In this free online book launch, Sonia will be joined by special guest Gary Budden, and Tom Chivers who will be chairing the event. There will also be an opportunity to ask questions.

In Heavy Time psychogeographer Sonia Overall takes to the old pilgrim roads, navigating a route from Canterbury to Walsingham via London and her home town of Ely.

Vivid in her evocation of a landscape of ancient chapels, ruined farms and suburban follies, Overall’s secular pilgrim elevates the ordinary, collecting roadside objects — feathers, a bingo card, a worn penny — as relics. Facing injury and interruption, she takes the path of the lone woman walker, seeking out ‘thin places’ where past and present collide, and where new ways of living might begin.

‘It is a talisman of a book. Heavy Time doesn't just describe a pilgrimage, it becomes one, for both writer and reader. It is an invitation to resist 'busyness', to think of ourselves as explorers, to seek out 'the everyday divine'. It has sent me out looking for 'thin places: pockets in the landscape where the membrane is so tightly stretched that other worlds might shine through.’ Beautiful and essential.’ - Helen Mort

You can preorder the book here.

You will be sent joining instructions for this event hosted by Zoom.

Sonia Overall is a writer, psychogeographer and writing tutor living in East Kent. Her published work includes novels, poetry, short stories, academic articles and features, many of which touch on psychogeography, spirit of place and aspects of the weird. Sonia is a member of the Walking Artists Network and founder and curator of Women Who Walk, a network for walking academics and creatives. She is currently a Senior Lecturer at Canterbury Christ Church University, where she runs the MA in Creative Writing.

Gary Budden is a writer, editor and the co-founder of award-winning independent publisher, Influx Press. He is the author of London Incognita (Dead Ink, 2020), Hollow Shores (Dead Ink, 2017), the Shirley Jackson Award-Shortlisted Judderman (Eden Book Society, 2018), and These Towers Will One Day Slip Into the Sea (2021) and The White Heron Beneath the Reactor w/ artist Maxim Griffin (2019). His writing has appeared in numerous magazines and journals including Ambit, Nightscript, Gorse, The Quietus, Structo, Minor Literature(s), Confingo, Uncertainties, The Lonely Crowd and many more.