Poetry/Short story workshop for Performance, Altrincham Town Hall, 25 Market St, Altrincham WA14 1QT
Sunday 17 May | 2.00pm
This writing workshop helped attendees to find their creative voice and prepared them for sharing their work with a larger audience. The workshop employed writing prompts on a wide variety of poetic/short story themes. I discussed techniques used to enhance performance, such as intonation, tone, tempo, and volume.

Birmingham Hippodrome, Patrick Studio, Hurst St, Birmingham B5 4TB
Thursday 20 February | 7.30 – 10.30 pm
Opening Verve 2020 was a Spoken Word Night to remember – a night of nights – a Spoken Word SUPER night.
Four of the best nights around the country were each asked to bring a poet of their choosing. Word Wise from Derby, hosted by Jamie Thrasivolou, brought Matthew Clegg. Verbose from Manchester, repped by Zoe Turner, featured Reshma Ruia. Milk from Bristol with host Maleika Kegode brought Birdspeed. Edinburgh’s Loud Poets and their host Kevin McLean presented Katie Ailes. The night was hosted by Verve’s Sean Colletti.

It was an honour to represent Manchester and Verbose at this acclaimed poetry festival and read from A Dinner Party in the Home Counties and see my book in such distinguished company.

The Poetry Café, 22 Betterton St, London WC2H 9BX | Monday 9 December | 7.00 – 9.00 pm
I was joined by guest poets Mimi Khalvati, Todd Swift, Rishi Dastidar and Yogesh Patel.

Fred’s Ale House, 843 Stockport Road, Manchester, M19 3PW | Monday 25 November | 7.30 – 10.00 pm
I read from my latest collection A Dinner Party in the Home Counties.

United Reformed Church, Park Road, Macclesfield SK11 7NA | Saturday 23 November 2019 | 6.00 – 8.00 pm
Six writers came to Macclesfield one day in Autumn, each in search of inspiration… Reading a commissioned story at a live literature project. I produced a new short story based on something related to Macclesfield and read it live at the festival.
‘Why six Manchester writers will be telling weird and wonderful tales in Macclesfield’ – Visit Manchester

Friday 1 November
Geoffrey Manton Building, MMU, Manchester
Panel participant ‘Writing in the Face of Doubt’.

The Talleyrand, 1030 Stockport Road, Levenshulme M19 3WX
Friday 18 October | 7.00 pm
Poetry reading in Levenshulme in aid of Safe Passage who are currently helping refugees find sanctuary.

Sunday 13 October 2019 2.30 – 3.30pm
I read from and discussed our latest anthology, May We Borrow Your Country with other members of The Whole Kahani Collective, Kavita A. Jindal and Nadia Barb.
Durham Town Hall (Burlison Gallery), Market Place, Durham DH1 3NJ

Tuesday 13 August 2019 | 6:30 – 8:00 pm
The Nehru Centre | 8 South Audley Street, London W1K 1HF
Readings from: Yogesh Patel, Debjani Chatterjee, Ravi Shankar, Jessica Mookherjee, Reshma Ruia and Kavita A. Jindal.
I received my Word Masala Award for the debut collection to be published by Skylark in October.

Thursday 27 June 2019 | 7.00-8.30pm
Blackwell’s Bookshop, University Green, 146 Oxford Road, Manchester M13 9RN

I was at the birthplace of the Suffragette movement, the Pankhurst Centre, Manchester, on Thursday 7 March 2019 for an evening filled with readings and debate as we launched the 100 Voices, a collection by 100 female identifying authors from all over the UK.
The inspiring collection features a hundred women’s stories which were crowd-sourced and broadcast on the acclaimed 100 Voices podcast last year.

From 7 March, a book of the stories will be available for readers to support through the publisher Unbound.

Verbose Manchester spoken word night at Fred’s Ale House on the theme of ‘Labels’, Monday 25 February 2019, 7.30-10.30pm.

Radio Interview with Susan Leigh on Trafford Sound, Tuesday 5 February 2019, 2-4pm.