POLLY CLARK

December 11, 2017

Tiger prints in the Siberian snow…

The tracks, body imprints and grisly kills of wild Siberian tigers surrounded me. Every morning in Durminskoye Reserve in the Far East new tracks criss-crossed the perfect snow. The tracks were so fresh it was clear that tigers had patrolled their territories through the night within a couple of kilometres of where I slept. Deeper…

November 12, 2017

Siberian tiger tracking… the preparations

Two weeks today I will be airborne on my way to Moscow, then Khabarovsk, then deep into the taiga of the Far East… a long journey undertaken in order to track the majestic Siberian tiger. A small group of us, along with a guide, translator and cook will spend our days in temperatures of up…

October 9, 2017

Creative Scotland funding award for TIGER

I’m thrilled to announce that Creative Scotland have generously awarded funds towards my epic tiger tracking expedition taking place this winter. This trip is research for my second novel TIGER. Not a natural traveller, I am getting both apprehensive and excited as the moment approaches to don my super insulated costume and head for Siberia.…

September 27, 2017

BBC2 WH Auden film featuring Larchfield

STOP ALL THE CLOCKS: WH Auden in an Age of Anxiety, a new film by Adam Low. The film features the following writers and poets: Alan Bennett, Polly Clark (that’s me! Among icons!), Richard Curtis, James Fenton, Alexander McCall Smith and Paul Muldoon sharing our passion for Auden’s work and his enduring appeal. I posted HERE…

August 13, 2017

Edinburgh Book Festival: Maps for Lost Lovers

Tuesday August 15th, 10.15am in the Speigeltent with Annalena McAfee, author of HAME…. So excited to be appearing here! Two novels, set on the west coast of Scotland, explore how the imagination connects writers of different generations. In Hame, Annalena McAfee’s heroine Mhairi McPhail moves to the remote Scottish island of Fascaray to write a…

July 29, 2017

Society of Authors funding award for Tiger novel

Siberia here I come! Thanks to a generous award from the Society of Authors I will, this winter, be tracking Siberian tigers in a remote region of the Amur, part of the research for my second novel TIGER. Thank you SoA for making my dream possible. More detail to come!

July 20, 2017

Larchfield Paperback Cover

Even though the paperback is not published until March next year, I can’t contain my excitement about the cover! Publishing my debut novel has demonstrated many times over how much top flight creative talent goes into making a book what it is (not my talent, I hasten to add: another key realisation is that my…

July 3, 2017

LARCHFIELD longlisted for the Historical Writers Association Debut Crown

So excited to be on this longlist, and in some stellar historical fiction company, including Sarah Day’s Mussolini’s Island. I’m busy writing my next novel (see my post about tracking tigers in Siberia for more details!) but there’s no getting away from it, being included on a list lifts the heart — and busts the…

July 1, 2017

BBC2 Documentary about W.H. Auden

The writing of Larchfield has led so many wonderful experiences. First among them is the discovery of Auden’s life in Helensburgh, which is at the heart of the book. It gave me such joy and creative satisfaction to discover Auden (whose work I did not know well), and to imagine him so completely as the…

April 21, 2017

“Gripping turf wars of the mind” — Margaret Atwood on Larchfield

My hero Margaret Atwood was gripped by Larchfield, as was Edward Mendelson, WH Auden’s brilliant biographer and literary executor, who said: What a wonderfully satisfying and gratifying book Larchfield is: vivid, moving, sympathetic, beautifully shaped. Author and Auden expert Alexander McCall Smith has called the book A magnificent book — haunting and beautifully written. And…