On Thursday 6th June 6:30, the Common Press are delighted to host an event with Observer Debut Novelist Jessica Moor and actress and LGBTQ+ activist Jill Nalder (of Channel 4's 'It's A Sin), to celebrate the publication of Hold Back the Night.
Hold Back the Night is a blistering, heart-wrenching novel of complicity and atonement, delving into one nurse's experience of the little-known history of conversion therapy and the heart-breaking betrayal of the AIDS crisis.
Join Jessica and Jill in conversation with Hannah Hutchings-Georgiou, to discuss and reflect on these issues during Pride Month.
Jessica Moor
Jessica Moor is widely regarded as a real rising star in fiction. She was selected as one of the Observer's debut novelists of 2020, and her debut, Keeper, was chosen by the Sunday Times, Independent and Cosmopolitan as one of their top debuts of the year. It was further nominated for the Desmond Elliott Prize and an Edgar Award. Jessica studied English at Cambridge before completing a Creative Writing MA at Manchester University. Jessica is based in Brixton, South London. Follow her @jessicammoor.
Jill Nalder
Jill Nalder is originally from Neath, South Wales. She is a successful West End actress and was the inspiration behind Jill Baxter's character in Russell T. Davies' Channel 4 programme IT'S A SIN. She was also one of the founders and first chairperson of West End Cares, now called Theatre MAD: Make A Difference. To date the charity has raised over £10 million for HIV/AIDS.
About the host:
Hannah Hutchings-Georgiou
Hannah Hutchings-Georgiou is a writer, the founding editor-in-chief of Lucy Writers, and has a PhD in English Literature from UCL. She holds a BA in English Literature from Lucy Cavendish College, Cambridge, an MA in Eighteenth-Century Studies from King’s College London and a Diploma in Fine Art from Camberwell College of Arts. She regularly writes on art, dance and literature for magazines such as The London Magazine, The White Review, Elephant, Art Monthly, Wallpaper*, The Arts Desk, Burlington Contemporary, Worms Magazine and many others. From 2022-2023, Hannah managed an Arts Council England-funded project for emerging
women and non-binary writers from migrant backgrounds, titled What the Water Gave Us, in collaboration with The Ruppin Agency and Writers’ Studio, which resulted in an anthology of the same name. She is currently working on a hybrid work of creative non-fiction about women artists and drawing, an extract from which is published in Prototype’s 2023 anthology, Prototype 5. Read her work https://linktr.ee/hhgsparkles Follow her on Twitter @hhgsparkles and Instagram @hannahhg25
Event details:
- Date: Thursday 6th June
- Doors open: 6:30pm
- Event starts: 7pm
This event will be taking place in our downstairs event space which is sadly not wheelchair accessible. The event space is accessed via a flight of stairs with 22 steps and a handrail.