Books published by Parthian Books

Widely acclaimed for its warm humour, lyricism and honesty, as well as its accurate evocation of the thirties, Ash on a Young Man's Sleeve has become a sought after classic.In this delightful autobiographical novel, Dannie Abse skilfully interweaves public and private themes, setting the fortunes of a Jewish family in Wales against the troubled backcloth of the times - unemployment, the rise of Hitler and Mussolini, and the Spanish Civil War.

A collection of new contemporary short stories by Welsh writers, comprising twelve diverse stories about relationships between people and places, representing the winners of the 2022 Rhys Davies Short Story Competition. Including short biographicalnotes on the authors.

'A major novelist' -- Punch'Warmth, liveliness, honesty and compassion' -- The Sunday TimesStan Barstow's landmark 'Brit-Lit' novel of the sixties immortalized Vic Brown, the amiable working class lad from the North and led the way for author's like Nick Hornby writing similar slice-of-life drama. Still as fresh and alive today, it spawned two sequels: The Watchers on the Shore (1966) and The Right True End (1976). First published in 1960, it has long been used as a set text in British schools. It has also been translated at various times into a film starring Alan Bates (1962) of the same name, a television series (1973) starring Clive Wood, a radio play and a stage play. A Kind of Loving was the first of a trilogy, published over the course of sixteen years, that followed hero Vic Brown through marriage, divorce and a move from the mining town of Cressley to London. This new edition includes an afterword by David Collard.

From the acclaimed author of The Last Kabbalist of Lisbon and The Warsaw Anagrams comes an unforgettable, deeply moving ode to solidarity, heroism, and the kind of love capable of overcoming humanity's greatest horror. The latest novel in the Sephardic Cycle, a group of independent works that explore the lives of different branches and generations of a Portuguese-Jewish family, the Zarcos. The other novels in this series (which can be read in any order) are: The Last Kabbalist of Lisbon, Hunting Midnight, Guardian of the Dawn, and The Seventh Gate. All of these books were Number 1 bestsellers in Portugal.

Gwyn Thomas was born, the last of twelve children, into a Rhondda mining family in 1913. After a childhood marked by the strikes of the 1920s, he went off to study Spanish at Oxford University and in Madrid, where he met the poet Federico García Lorca and witnessed the turmoil which would lead to the Spanish Civil War. On his return, amidst the economic mire of the 1930s and his own burgeoning teaching career in Barry in the 1940s, he picked up his pen and began to write. For more than forty years, until his death in 1981, as novelist, screenwriter, master of the short story, and prizewinning playwright, Gwyn Thomas delivered compelling and comedic portraits of his world of South Wales. His creative genius earned enduring fame on both sides of the Atlantic and on both sides of the European Cold War divide. As a provocative and insightful broadcaster, he embraced the possibilities of radio and television, whilst leaving his hosts and guests alike in fits of knowing laughter. This landmark biography, enriched with unrivalled access to private papers and international archives, tells the remarkable story of one of modern Wales's greatest literary voices.

The history of Wales as a destination and confection of English Romanticwriters is well-known, but this book reverses the process, turning a Welshgaze on the rest of the world.

This title is the second part of Miren Agur Meabe's triptych. In2020 she published her fifth poetry collection, Nola gorde errautsakolkoan (Holding Ashes Close to the Heart) - which is the final partof the triptych. It won the 2021 Spanish National Poetry Award.

The Herring Man is a modern-day fable, beautifullyillustrated by the author, about dealing with grief andsearching for hope.

Global problems like climate change feel terrifying, too big for one person totake on. But what if, instead of being overwhelmed, we were to look for hope inthe smallest details? A dying moth falling against a kiss. A distracted lover's hippressing into a table. A single carder bee, dying on the driveway of a suburbangarden in Wales.

'My great grandfather and grandfather sailed the Horn, in steam and diesel, out of Liverpool. I was the first generation not to sail the Horn or fight a war. Instead, I would go to the end of the world, beyond Patagonia, to Tierra del Fuego. I would do more, I would see the Horn and find lost tribes. The child in me could go even further and sail the waters of Coleridge's albatross and enter the watercolours' blue horizons of my first novel, and sit on Robinson Crusoe's imaginary shore. I had imagined these places; they must exist. All I had to do was look for them.'

Ranging from flash fiction to novelette, these stories are inturn chilling, playful, and melancholy. Every tale is rich with landscapeshaunted by loss and longing.

Gorwelion: Shared Horizons is a climate change anthologyof poetry and prose edited by prize-winning writer andenvironmental activist Robert Minhinnick featuring Welsh,Scottish, Indian and English writers.

This collection with parallel texts in Italian and English gives theEnglish-reading audience a sense of the great variety of the presentpoetic scene in Italy with a selection of twenty-one of the mostrepresentative contemporary poets.

This book comprises the life stories of 40 Black Asian MinorityEthnic women that were finalists/winners for the Ethnic Minority WelshWomen Achievement award (2011-2019).

In the totalitarian CSR, unruly Karolina and physically handicapped Romana have found a means of escape as part of a successful trick riding team. However, as capitalism looms, both their relationship and their freedom to ride will face a new threat - money. For there will be no room for these two 'imperfect' women while professionalism beckons...

Edited with an introduction by Peter Wakelin. Part of the Modern Wales series. Originally published in 1945, Miner's Day tells of the coalmining life of the thirties in south Wales.

Marcia Pullman has been found dead at home in the leafy suburbs of Bulawayo. Chief Inspector Edmund Dube is onto the case at once, but it becomes increasingly clear that there are those, including the dead woman's husband, who do not want him asking questions.The case drags Edmund back into his childhood to when his mother's employers disappeared one day and were never heard from again, an incident that has shadowed his life. As his investigation into the death progresses, Edmund realises the two mysteries are inextricably linked and that unravelling the past is a dangerous undertaking threatening his very sense of self.

Gavdos: a remote island south of Crete, the southernmostpoint of Europe, surrounded by an endless expanse ofsea. To Oksana, who has come from Ukraine with her friendsto recover from illness in the aftermath of Chernobyl, itseems like a dream to live in a blue-and-white housewith a lemon tree. To Penelope, a Greek woman, it is a kind of

When the author is given a small package, containingletters and papers relating to his grandfather's brother, whowas killed in Syria during the Second World War, it leadshim on an extended personal journey.

This ground-breaking volume makes visible a long and diversetradition of queer writing from Wales. Spanning genres fromghost stories and science fiction to industrial literature andsurrealist modernism, these are stories of love, loss andtransformation.