Jen Bowden
Jen Bowden
Journalist, editor and writer, Jen Bowden, is originally from Wingate, County Durham (the pit village that her novel setting is based on). She chose to work with an international team for this series to increase representation and diversity of North of England stories and settings.
Jen’s podcast – Northern Voices – explores Northern writers (published and unpublished), publishing and stories. She has a PhD in Creative Writing from Curtin University, researching how the use of Northern working-class dialect in contemporary fiction might affect the UK book industry's response to that work. Her journalism has appeared in the Guardian, the Scotsman, the List and, recently, The Bookseller, among others. She also hosts the Readers & Writers Podcast for Arts Margaret River. You can find Jen on Instagram and Twitter @jenbowden12
About the series
One for Sorrow, the first book of the trilogy, takes us to 1973 where the residents of the fictional North East pit village of Blackton are already struggling with the weight of knowing the pit is both life-giving and life-taking. After a devastating explosion burdens the village with more tragedy, brother and sister Dan and Sarah Bradley, and miner Joe Bernard must pull together with their community and do everything they can to bear their collective grief. The second novel, Two for Joy, formed the creative component of Jen’s PhD and follows the same characters through the turmoil of the 84/85 miners' strike. The third, Three for a Girl, explores how community has moved online, and is set around the time of Brexit and the result of the Hillsborough Inquiry.