‘Bit bigger than Bodmin, isn’t it.’

‘And busier.’

‘I mean, changeover at the meat-packing factory gets pretty hectic, but…’

We haven’t done a book fair since before the pandemic and I’ve never driven in central London. We passed Buckingham Palace and then drove right through the West End on our way to Conway Hall

‘How far till we’re there?’

‘Two and a half miles.’

‘Amazing. We’ll be there in a minute.’

‘Erm…’

‘What?’

‘Satnav says forty.’

‘Forty what?’

‘Forty minutes.’

‘Forty minutes for two and a half miles? How?’

It’s a gamble travelling up from Cornwall for a book fair and there’s a little bit to balance. We had very little idea how well books might sell at the two-day Small Publishers’ Fair but to even have a chance of making the travel and the three nights away worthwhile we had to take more than both of us could carry on the bus or train. So I packed just about everything - ten large boxes crammed full of books, as well as a couple of bags - into our little hatchback. The car sank with the weight.

‘Have I packed too much?’ I said, thinking I ought to check the tyres.

‘Where do I sit?’ Sarah asked.

I remember our first book fair in Conway Hall. It was maybe 2017 and we only had three or four books to sell. We were perched on the end of Atlantic Press’s table. This year, we had a full table to ourselves, next to Fine Press and Hercules Editions on one side and the book artist Friederike von Hellermann on the other, and behind us, back-to-back, was Prototype. These were just about all the book stalls I saw over the weekend.

We took around 40 titles this time, which included almost all of our poetry books still in print as well as a handful of non-fiction titles. Our featured book for the fair was Maia Elsner’s Dante Elsner, the story of her grandfather and his art, and we also had an event with readings from debuting Guillemot poet Prerana Kumar, who performed work from Ixora, and from Astra Papachristodoulou, whose Selected Variations for Bees we were launching at the fair.

Petals signing *Marsh-River-Raft-Feather*

Better-seasoned fair-goers told me the first day would be quiet, but we ended up selling more books than I had anticipated for the whole weekend, which was good because I hadn’t been able to fit all of our titles on the table when setting up on the Friday morning. There were groups of design and illustration students taking photos of the covers and asking questions about the paper stocks, and by the end of the day I could tell the illustration students simply by the three titles they picked up - Constellations, Signals, Eight Songs.

And there were loads of Guillemot poets. We don’t get to London often and with a number of titles launching during the covid lockdown and fallout years this was the first time I’d met some of them in person - Karenjit Sandhu, Prerana Kumar and Derek Beaulieu, for instance. Others we had met before and it was wonderful to catch up with them here - Astra Papachristodoulou, Camilla Nelson, David Harsent, Nancy Campbell, Petals Kalulé, Amy McCauley, Susie Campbell, J.R. Carpenter, and no doubt more…

David Harsent signing *Nine* & *Salt Moon*

I was hoarse by the end of the first day and by today (Monday morning) my throat is still gravelly and my voice an octave deeper than usual from talking so much.

Lessons learned?

People love shiny books. Our forthcoming Dorothy Lehane title, with its cover printed on the garishly bright Pastel Heart Attack from Gmund, was a special favourite.

I’m not sure about London drivers. Maybe they’re fine once they get out of their cars, rickshaws and bicycles, but once they’re on the road…
Tony Frazer of Shearsman is probably the best organised of us all. With his stackable boxes and folding hand truck he was in and out in seconds!
Vegetables make beautiful papyrus. If you haven’t already, check out the work of Dizzy Pragnell - I could see her table from across the hall and wished I could spend a little more time with it.
Derek Beaulieu’s name is not pronounced like the Hampshire village.

The fair was a terrific success for us - yes, in terms of sales, but also in terms of the people we spoke with - publishers, artists, students, writers and book lovers. I think some of the best people I’ve met have been in this little world of writers and artists and makers and it was a thrill to see so many of them here and to have a little time to talk about what we all do. And it was a privilege to be able to speak about books and publishing with my lovely neighbours - Jess at Prototype, Tammy at Hercules, Ghazal at Pamenar - and to join in Friederike’s ongoing game of finding people who were wearing clothes or had tattoos that mirrored her books. (Check out Friederike’s Instagram - the butterfly one is especially good!) Space is tight behind those tables and we were all shuffling and bustling about, so it’s handy to have good folk all about you.

We’re back in Cornwall now and I’m writing this up at dawn. There’s a little mist in the woods down the valley, above the river, and roe deer in the field. Today, I’ve got to do a stock take. We’ve sold out of Camille Ralphs’ limited edition box set altogether and I’m going to have to reprint a couple of those shiny books - Richard Carter’s Signals and Camilla Nelson’s EPIC, for instance. Then we can get ready to release that shiny Pastel Heart Attack book by Dorothy Lehane next week…