Kit Habianic's Blog

The Battle of Orgreave

This autumn the UK government ruled out holding an independent enquiry into claims of police brutality during the so-called Battle of Orgreave, a milestone during the year-long miners' strike. This scene from Until Our Blood is Dry takes us back to that blazing hot day in Yorkshire, and to the medieval-style battle that followed.





Until Our Blood is Dry

The field stretched across a hillside, looking down on the coke plant. Below them, a line of police stood ten deep, long shields glittering coldly. Scrapper shuddered. The couple of thousand miners and supporters were well outnumbered by the boys in blue. Behind the shields, he saw dog handlers, muscular Alsatians straining at the leash, and other officers on horseback.

Time passed and heat rose as the sun hardened in the sky. At the top of the field, some boys from Kent kicked a ball between them. Scrapper stripped down to his vest, tied the arms of his sweater around his waist, tried not to stare at a group of knottyhaired students sprawled against a tree trunk, breathing clouds of pungent smoke.

The lines of police and dogs and horses drew closer together, shifted into a solid mass. The miners did the same. Scrapper sensed both sides waiting for some kind of signal. Then he heard it – the far-off growl of engines. On the road beyond the hedgerows, a lorry was approaching the plant.

The mood darkened so fast, he thought clouds had closed around the sun. All at once, his boys were shouting, bodies crushed against him, carrying him forwards. A slow, heavy beat rose from behind the line of long shields, batons thudding on Perspex, daring the miners to come down.

The cry went up: ‘The workers. United. Will never be defeated.’

Goosebumps studded Scrapper’s arms and legs. He and his butties, stood shoulder to shoulder with men from the other coalfields, with trade unionists and newspaper sellers and students.

Tears pricked his eyes. He was proud – so fucking proud – to be a part of it.

Until Our Blood is Dry

Some favourite reads

Books
Giovanni's Room -- James Baldwin
Wuthering Heights -- Emily Bronte
The Outsider -- Albert Camus
Oscar and Lucinda -- Peter Carey
Cold Comfort Farm -- Stella Gibbons
The End of the Affair -- Graham Greene
Notes on a Scandal -- Zoe Heller
Fiesta -- Ernest Hemingway
Leviathan -- Philip Hoare
The Poisonwood Bible -- Barbara Kingsolver
Ancient Evenings -- Norman Mailer
My Traitor's Heart -- Rian Malan
Tales of the City -- Armistead Maupin
Half of a Yellow Sun -- Chimimanda Ngozi Adichie
Swallows and Amazons -- Arthur Ransome
The God of Small Things -- Arundhati Roy
Season of Migration to the North -- Tayib Salih
We Need to Talk About Kevin -- Lionel Shriver

Shorts
Going to Meet the Man -- James Baldwin
Gode's Story -- AS Byatt
The Five Forty-Eight -- John Cheever
Miss Brill -- Katherine Mansfield
The Knife Thrower -- Kevin Millhauser
Tell Me Yes or No -- Alice Munro

The Writer's ABC Checklist -- interview

Interview with lovely Vlad the Inhaler author Lorraine Mace on the highs and lows of writing that tricky first novel.

http://thewritersabcchecklist.blogspo...

The Writer's ABC ChecklistABC Writers Checklist

Author's notes interview, Western Mail

Here's an interview from this weekend's Western Mail/Wales Online about what inspired my novel, Until Our Blood is Dry.
http://www.walesonline.co.uk/whats-on...

South Wales book lovers... say hi

Stop press: Saturday 24 May, Waterstones bookshop in Newport.

I'll be in the store from 1230-1330, reading from my debut novel Until Our Blood is Dry.

If you're in Newport, do please stop in, say hello, have a chat about writing or books or memories of the miners' strike.

Until Our Blood is Dry (Parthian Books, April 2014)
Book of the Month, May 2014 for the Welsh Books Council and independent booksellers in Wales.

A book -- and Dannie Abse

Until Our Blood is Dry has launched at last. Available at all good independent booksellers, major chains and on the internet.
Parthian Books held a launch party for the book at the Wheatsheaf pub in Fitzrovia, the boho wateringhole where Dylan Thomas met Caitlin and the rest is-- messy.
The Welsh Cultural Embassy pop-up event featured the very talented and Welsh Dan Tyte, Rhian Elizabeth, Jonathan Edwards and Sion Tomos Owen.
Star billing was poet Dannie Abse, who held a hushed audience in the palm of his hand.

A magical afternoon.

Until Our Blood is Dry — a quick update.

Wales’ daily newspaper The Western Mail has picked up my miners strike novel Until Our Blood is Dry, to run daily as its morning serial over a year, starting from Thursday 6 February.

This allows Western Mail readers to follow the story in bite-sized chunks on the Arts pages.

Western Mail journalist Rachael Misstear wrote an introductory piece to flag up the serialisation here: http://ow.ly/tqOUm

To find out more about the book, there’s a short piece by Parthian Books’ Glenda Loschi here: http://ow.ly/tqOXC

If you’d like to know more about Parthian Books, please visit them here: http://ow.ly/tqP15

The book has also been chosen by Wales Independent Book Shops to be their Book of the Month for May 2014.

Thank you so much to everyone rooting for Until Our Blood is Dry, published by Parthian Books on April 1, 2014.

Details of the launch plans coming soon.

x Kit