Hachette Pride Partners With Virago For Book Club Event

Hachette UK’s LGBTQIA+ employee network, Pride, is hosting an event with Virago author Stella Duffy, as part of a series of sessions devoted to LGBTQIA+ novelists.

The webinar, which will be hosted on Zoom on Wednesday 28^th April from 7-8pm, will discuss Stella’s latest novel, Lullaby Beach, which is a brilliant story of loss and love, revenge and redemption. Hachette Pride co-chair and event host, Sophia Blackwell, will discuss the themes in the book with Stella, including class, relationships, family, women’s rights, post-war conflicts and concerns, and dealing with the aftermath of death, loss and shame.

The Pride network will also be discussing Stella’s long, diverse and distinguished career as a writer, theatre-maker and co-founder of community cohesion organisation, Fun Palaces, as well as her new work as a trainee existential psychotherapist and teaching yoga for writing. The discussion will also cover Stella’s earlier contemporary fiction – Singling Out the Couples, State of Happiness, Eating Cake, Immaculate Conceit and The Room of Lost Things – and introduce them to a new audience. This is the second time that Hachette Pride has worked with Stella for a LGBTQIA+ event; she was involved in the network’s ‘Pride in Writing’ event in partnership with Waterstones back in 2019.

Hachette Pride has previously partnered with fellow employee network, Thrive, for a session on The Prophets by Robert Jones, Jr. and one of Hachette UK’s divisions, Quercus, for Laura Kay’s debut novel, The Split. The events form part of Hachette UK’s wider diversity and inclusion programme, Changing the Story, which marks its 5^th anniversary this year.

Stella Duffy, author of Lullaby Beach, said: “Lullaby Beach was both a joy and very difficult to write – the violence and shame that permeate the novel, both contrasting to and alongside love and care, feel like enormous and hugely vital subjects to tackle – personally, at this stage in my career, and in our wider society.”

Sophia Blackwell, co-chair of Hachette Pride, commented: “It will be a real honour to host this event. I grew up reading Stella’s novels and always look forward to seeing her and being on panels with her – she’s a real inspiration and is always trying something new, both in her fiction and outside it.”

Tickets are free and you can register for the event here.