Back in the summer of 2008, some local artists and performers got together to create a celebration that would bring the community of Hebden Bridge, Yorkshire together through art. Since then, the Handmade Parade has grown into one of the biggest events in the town's calendar. It draws thousands of spectators from across the UK and guest artists from around the world. It's a unique event for a unique town. This book tells the story of the people who helped to make it such a success.
Author Biography:
Linda Green is the bestselling author of eight novels. Her latest psychological thriller, After I've Gone, published by Quercus, is a top five Amazon kindle bestseller. Her previous psychological thriller, While My Eyes Were Closed, was the sixth bestselling novel on Amazon kindle in 2016, selling more than 450,000 copies across all editions. Linda was born in North London in 1970 and brought up in Hertfordshire. She wrote her first novella, the Time Machine, aged nine, but unfortunately the pony-based time travel thriller genre never took off. Linda joined her local newspaper, the Enfield Gazette, as a trainee reporter at eighteen. During a ten year career in regional journalism she worked as a reporter on the Birmingham Daily News, news editor on the Birmingham Metro News and Chief Feature Writer on the Coventry Evening Telegraph, winning Highly Commended in the Feature Writer of the Year category of the 1997 Press Gazette Regional Press Awards. By 1998 she left her staff job to write her first novel and work as a freelance journalist. She has written for The Guardian, The Independent on Sunday, The Times Educational Supplement, The Big Issue, Wanderlust and Community Care Magazine. After more than a hundred rejections from agents (and more rewrites than she cares to remember) she finally obtained a two-book deal with Headline Review in 2006. Her first novel I Did a Bad Thing was published in paperback in October 2007 and made the top thirty official fiction bestsellers list. 10 Reasons Not to Fall in Love was published in paperback in March 2009 and reached no 22 in the official fiction bestseller charts. Both novels were also long-listed for the RNA Romantic Novel of the Year Award. They were followed by Things I Wish I'd Known, which was a top thirty paperback bestseller and And Then It Happened, which was a top forty bestseller. After five years with Headline she left to join Quercus in 2011. Her fifth novel The Mummyfesto, published in 2013, told the story of three women who set up a new political party and stand in the general election and was featured on Radio Four's Woman's Hour. Her sixth novel The Marriage Mender was published in August 2014. Linda's first psychological thriller, While My Eyes Were Closed was published in ebook in January 2016 and paperback in May 2016 and has gone on to sell more than 450,000 copies across all editions. Her latest novel, After I've Gone, has already made the top five on Amazon kindle. Linda lives in West Yorkshire with her husband and son. She enjoys travelling and has trekked after wild orang-utans in Borneo, been to the edge of the Arctic Circle to see polar bears and as far south as Tierra del Fuego to photograph penguins. She also enjoyed taking former PM David Cameron to task on Leadership Question Time in 2015. For more info, please go to Linda's website at www.linda-green.com, like @lindagreenauthor on Facebook and follow @LindaGreenisms on Twitter. Andrew Kim (Puppet and Mask Maker, Performer and Director) was born in Korea, raised and educated in the USA. Andrew has created and performed puppet and mask plays, parades and pageants for over 25 years with In the Heart of the Beast Theatre, Bread & Puppet Theater, Horse and Bamboo, Theatret Thalias Tjenere (Denmark) and with his own company Thingumajig Theatre. Andrew has served as an organiser, giant puppet maker, puppeteer and stilt walker in events throughout the UK, Ireland, France, Germany, Luxembourg, Denmark, Hungary, Poland, Italy, UAE, USA, Canada, China, Taiwan and Korea. He is the founder and Artistic Director of the Hebden Bridge Handmade Parade (http: //handmadeparade.co.uk/) and Thingumajig Theatre (http: //thingumajig.info/) which has been the hub of his work since 2006. John Fox MBE is an artist, poet and cultural provocateur. His company Welfare State International (1968-2006) re-invented influential prototypes of fire shows, site specific theatre, lantern parades and street music. His current company Dead Good Guides with Sue Gill, trains celebrants in secular rites of passage and seeks a role for art that weaves it more fully into our lives.
