Hi Tabitha. Thank you for taking part in this interview and even more so for contributing to our cause. Can you tell us a little a bit about yourself?

I live in Bradford, and work as a sex and relationship therapist. I write as a side hustle. I spent most of my life committed to the direct-action movement and running around getting arrested…at heart I’m still 100% a revolutionary but a bit tired now and protest has been well and truly stamped down on. In my day you could occupy the offices of companies killing the Earth and its inhabitants and you’d get a few hours in a cell. Now climate protestors are getting custodials for minor disruption.

I lived in a very deprived area of inner-city Leeds prior to where I am now, and spent most of that time in housing co-ops: about 25 years of them. Now I have countryside minutes from my door, which makes an incredible difference. I love nature, and bird watching, and nice traditional pubs. Though I do miss some of the explosive riotous 2 day partying from the good ol’ 90s.

Foodbanks have become a part of our life. What started as a means to support those in financial difficulty has now turned into a long-term lifeline for many. Do you think that we will ever be free of them, or do you believe they will be here to stay?

The fact we have foodbanks in a country where some people have 2 – or more! – homes and many people can’t even afford to rent, where private schools exist for the 6% and 10% of our kids go to school hungry, is outrageous. The “cost of living crisis” is also known as just poverty, and poverty in the UK isn’t incidental, it’s made by the very rich getting even richer. But the working classes have always cared and supported each other, and foodbanks in various forms are part of a long history of supporting those who are struggling. Yes, they’re here to stay. I have no faith in Starmer’s government turning this around. I went door knocking for Corbyn despite my lack of faith in parliamentary politics but Starmer has just thrown every progressive hope out of the window.

Do you think it is down to the volunteers and fellow man to keep food banks going or should the government be doing more to intervene?

Tax the rich and redistribute the wealth, it’s a no brainer. Even most billionaires think they should be taxed more in order to stop the crazy growing gulf between the rich and the rest of us.

Here at Urban Pigs Press we believe that the indie writing scene is an incredible place of support. From fellow writers to zines and indie presses. Who is your favourite writer in the indie community and why?

Kristina Diprose is a poet who lives near me who is having her poems published by Black Cat Poetry Press. She does loads of great work with putting on poetry nights locally and collaboratively, and I’m hoping we might end up working together on some creative projects for Bradford 2025 (City of Culture).

I also should mention SJ Bradley from Comma Press as she got me back in the writing saddle after a decade of not writing. I attended a 6 week short story course she was running and since then I’ve been writing fairly regularly (in a sporadic way!) since.

Tell us about your latest work? Do you have any books you would like our readers to know about?

 I write a personalised feminist blog on positive masculinity using my teenage son (he always reads through before anything being published about him!) https://theboysarealright.substack.com/  which I began because all the stories of modern men were negative, be it the horrendous Andrew Tate narratives populating the internet, or stories from women and girls about men as predators or idiots. I wanted to be a voice of opposition to both those common tropes. I consider it a love song to the men and boys in my life. Part psychology, part memoir, part politics. I’m looking into delving deeper into it and making it a book of personal essays. https://theboysarealright.substack.com/

Fiction wise, I’ve had 8 short stories published since 2018, most recently “Finished Symphony” in “Oluwale Now” with Peepal Tree Press in 2023.The anthology was in memory of David Oluwale (a black man who was murdered by racist police in Leeds) . It was inspired by hearing a news story about a conductor in Ukraine who refused to lead the orchestra for the Russian occupiers. https://www.peepaltreepress.com/books/oluwale-now

How did you first hear about Urban Pigs Press?

From a post on Facebook by another shortlisted writer from a competition by Save As Writers https://saveaswriters.co.uk/competitions/all-in-the-mind.html – it was total chance and I saw about the Hunger anthology when I looked up her work and thought that looked a perfect fit for my story, and an excellent cause to support.

Wow, Tabitha! Your answers are brilliant. I’d love to do a follow up with you at some point. You’ve certainly lived an interesting life. Like you, I really championed Jezza. Gutted that all the progress he made with the Labour party has now been undone by Keir’s Tory-lite campaign. Now with everything happening I really hope some people will wake up and realise what a missed opportunity for change it was. Unfortunately, anyone who even tries to criticizes this one group is wrongly labelled and on it keeps going. A clear intervention and healthy discussion was what we really needed. JC was the man for that. Moving on to your story, this was the first piece of writing either of us have read of yours and we were both really taken by the dystopian setting. I can’t wait to share it with our readers.

“Because of What is Out There” is a dark dystopian story with an unreliable narrator managing her status and survival.

Read it from the 7th March in the Hunger anthology.

Tabitha Bast lives in Bradford, and works as a therapist and writer. Writes a personalised feminist blog on positive masculinity https://theboysarealright.substack.com/ 

Tabitha has 8 short stories published since 2018, most recently “Finished Symphony” in “Oluwale Now” with Peepal Tree Press in 2023. First prize with Grist Publishing and published in “Trouble: An Anthology of Protest”.  Creative Futures Award Winner in 2020 and has delivered 3 creative writing courses as part of their development programme.

Release date for the HUNGER anthology!

We have good news! The release date for the HUNGER anthology is set for the 7th March. Initial release will be through Amazon and Kindle but we hope to have physical copies in local book shops soon after. One place you can be sure to find this incredible collection will be Dial Lane Books in Ipswich. Andrew has been as much a part of this fantastic cause as all our contributors. We couldn’t be any more excited to share this with everyone. 23 different authors have given up their time and talent to help us make a difference to those in need and we are beyond grateful to each and everyone one of you. Jo Andrews has gone above and beyond to deliver us a cover that represents everything we set out to do. Cody Sexton has also contributed with an incredible piece of talent for our title page. We are both proud and humbled by the incredible efforts of everyone involved. Stephen J. Golds and Rob Jelly (BBC Suffolk) have also given their time to praise this darkly beautiful collection.

As part of our promotion for the anthology we will be posting interviews from the authors involved. Judging by some of the answers given already, I can confirm that we really have discovered a great bunch of humans in this anthology.

This book won’t put an end to poverty or hunger. Neither will it change the agendas of our politicians. But it will make a direct impact to a few of those we hope to represent. And for now, we’ll take it. So, please set that date in your calendar and help us to make that difference.

The Hunger anthology is a collection of 23 stories by 23 different authors. Tales of brutal reality, dark horror, gritty crime and dark humour sprawled out upon each page. Each story delivering a unique take on the prompt HUNGER. A true representation of some of the strongest talents within the writing community.

“A collection of stories that are as close to the bone in literary class as they are in their scathing analysis of a broken society.”

– Stephen J. Golds

Author of Say Goodbye When I’m Gone