In this episode, we read a passage from Okechukwu Nzelu's Here Again Now (p.47 of the UK paperback). You can buy this book and Nzelu's previous novel from your local bookshop or at Bookshop.org [https://uk.bookshop.org/p/books/here-again-now-written-in-exquisite-prose-and-told-with-compassion-and-tenderness-brit-bennett-author-of-the-vanishing-half-okechukwu-nzelu/4957903?ean=9780349701097]. Dr Okechukwu Nzelu FRSL won a Northern Writers' Award from New Writing North in 2015. His debut novel, The Private Joys of Nnenna Maloney [https://www.waterstones.com/book/the-private-joys-of-nnenna-maloney/okechukwu-nzelu/9780349701035] (Dialogue Books, 2019), won a Betty Trask Award; it was also shortlisted for the Desmond Elliott Prize and the Polari First Book Prize, and longlisted for the Portico Prize. In 2021, it was selected for the Kingston University Big Read and distributed to all staff and students at three universities. His second novel, Here Again Now [https://geni.us/HereAgainNow] (Dialogue Books, 2022) was shortlisted for the Royal Society of Literature Encore Award, the Polari Prize, the Jhalak Prize and the Diverse Book Awards. He has made several appearances on national radio, and is a regular contributor to Kinfolk magazine. He is a non-executive director of ALCS and CLA, and Lecturer in Creative Writing at Lancaster University. In 2024 he was elected a Fellow of the Royal Society of Literature. Episode references: * Jane Austen, Virginia Woolf * John Milton, Paradise Lost * Janet Burroway (with Elizabeth and Ned Stuckey-French), Writing Fiction [https://uk.bookshop.org/p/books/writing-fiction-tenth-edition-a-guide-to-narrative-craft-janet-burroway/2482624?ean=9780226616698] * Walt Whitman, Leaves of Grass * Zora Neale Hurston, Their Eyes Were Watching God [https://uk.bookshop.org/p/books/their-eyes-were-watching-god-zora-neale-hurston/161660?ean=9780349019680] * D.H. Lawrence, The Rainbow * George Eliot, Middlemarch * John Williams, Stoner [https://uk.bookshop.org/p/books/stoner-a-novel-john-williams/3261498?ean=9780099561545] Follow the show (and Okechukwu [https://www.instagram.com/nzeluwrites/?hl=en-gb]) on Instagram [https://www.instagram.com/booksupclose]. Please leave feedback here [https://forms.office.com/Pages/ResponsePage.aspx?id=ur7mk6rEMUevXdc1sJfq2-MtVOsMawJDpBA3aJ944dVUMkI4OTA3N0dBMUE2SDVJWlpaOE8zNlo4NC4u]. Produced, hosted, and edited by Chris Lloyd [https://www.instagram.com/chrisllloyd9].