Nights on the town

From Brixton to Pimlico, I’ve been having some unusual writerly fun out and about recently.

BrixtonBookJamAll First at the famed Brixton Book Jam held at the Hootananny, Brixton. I’d never been to the Book Jam and was surprised when a friend and fellow writer remarked on how scary it was. The Hootananny is, I discovered, a live music venue, a big room with a full height stage, sound system and spotlights. Suddenly I understood what she meant. On a freezing Monday night in March it seemed very daunting. There was a mixed line-up of writers. I got there early and sat chatting to one of the most experienced performers, Paul Eccentric and his wife Donna Ray. They were live Festival veterans (seven Glastonburys) on the poetry circuit, Paul being half of the Antipoet. The other half, a bassist, came along to watch.

The really enjoyable part of appearing was the chatting with the other writers in the Green Room off to the right of the stage, a Hootananny Brixton GreenRoom fabulous side room wall-papered with posters of previous performers. It’s terrifically nostalgic and much time was spent spotting bands we recognised or knew from more youthful days. Zelda Rhiando, herself a published writer and the organiser of the Jam, was there to calm our nerves and point out the beers in the little fridge and the bottles of wine. I swore not to touch a drop before I went on.

I was not, I discovered, the only one with nerves, yet all of us were used to discussing books, our own and others’ in public. It was that high stage, the single mic and the coloured spotlights (which ran the whole spectrum) which looked so terrifying. The hall was filling up and Zelda said we were off. The first writer’s hands were shaking as he waited at the foot of the stairs to the stage. I was on fourth, to end the first set before the interval and I managed. I even got a laugh at my wry comment at the beginning about my cardigan. Phew, it was over. A big glass of wine later I was back in the Green Room to support the others. Ashley, West and Zelda were all tremendous.

Millbank1 Brixton Book Jam was not my only interesting night on the town. Only three days later I attended the first meeting of the London chapter of the Crime Writer’s Association since before the pandemic. Held in the fantastic Morpeth Arms on Millbank a great group of fellow scribes chatted books, publishers, contracts, remuneration and anything else we fancied. Then Anthony, intrepid manager of the pub, asked if we would like a ‘tour’. A tour of what? It transpired that the public house had used to stand adjacent to the notorious Millbank Prison and that, beneath the ground, elements leading to that place still existed. Down steep stairs and beyond the barrels and machinery we entered a long corridor with archways on one side. The corridor had once been open to the air, the dividing line between prison and pub.

At the end of the corridor was a dark arch leading to a tunnel. This was the route used to bring convicts Millbank2jpg out of the prison down to the prison hulks moored on the Thames. They would then be removed to the transportation ships bound for Australia. The pub was, Anthony informed us, one of the most haunted in London. But the writers’ imaginations were already hard at work and one of us was already speculating aloud about a crime plot using the tunnels. This is, I guess, the sort of thing that happens when a group of Crime Writers gets together. I’ll be looking forward to the next meeting.