This sort of thing’s getting to be old hat for Tindal Street Press, who had Catherine O’Flynn’s ‘What Was Lost’ longlisted last year.  Gaynor Arnold, on the other hand, has spent the past 40 years or so working as a social worker in Birmingham and took five years to write the novel.

Of course you may already be aware of all this – the Birmingham Post picked up on it first and the Custard Factory blog and BiNS both mentioned it.  Also, The Times have a short interview with Gaynor and the Guardian have also run a rather flattering piece entitled ‘Why Birmingham rules the literary roost‘.