Allen Ashley

One of the most distinctive voices in modern literature, Allen Ashley has been published in dozens of books and magazines in the UK, USA, Canada and Spain and has now passed his first century of short story publications. Allen is a highly respected author equally adept at novels, short stories, poetry and lyrics. He is also well known for a wealth of critical commentary and non-fiction articles and, more recently, as an acclaimed and award winning editor.

Allen has run successful writing workshops in Newham and Tower Hamlets libraries. In October 2005 he gave two readings at the Norwich Fringe Festival. In November 2005 he was the special guest of the Birmingham Science Fiction Group. In May 2006 he ran a writing workshop in Derby as part of the very first "Alt. Fiction Day". On 2nd June 2006 he was the Guest of Honour at The British Fantasy Society (BFS) Open Night at The Devereux Arms, London WC2. On 7th July 2006 he compered the annual BFS "Showcase" evening, also at The Devereux.. At Fantasycon 2006 he moderated a panel on "Independent Versus Mainstream Editing" and was also thrilled to receive the BFS Best Anthology award as editor of "The Elastic Book Of Numbers". At Fantasycon 2007 he moderated a panel entitled "The Small Press - Building and Maintaining an Audience".

Allen writes lyrics for the London-based band Foul House. To hear Foul House perform some of their songs - including "Gravity Space", "Work Song" and "Rescue", all with lyrics by Allen - go to "My Space" and click on "FoulHouse2006".

At various stages of his fascinating career, Allen has also been a performance poet, a singer / songwriter, a cabaret organiser, a music critic and a football journalist. As well as loads of instantly recognisable pieces with the by-line "Allen Ashley", he currently writes under a different name for the London listings magazine Time Out. Rumours that he has published the occasional story under another moniker are thought to be well founded.