Joan Taylor-Rowan – författare

Moving from 1930s Camden to a Royal Wedding "riot", via football fights, office steeplechases and awkward dates in art galleries, London Lies is a bizarre, funny, moving and sometimes unnerving glimpse into the secret life of the city we all love and know.Featuring nineteen writers and twenty-three stories showcased at award-winning monthly live literature event, London's Liars' League.

From tigers in a South London suburb to retired Victorian police inspectors investigating train based thefts, from collectors of poets at Shadwell to life-changing decisions in Canonbury, by way of an art installation that defies the boundaries of a gallery, Stations takes a sideways look through the windows of the Overground train, at life as it is, or might be, lived beside the rails: quirky, humorous and sometimes horrifying.

A showcase for authors Arachne Press has published previously in anthologies, giving a wider perspective on their writing. The collection as a whole has tendency towards fantasy and magical realism, with Cassandra Passarelli’s (Liberty Tales) Guatemalan stories taking on a more gritty reality, and Katy Darby’s (London Lies, Stations, Shortest Day, Longest Night) engrossing SF and historical stories alongside Joan Taylor Rowan’s (London Lies, Lover's Lies, Stations) acid humour and modern desperation and Sarah James’ (Longest Day, Shortest Night) elliptical poet’s sensibility brought to flash fiction and Helen Morris’ (Liberty Tales, Solstice Shorts) ability to get to the heart of a story, and make you laugh out loud or weep inconsolably.