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Nicola Garrard 🏳️‍🌈BLM @nmgarrard.bsky.social · 1d

Know your history! My recommendations for #BlackHistoryMonth are David Olusoga’s sweeping history #BlackAndBritish & Samuel Selvon’s #TheLonelyLondoners. Olusoga’s chilling Preface, about the 70s & 80s racism & ethno-nationalism in his childhood, reads like an account of today.

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Nicola Chester @nicolawriting.bsky.social · Aug 2

Exciting #booksky post, all in just over a week! All subjects so close to my heart: #TheEmpathyFix, #NeurodivergentbyNature, #LoveAngerBetrayal, #OntheEdge, #Fenwomen & #Village added to my pile of books tbr, that will inform, enlighten, move & enrich my life, writing & understanding. Books eh? 1/4

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Nicola Garrard 🏳️‍🌈BLM @nmgarrard.bsky.social · 10d

The family in #ontheedge fish, forage & scrump for free food, just like my family does. I spent a lot of time as a child gathering mushrooms with my parents, but I didn’t put that in the novel for obvious reasons! Don’t collect mushrooms if you don’t know what you’re doing!
#foodforfree #forestfood

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Nicola Garrard 🏳️‍🌈BLM @nmgarrard.bsky.social · 10d

It’s been a bumper Ceptember! 🍄‍🟫Scroll through the photos to see what I made with these penny buns (AKA cep, porcini, boletus) We eat like kings for free! Super yellow eggs thanks to my garden hens. 🥰

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Nicola Garrard 🏳️‍🌈BLM @nmgarrard.bsky.social · 12d

Thank you Midhurst Rother College for inviting me to visit your school😁. It was great talking to Yr 9 about the history of protest & the dangers of extremism. I loved discussing the causes of riots with your A-Level Politics students. Teenagers are really engaged in the issues in #OnTheEdge!🥰

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Nicola Garrard 🏳️‍🌈BLM @nmgarrard.bsky.social · 13d

Wait till you meet a raven!

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Nicola Garrard 🏳️‍🌈BLM @nmgarrard.bsky.social · 13d

“When I eventually encounter the gang, I'm faced with a 14-year-old girl in pink leggings and Crocs.”
Interesting how the BBC journalist codes socioeconomic background without naming it. Now let’s talk about the 1,243 youth centres closed since 2010.😠

www.bbc.co.uk/news/article...

Teenage girls with no fear of police torment shopkeepers on Shirley High Street

Teenagers have been targeting shops in Shirley, Hampshire, with antisocial behaviour - leaving the owners feeling

www.bbc.co.uk

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Nicola Garrard 🏳️‍🌈BLM @nmgarrard.bsky.social · 13d

“A comment on the state of Britain worthy of Dickens … a major tour de force and I cannot recommend it enough.”

I love this very detailed and thoughtful ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️review of #OnTheEdge on Amazon. Thank you, Piers! 🥰
@oldbarnbooks

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Nicola Garrard 🏳️‍🌈BLM @nmgarrard.bsky.social · 14d

I was thrilled today to receive an early copy of Nicola Chester’s beautiful new book, #GhostsOfTheFarm. The Preface is stunning - I can’t wait to read the rest of it. Thank you, @chelseagreen 🌱❤️
#ruralhistory #sustainability #environment #womeninfarming #farminghistory

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Nicola Garrard 🏳️‍🌈BLM @nmgarrard.bsky.social · 14d

Thanks to Phil Hewitt, Arts Editor at @sussex_express @Sussex_World for the interview - and a shout-out for my Chichester Literary Society event in January 2026! ❤️🔥

www.sussexexpress.co.uk/news/coastal...

Coastal tensions and violence explored in new book

The dangers of extremism and the challenges of many of our coastal communities are at the heart of On the Edge (Old Barn Books), the latest novel from Nicola Garrard who lives near Petworth.

www.sussexexpress.co.uk

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Nicola Garrard 🏳️‍🌈BLM @nmgarrard.bsky.social · 15d

I LOVE getting photos of #OnTheEdge in its natural habitat - a sunny, sandy beach. ❤️🔥🌊🏄 This copy looks like it might have been handled by chippy and/or ice-creamy fingers! Even better!😂

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Nicola Garrard 🏳️‍🌈BLM @nmgarrard.bsky.social · 16d

More book signing in the Old Barn! Teachers don’t give lines as punishment anymore but signing 70+ copies makes me feel like a kid doing lines, except instead of “I must write neatly” it’s “Nicola Garrard”! 😂Buy your signed copy of #ontheedge from @oldbarnbooks Thank you!😁🥰

Nicola Garrard 🏳️‍🌈BLM @nmgarrard.bsky.social · 16d

This book got me! 🤩🐴❤️#ahorsenamedsky by Rosanne Parry is set in the US with talking mustangs…sounds sentimental, right? NOT AT ALL! It’s brilliant. I SUSPENDED ALL DISBELIEF, handed in my adult reader card & became a child again. Get this book for the 7-13yos in your life⭐️💫

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Just Imagine @justimaginecentre.bsky.social · Apr 5

Here are our first book reviews for April. Thank you Lisa Hagan, Jayne Truran, Nicola Garrard, @stephenconnor.bsky.social
@edfinch.bsky.social Helen Dearing, Theresa Gooda and @jobowers.bsky.social
for your reviews this week:
justimagine.co.uk/childrens-bo...

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UKLA @uklitassociation.bsky.social · Aug 13

Written by UKLA Award winner, Nicola Garrard, On the Edge follows Rhys and his brothers, struggling to get by in an off-season tourist resort. When their home is threatened, Rhys resorts to drastic measures to protect his family. Members, repost to be in with a chance to win #lucky13th

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Nicola Chester @nicolawriting.bsky.social · Aug 2

Here are #TheEmpathyFix, a radical rethink of how we perceive poverty, & break the cycle from @keetieroelen.bsky.social, & #OntheEdge, a YA crossover novel on young lives & the dangers of rural hardship & inequality, from Nicola Garrard 2/4 #booksky

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Nicola Garrard 🏳️‍🌈BLM @nmgarrard.bsky.social · 17d

Fantastic list! I’ve written a blog for the Federation of Children’s Book Groups about politics in children’s fiction fcbg.org.uk/on-the-edge-...

On the Edge by Nicola Garrard

‘If you want to change the world, pick up your pen and write.’ Martin Luther King. In this post, Nicola Garrard, teacher and author of On the Edge, argue

fcbg.org.uk

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Nicola Garrard 🏳️‍🌈BLM @nmgarrard.bsky.social · 18d

I was so happy when I was sent this photo, taken in a bookshop in Exeter! #ontheedge, next to the wonderful #kingofnothing surrounded by the bestselling YA post-apocalyptic, speculative, romance, fantasy and romantasy😂 #ukya #trendingteens @oldbarnbooks

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Nicola Chester @nicolawriting.bsky.social · 21d

they are felled time & time again by societal unfairness.
A genuine page turner, stunningly written, with a message both from history & for our time. An essential beach read for kindness, & when thinking about booking your holidays, for any age. I loved these tender, angry, seasalt-on-wounds boys!

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Nicola Garrard 🏳️‍🌈BLM @nmgarrard.bsky.social · 21d

Thank you so much! This means the world to me ❤️❤️❤️❤️

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Nicola Chester @nicolawriting.bsky.social · 21d

Raw, urgent, lyrical, funny & full of angry power & love @nmgarrard.bsky.social has created richly authentic characters & lives we rarely hear about, but should. Adolescent, working class boys in rural & seaside towns, pushed to the edge; unsupported by a system that disposes of them once used 2/3

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Nicola Chester @nicolawriting.bsky.social · 21d

As school librarian, I’m lucky I’m alive to the utter brilliance of YA/crossover fiction (do try it! It keeps you in touch, current, fresh-thinking & boy, it’s where it’s at!) This is one of the very best I’ve read for our time #OntheEdge @nmgarrard.bsky.social @oldbarnbooks.bsky.social #booksky 1/3

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Nicola Garrard 🏳️‍🌈BLM @nmgarrard.bsky.social · Sep 7

Subscribe to the excellent Caught by the River @caughtbytheriver.bsky.social newsletter for a chance to WIN one of three copies of #ontheedge😁🤩🥰 @oldbarnbooks.bsky.social
www.caughtbytheriver.net/explore/topi...

Explore > Events | Caught by the River

www.caughtbytheriver.net

Nicola Garrard 🏳️‍🌈BLM @nmgarrard.bsky.social · Sep 6

On the Edge has hit the shores of Jersey! 🔥❤️😁

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Nicola Garrard 🏳️‍🌈BLM @nmgarrard.bsky.social · Sep 6

I had an absolutely brilliant night at the beautiful @petworthbooks with my wonderful publisher, Ruth Huddleston @oldbarnbooks We celebrated #OntheEdge in style! Thank you so much everyone for coming!🥳🤩🥰

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