• Sarah Jane Butler Sarah Jane Butler
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    For PR & Media enquiries relating to Starling, please contact publicity@fairlightbooks.com

    My literary agent is Julia Silk at Greyhound Literary. Please contact Julia at julia@greyhoundliterary.co.uk .

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    I am so looking forward to an afternoon chatting w I am so looking forward to an afternoon chatting with wonderful writer, ecologist and all-round lovely person Carol Donaldson - come and join us at Sevenoaks Boolshop this Wednesday afternoon if you’re free!
    I’m so sad I can’t be on the March for Clean W I’m so sad I can’t be on the March for Clean Water today - over the last year I’ve been testing the rivers Grom and Medway with my friends in Project Ripple Effect and while I knew the river was struggling the truth of just how much shit Southern Water is releasing into it has appalled me. So raise your voices loud, everyone, and if you can’t be there write to your MP, support your local group, get loud. We have to do something fast to stop greed killing our rivers and all the life in them. #savetherivers #cleanrivers #cleanwater #healthyrivers #rivermedway #marchforcleanwater #tunbridgewells
    Time to get making a banner for Sunday’s March f Time to get making a banner for Sunday’s March for Clean Water in London - the Ripple Effect team and Friends of the River Medway will be there and I’m so looking forward to seeing friends of rivers and waters and sharing our hopes and fears. Come and join us if you can!#marchforcleanwater #riveraction #citizenscience #loverivers #rivermedway
    Ivy flowers bring all the buzz to the yard! Ivy flowers bring all the buzz to the yard!
    Bees, flies, hornets, bumbles (and a Red Admiral t Bees, flies, hornets, bumbles (and a Red Admiral that didn’t hang around) all loving the ivy flowering on our shed roof this sunny October day #letyourivyflower!
    So much love for Charlie Rose’s story on BBC Sou So much love for Charlie Rose’s story on BBC Southeast tonight about Project Ripple Effect. Thank you to Charlie, our citizen scientists and all the people supporting us as we uncover the sad state of the river Grom and the Upper Medway. You can watch the story on the BBC site or read Charlie’s article here https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/articles/cx252pk7xqyo #rivermedway #tunbridgewells #rivergrom #rippleeffect
    UPDATE - NOW SHOWING TUESDAY 6.30 BBC1! River news UPDATE - NOW SHOWING TUESDAY 6.30 BBC1! River news! I’ve just spent the morning down by the river Grom with my Project Ripple Effect friends and Charlie Rose of BBC SouthEast. Charlie’s editing the footage right now and his story about the health of the Grom and the Medway goes out tonight at 6.30 on BBC1! #river #medway #citizenscience #riverguardians #riveraction
    Instagram post 17858273655271193 Instagram post 17858273655271193
    Posted @withregram • @barnettsbooks There are st Posted @withregram • @barnettsbooks There are still a couple of places left on our next Creative Writing course, “Writing about the Natural World”, starting 5th November, led by Sarah Jane Butler, acclaimed author of Starling, who ran a short story course last autumn at Barnett’s. Get in touch asap to secure your spot! More details are on our website. The course runs 7pm to 9pm on four consecutive Tuesdays, 5th, 12th, 19th and 26th November. #wadhurst #crowborough #goudhurst #ticehurst #tunbridgewells #hawkhurst #mayfield #groombridge #cranbrook #thepantiles #independentbookshop #shoplocal
    Thank you to @hulkedproject @annabraithwaitemusic Thank you to @hulkedproject @annabraithwaitemusic Jeremy Scott and Caroline Millar for a fantastic day on the Medway estuary at Lower Halstow yesterday - absorbed in your sound walk (there for anyone to listen to any time you like) and fascinating conversations about layers of time, connections and disconnections, people and rivers, and so much more. And the estuary brought itself so here are hulked boats becoming marsh, Glass Bottle Beach, the gorgeous Thames barges of @tillerandwheel and the worms, there before us and long after us.
    I’m just home from a strange and wonderful water I’m just home from a strange and wonderful watery day in London. First The River at the Natural History Museum by @jana.winderen with Tony Wyatt, a sound installation recorded beneath the surface of the Thames, from its rising to the estuary, with miraculous sounds of invertebrates calling, and the calls and incidental sounds of plants and mammals - and then the brutal noises that humans impose on this magical world. Then to the Royal Geographical Society for Waterlines, a collaborative exhibition by the Wilderness Art Collective. So much great work here - and I was so happy to meet up with @catherinegreenwood_ to celebrate her utterly gorgeous diptych - I’ve been watching it develop since her first sketch with a feather on Skye last year so it was a joy to see the final print in real life. And I had to RESIST the temptation to run my fingers over the rusty panels made by @polben.art and streams and rivers close to me. And rivers in trees? Of course! I loved Laura Melissa Williams’ Stemflow, complete with live feed from a tree!
    A treat! Waiting for Godot at the Haymarket Theatr A treat! Waiting for Godot at the Haymarket Theatre in London was wonderful - it’s the warmest, most human of plays, bleak of course, but I’ve always felt it to be at heart a play that’s full of love too, for the way the characters (and we too) just keep going on through life. I studied Godot for A Level a very long time ago and it was like an explosion of joy that’s still sending waves more than forty years later. I’ve seen it staged several times, and this was one of the best. Ben Wishaw and Lucian Msamati were perfect - and seeing the play with my daughter and her mate just made my night.
    Frosts are coming so I’m gathering in our small Frosts are coming so I’m gathering in our small autumn harvest. I love this time of year, laying in food for winter like dormice - I’ve stewed the very last blackberries, wrapped the best eating apples in paper (they’re James Grieve and don’t last super well but I keep trying) and set them on a shelf in my office (the coldest room). I’ve peeled, sliced a frozen trays of the Rev Wilkes apples ready to cook through winter. And I’ve frozen a bag of the Ruby Falls tomatoes to grab and roast or add to January soups. And now I’m pooped so the herbs will have to wait, but the kitchen and my office smell so good, and the sun is shining on the late lettuces, chard and kale so all is well with the world. #harvest #veggarden #heritageapples #autumngarden
    Today I’m curled up inside as the storm batters Today I’m curled up inside as the storm batters the house, and reflecting on yesterday’s visit to the London Museum in Canary Wharf. It was my first time in that strange inhuman-feeling finance district, built on the scars of centuries of dock trade and now baring its teeth at the river. I was so glad of the Thames when I emerged from the museum, and caught a boat to take me up past all the old warehouses, skinny stairs between tight-packed buildings and little shingle beaches, to Tower Bridge. And from there, a stroll into the narrow streets of Bermondsey, finally to meet @ardyn.halter , wonderful artist with whom I worked on a collaboration back in 2020 and who now has a new series of gorgeous prints out with @eamesfineart . What a day!
    My first time gathering our samples for invertebra My first time gathering our samples for invertebrate testing - normally I’m up on the bank with the stopwatch - and I picked a perfect day to be in the cool water! Even better, we found a tiny eel (filmed here in slo mo), and at our second site there was a small gaggle of cased caddis larvae - such strange and wonderful creatures. Much lower numbers today - maybe because of the later season? We’re still learning about what lives here and establishing our baseline, so who knows? If you’d like to volunteer with Project Ripple Effect, on the Upper #medway, drop me a message. Anyone can do it! #riverfly #rippleeffect #riverguardians #riverlove #citizenscience
    River love! It’s so easy to be busy, and my mind River love! It’s so easy to be busy, and my mind was buzzing yesterday. I didn’t have time or energy to swim so I headed down to the river, took my shoes off and paddled. Aaaaaahhhhh - I could have stayed for hours ankle-deep in cool water listening to it singing over the stones. But I headed off to meet up with the Ripple Effect team to catch up, plan and share our excitement at the way our project is already sending out ripples. We have 24 volunteers testing the Upper Medway every fortnight. We have Riverfly records building up, and eDNA results just in (all kinds of fish, invertebrates, etc. and turkeys???). We’re reporting pollution incidents that would otherwise have gone unnoticed - some really significant, too. And we’re building love and care for the river across the upper catchment. So happy! #rippleeffect #rivermedway #medway #watertesting #sussexrivers #tunbridgewells #citizenscience #riverlove #loveyourriver #friendsoftherivermedway
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    sarahlooseleaf Sarah Jane Butler @sarahlooseleaf ·
    19 Nov

    The highlight of my week!

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    16 Nov

    Mariann Johansen-Ellis, Contemporary artist and printmaker based in Denmark #WomensArt

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    sketchesbyboze Owl! at the Library 😴🧙‍♀️ @sketchesbyboze ·
    10 Nov

    someone accidentally started a silent book club and I truly believe this could heal our country.

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    10 Nov

    Hastings, East Sussex, #England

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    4 Nov

    Did it work for you? Let me know in the comments!

    #reel #comedy #sketchcomedy #recipe

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    poetryschool Poetry School @poetryschool ·
    4 Nov

    Our #SpringTerm is now live & we’ve got a whole host of brilliant tutors & #poetrycourses lined up, so be sure to book promptly to avoid disappointment. Below is our handy Quick Course Guide, where you’ll find everything you’ll need to know…🌸💧

    https://poetryschool.com/new-courses/spring-2025-quick-course-guide/

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