Join us to celebrate the new lyrical and beautiful novel by local author Cecilia Knapp and discuss everything about contemporary womanhood, existentialism, grief, and love in all its forms.

Cecilia will be in conversation with the brilliant Naomi May. There will be time for a Q&A with the audience and signings from the author.

Cecilia Knapp is a poet and novelist and the Young People’s Laureate for London 2020/2021. She was shortlisted for the 2022 Forward prize for best single poem. She is the winner of the 2021 Ruth Rendell award and has been shortlisted for both the Rebecca Swift Women’s prize and the Outspoken poetry prize. Her debut poetry collection Peach Pig was published by Corsair in 2022 and was the Observer’s poetry book of the month for October. Her poems have appeared in The Financial Times, Granta, The White Review, Wasafiri, Popshot, Ambit, Magma and bath magg and anthologised. She curated the anthology Everything is Going to be alright: Poems for When you Really Need Them, published by Trapeze in 2021. Her debut novel Little Boxes is published by The Borough Press. In 2023, Little Boxes was longlisted for The Authors Club Best First Novel Award. Her second novel Lack will be published in 2026 by The Borough Press.

Naomi May is a seasoned culture journalist and editor with over ten years’ worth of experience in shaping stories and building digital communities. After graduating with a First Class Honours from City University's prestigious Journalism course, Naomi joined the Evening Standard, where she worked across both the newspaper and website. She is now the Digital Editor at ELLE Magazine and has written features for the likes of The Guardian, Vogue, Vice and Refinery29, among many others. Naomi is also the host of the ELLE Collective book club.

We apologise for the inconvenience but our bookshop is currently not wheelchair accessible.

The toilets are located on the ground floor.

The event space/bookroom café is located at the top of a staircase (17 steps).

Please do get in touch if you’d like to know more details to plan your visit ahead.

Email is: salomee@kemptownbookshop.co.uk

Contact the host of Existentialism and womanhood - Lack by Cecilia Knapp