within a couple of years he was being talked about as the best full back in the world, and rightly so,’ said Shane.

Former England star Jeremy Guscott also waxes lyrical about Lee’s abilities. ‘Lee played sublime rugby that really stood out. Great players have the ability to slow everything down… Lee certainly had that ability. A world-class full back with an exceptional skill-set – sheer class.’

Lee currently runs rugby camps for young players, and pursues a number of business interests. He is an ambassador for Tomorrow’s Generation , a dyslexia charity based in Cardiff. He lives in Bridgend.

The autobiography was co-written by television journalist and sports reporter Richard Morgan.

Lee Byrne will be embarking on a book signing tour to promote his book, beginning in Llanelli on November 3rd, and will visit Swansea, Carmarthen, Newport, Cwmbran, Penarth and Bridgend.

The Byrne Identity by Lee Byrne (£9.99, Y Lolfa) is available now.