Supposedly, pre-ordering helps the algorithm – whatever that means – but who knows! In any case, if you enjoyed The Fountain in the Forest, or any of my previous novels, then maybe you’ll enjoy this one: Phantom at the Feast, out 18 June from No Exit Press.
The cover features the incredible London photography of Chris Dorley-Brown, and typography by designer Mark Ecob – what a privilege.
I can’t wait to see how Phantom… looks in the shops. Once it’s out, if you should happen to see it on your travels, do feel free to take a photo and send or share it with me!
Watch this space – or my events and bookings page – for news of gigs, talks, readings and appearances around publication.
I am thrilled to have at least been longlisted for the 2025 Artangel Open, one of the most prestigious and ambitious public art commissions in the world. My proposal was inspired by the outdoor pulpit that is part of St Luke’s church in Plymouth (part of the The Box museum and art gallery) which I saw for the first time while visiting my friend the artist George Shaw’s exhibition there in 2022, and which reminded me of similar but disused or semi-derelict outdoor pulpits that I know of in London and elsewhere.
Here’s the Artangel info and judging panel:
The 2025 Artangel Open invited artists based anywhere in the world to submit ambitious ideas. We received over 1,000 submissions from 80 countries, conveying the breadth of what artists are thinking about across the world. The panel for the 2025 Open included artist Zineb Sedira; musician, producer and composer Nitin Sawhney CBE; Artistic Director and co-Chief Executive of Dance Umbrella Freddie Opoku-Addaie; previously-commissioned Artangel Open artist Andrea Luka Zimmerman; and director of Artangel Mariam Zulfiqar. Read more about each of the panelists at the bottom of this page.
If it is of interest, here (with two minor updates) is my application.
Summarise your idea. *
Your response to this question can be up to 350 characters long, which is approximately 100 words.
Discovering Britain’s disused outdoor pulpits and bringing them back to life (with local partners and a national campaign) for a country-wide programme of local outdoor spoken-word events, developing writers networks, local history and opportunities via an overlooked outdoor performance infrastructure that is hiding in plain sight.
0/350
More about your proposal *
Your response to this question can be up to 1500 characters long, which is approximately 400 words.
Inspired by an open-air pulpit at St Luke’s church, Plymouth (seen while visiting George Shaw exhibition, 2022), I have identified an unmapped network of disused open-air pulpits around the UK. These could become sites for new kinds of public spoken word events involving local writers groups and literary organisations. I have so far identified fourteen open-air pulpits mainly on church sites. These include, in London: Holy trinity church, Marylebone Road; St James’s, Piccadilly; St Augustine’s, South Kensington; Christchurch, Brixton; St Paul’s Cathedral. In the SE: St. George Church, Brentwood, Essex; St John’s Church, Reading; St Nicholas Church, Cranleigh. In the SW: St Lukes, Plymouth. In the Midlands: St. Martin’s, Birmingham; the old Pulpit, Cathedral Church of St Michael Coventry; the ‘Refectory Pulpit’ Shrewsbury Abbey; Cucklet Delf, Eyam. In the North: St Stephen’s, Tockholes, Lancs. Wales: St Tudno’s, Great Orme; the Pulpit Yew, Nantglyn. In Scotland: the Pulpit Rock, Ardlui, Loch Lomond and Trossachs National Park. This is important to me because I have been performing spoken-word prose works since the late 1980s. Reading my prose to live audiences was my path to getting published and becoming a novelist, and may be for others. This would entail R&D/location work, site-visits, media campaigns, work with site-owners, libraries, literature-development organisations, museums, local history groups etc.to re-animate these historic sites for new spoken word events.0/1500
Your response to this question can be up to 1500 characters long, which is approximately 400 words.
I’m the author of novels incl. The Fountain in the Forest (Faber and Faber, 2018), and Foxy-T (Faber and Faber, 2003). My next novel Phantom at the Feast is out in [June 2026]. I’m currently the RLF Fellow at Royal Holloway University of London. I am editor/publisher of the artists’ book series Piece of Paper Press, founded in 1994, recently exhibited at Matt’s Gallery, London. I present the occasional radio programme Literature Live on Resonance FM. I’ve delivered major projects for the Science Museum’s Atmosphere Commission 2013, with Blast Theory for Channel 4, and Situations in Bristol & have professional contacts in libraries, festivals, NPOs uk-wide. My 2012 novella Dicky Star and the Garden Rule, was published by Forma alongside a touring exhibition by Jane and Louise Wilson for the Chernobyl 25th anniversary. I worked for Arts Council England 1997–2007, & chaired the board of London arts radio station Resonance 104.4fm 2010–2018. I’ve been writer in residence at the Science Museum, UCL, and the city of Split, Croatia among others, and am associate lecturer on the Creative Writing MA at Birkbeck. I’ve performed spoken word since the late ’80s and given hundreds of readings from my novels and short stories in bookshops, libraries, literature and music festivals including Glastonbury, museums, galleries, pubs and nightclubs all over the UK and internationally. These skills can be shared, & make me confident we could deliver a great large-scale local project.
An event to celebrate the publication of Tony White’s new novel, Phantom at the Feast. All welcome. BOOKING ESSENTIAL
Join us for readings from and discussion about Tony White’s seventh novel Phantom at the Feast (No Exit Press). Tony will be in conversation with Dr Will Montgomery of Royal Holloway University of London, and there will be time for a Q&A.
Police stations are outdated and AIs make more efficient detectives, or so says a UK Home Office determined to make cuts. When the sole witness in a trafficking case is discovered brutally murdered, a brass horseshoe forced between his teeth, DS King is summoned back to London and into a labyrinth of memory, music, and political unrest.
This is the first public event for Tony White’s latest novel Phantom at the Feast, published by No Exit Press on 18 June 2026. Phantom at the Feast is the follow up to Tony White’s critically acclaimed The Fountain in the Forest (2018) which will be reissued by No Exit Press in December 2026.
Dicky Star and the Garden Rule was commissioned to mark the then twenty-fifth anniversary of the Chernobyl disaster, and was published in the form of an A5 chapbook alongside a touring exhibition by the artists Jane and Louise Wilson.
The novella is out of print currently, but an ebook edition is available on request.
Tony White’s novella, Dicky Star and the Garden Rule, published to coincide with the photograph exhibition Atomgrad: Nature Abhors a Vacuum (2011) by Jane and Louise Wilson, is set in the UK city of Leeds in the days following the Chernobyl reactor explosion on 26 April 1986. In the story, Jeremy, a chronically depressed and unemployed artist, draws associations between a photograph of the destroyed reactor published in the Guardian newspaper and the narrative of a Fantasy novel by Michael Moorcock, The Warhound and the World’s Pain (1981) . . . Chernobyl proliferates and evades Jeremy’s representative memory, acting as indicator of the real object’s withdrawn properties and its sensual horror affect in the frantic, Gothic intertextuality woven by White’s novella…
I love that: ‘frantic, Gothic intertextuality’!
Here’s the blurb:
A textually rich, historically informed and theoretically sophisticated account of the Chernobyl crisis, its cultural antecedents and its aftermath in global culture. This scholarly monograph explores the published eyewitness testimonies, poetry and literature surrounding the 1986 Chernobyl nuclear disaster. It argues for the contextualisation of the disaster’s collective traumatic wound and its Soviet political repression through public articulation of survivor experience and its interpretation by the trauma narratives of Science Fiction and the Gothic.
I was delighted to discover this week (from one of my Birkbeck MA students) that The London Archives has a book group – an online discussion group that meets monthly – and that their chosen book this month is my novel The Fountain in the Forest! I hadn’t actually heard of The London Archives book group before, but it sounds really interesting. Their mission? To enjoy London literature with an archives twist. What’s not to like?
Recent London Archives book group choices have included Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy by John le Carré, and The Lowlife by Alexander Baron among many others. So Fountain is in some great company.
Here’s their blurb:
The London Archives’ Book Group meets monthly to discuss literature, both fiction and non-fiction alike with a London theme. The group gains further insights through discussion about the book which is complemented by the use of historical documents from our collections.
The history and the people of London have always inspired writers, and the capital features in thousands of novels, history books, biographies and more. The books we enjoy can focus on any period in London’s history.w
Prior to the meeting, our London Archives’ team investigate the archives to discover original documents that relate to the book or the author. We meet virtually using ‘Zoom’ and details of how to join are sent out once you book your free place.
I should say that the event is not something I’ve set up or been involved with, which makes it all the more thrilling to hear about. Especially when The Fountain in the Forest is currently out of print, at least until the No Exit Press reissue which is scheduled for publication 3 December 2026. But nonetheless I continue to find it both wondrous and fascinating how books have lives of their own…
ICYMI my new novel Phantom at the Feast, which is the follow-up to The Fountain in The Forest, is published on 18 June 2026.
The London Archives book group — what a great idea. I wonder what archival materials they will find to complement and inform the discussion!
My occasional radio programme Literature Live returns at 8:00 pm on 4 May for a new season on London’s arts radio station Resonance 104.4fm – broadcasting on FM in London, online and on DAB. Thereafter the series will air at 8:00 pm on the second Monday of each month for the rest of 2026 (excluding the August break).
Here’s the blurb:
London author Tony White presents readings and chat with some of the best novelists and short story writers around, in a monthly programme focusing on live literature with the emphasis on authors reading from and discussing their fiction live on the air. Repeats the following Tuesday (next day) at 10:00 am.
On 4 May Tony is joined by the authors S.J. Fowler and Andrea Mason.
SJ Fowler is a writer, poet and performer living in London. His collections include I will show you the life of the mind (on prescription drugs) (Dostoyevsky Wannabe, 2020), The Great Apes (Broken Sleep Books, 2022) and The Parts of the Body that Stink (Hesterglock, 2024). His work has become known for its exploration of the potential of poetry, alongside collaboration, curation, asemic writing, sound poetry, concrete poetry, and improvised talking performances. He has been commissioned by institutions such as the The National Gallery, Tate Modern, Wellcome Collection and Southbank Centre, and he has presented his work at over fifty international festivals, including Hay Xalapa, Mexico; Dhaka Lit Fest; Hay Arequipa, Peru; and the Niniti Festival, Iraq. Fowler was nominated for the White Review Short Story Prize, 2014, and his short stories have appeared in anthologies including Isabel Waidner’s edited collection Liberating the Canon (Dostoyevsky Wannabe, 2018). In 2022, Tenement Press published MUEUM, Fowler’s debut novella, which was shortlisted for the 2022/2023 edition of the Republic of Consciousness Prize for Small Presses.
Andrea Mason is a writer and artist based in London. Publications include: Book Drawings 1-12, Piece of Paper Press (042), 2023; Waste Extractions (Fiction pamphlet) Broken Sleep Books, 2022; ‘Ada & Carter’ limited edition handmade pamphlet, Aleph Press, 2020 (a winner of the Aleph Writing Prize, 2020). She was Runner Up in the Desperate Literature Short Fiction Prize, 2023, was shortlisted for the Manchester Fiction Prize, 2020, and shortlisted for the inaugural Fitzcarraldo Editions Novel Prize, 2018. Recent anthology publications include: 22 Fictions: New Writing from Desperate Literature & Brick Lane Bookshop (2025, Cheerio publishing); Cybernetics, or Ghosts? Stories from Myth to A.I. (2024, Subtext Books); Eleven Stories (2023, Desperate Literature).
And watch this space for two more superb author guests on Literature Live, Monday 8 June at 8:00 pm!
I’m pleased to share that I’m joining Chris Simmons (Chair), Harriet Tyce and Laura Wilson on the judging panel for the Crime Writers’ Association Short Story Dagger 2027, the prize awarded to the best crime-focused short story of the year published or broadcast in the UK. The CWA Daggers 2027 opened for submissions yesterday. So UK authors and publishers – whether big five, independent or small press – if you have any crime-focused short story published or being broadcast in the UK this year (i.e. from 1 January 2026 to 31 December 2026 inclusive) do check out your eligibility, entry process, and T&Cs on the CWA site right now.
Having written dozens of stories since the mid-nineties, and published a fair few by others (in anthologies, in magazines or as limited editions on Piece of Paper Press) as well as having taught the short story in UK universities, I know that at bottom I agree with the late great Ursula K Le Guin: each story sets its own rules, you just have to follow them.
But I also know that we write short stories for as many reasons as there are writers. Perhaps to try something out or to find a new approach, to take an idea for a walk, to test a voice or test ourselves, to take risks and to be opportunistic, to contribute-to or collaborate-with, in response to invitations, deadlines, events or ideas, for the fun or the challenge or the love of it, out of rage or shame or ‘I’ll show you’, to hone our craft, or for the pleasure of making something work, to be part of a conversation or a community, to participate in the circulation of ideas, as an intrinsic part of a creative writing course (like the ones I currently teach at Birkbeck University of London, and the University of Essex), or simply to surprise, delight, shock, amuse or confound the reader or the listener. My expectations as a judge on the CWA Short Story Dagger will be informed by these infinite variations and motivations, and by the endless versatility of the short story form; enjoying how at best every author can make it their own.
Short stories are often seen as a hard sell in the book industry, yet they persist as a form. Short stories continue to be written and published, and to have a kind of currency and attraction for writers and readers at any time and at any scale, from entry-point to late work, from the mainstream to the margins, cutting across hierarchies and issues of diversity, status, access and representation. I’m also aware that some of the most adventurous short story publishing in recent years has been done by small presses – and it was from small presses that I got my first breaks in the industry. So I hope that publishing houses large and small as well as individual authors will check their eligibility and consider entering their best crime-focused short stories published this year for the CWA Short Story Dagger 2027. I can’t wait to read the submissions!
*DRUM ROLL* – cover reveal! My new novel Phantom at the Feast, the follow-up to The Fountain in the Forest, is published by No Exit Press on 18 June ’26. It has a stunning cover designed by Mark Ecob, with image by the great London photographer Chris Dorley-Brown. I’m so delighted to share it with you now, along with a pre-order link ahead of publication.
Police stations are outdated, and AI’s make more efficient detectives, or so says a UK Home Office determined to make cuts
When the sole witness in a trafficking case is discovered brutally murdered, a brass horseshoe forced between his teeth, Detective Sergeant Rex King is summoned back to London and into a labyrinth of memory, music, and political unrest. From The Clash’s ragged 1985 busking tour to the fractured legacy of the anti-nuclear movement, Rex follows threads that tug uncomfortably at his own history – echoes he can’t quite place, shadows that refuse to settle.
When Rex’s boss, DCI ‘Lollo’ Lawrence, suddenly disappears, and long-buried papers from the Miners’ Strike surface, he must work alongside a sharp young detective, a seasoned former soul boy, and the National Crime Agency’s unsettlingly brilliant new AI. Yet the deeper he travels, the more he finds the investigation folding back on him: professional loyalties strained, personal relationships tested, and accusations from his undercover past threatening to unmake him.
Two murders, one ‘misper’ and a force under fire – has former ‘spycop’ DS Rex King finally met his match?
Piece of Paper Press & tonywhite.london 
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