Nicholas Royle (born 20 March 1963 in

Manchester Manchester () is a city in Greater Manchester, England. It had a population of 552,000 in 2021. It is bordered by the Cheshire Plain to the south, the Pennines to the north and east, and the neighbouring city of City of Salford, Salford to ...

) is an English novelist, editor, publisher, literary reviewer and creative writing lecturer.

Literary career

Author

Royle has written seven novels: ''Counterparts'', ''Saxophone Dreams'', ''The Matter of the Heart'', ''The Director’s Cut'', ''Antwerp'', ''Regicide'' and ''First Novel''. He also claims to have written more than 100 short stories, which have appeared in a variety of anthologies and magazines, including '' Bad Idea'', with his short story ''Confessions of a Serial Coat Snatcher'' appearing in the 2008 ''Bad Idea Anthology''. He has written two short-story collections: ''Mortality'' and ''Ornithology''.

Awards

Royle has won a

British Fantasy Award The British Fantasy Awards (BFA) are awarded annually by the British Fantasy Society (BFS), first in 1976. Prior to that they were known as The August Derleth Fantasy Awards (see August Derleth Award). First awarded in 1972 (to ''The Knight of ...

three times: Best Anthology in 1992 and 1993 and Best Short Story in 1993. He has been nominated for Best Short Story three further times. ''The Matter of the Heart'' won the

Bad Sex in Fiction Award ''Literary Review'' is a British literary magazine founded in 1979 by Anne Smith, then head of the Department of English at the University of Edinburgh. Its offices are on Lexington Street in Soho. The magazine was edited for fourteen years by v ...

in 1997.

Editor

As an editor, Royle is best known for having edited ''

The Lighthouse A lighthouse is a tower aiding marine navigation. Light House, Lighthouse, or The Lighthouse may also refer to: Art and architecture Actual lighthouses Buildings called "Light House" or "Lighthouse" * Light House (Aarhus), a skyscraper under ...

'', by Alison Moore, which was shortlisted for the

2012 Man Booker Prize The 2012 Booker Prize for Fiction was awarded on 16 October 2012. A longlist of twelve titles was announced on 25 July, and these were narrowed down to a shortlist of six titles, announced on 11 September. The jury was chaired by Sir Peter Stothar ...

, and '' The Many'' by Wyl Menmuir, which was longlisted for the

2016 Man Booker Prize The 2016 Booker Prize for Fiction was awarded at a ceremony on 25 October 2016. The Man Booker dozen of 13 books was announced on 27 July, narrowed down to a shortlist of six titles on 13 September. Paul Beatty was awarded the 2016 Booker Prize fo ...

. He has also edited more than two dozen anthologies including ''A Book of Two Halves'', ''The Tiger Garden: A Book of Writers’ Dreams'', ''The Time Out Book of New York Short Stories'', and ''Dreams Never End'' ( Tindal Street Press) and several other novels. He has been series editor of ‘Best British Short Stories’ (Salt) since it launched in 2011.

Publisher

Royle owns and manages Nightjar Press, which publishes short stories as signed,

limited edition The terms special edition, limited edition, and variants such as deluxe edition, or collector's edition, are used as a marketing incentive for various kinds of products, originally published products related to the arts, such as books, prints, r ...

chapbook A chapbook is a small publication of up to about 40 pages, sometimes bound with a saddle stitch. In early modern Europe a chapbook was a type of printed street literature. Produced cheaply, chapbooks were commonly small, paper-covered bookl ...

s. Nightjar Press has published authors including M. John Harrison,

Christopher Kenworthy Christopher Kenworthy (1968) is an Australian writer, artist, and former film director. He was the author of two novels, ''The Winter Inside'' and ''The Quality of Light'' for Serpent's Tail, along with a short story collection, ''Will You Hold Me? ...

, Joel Lane, Alison Moore and

Michael Marshall Smith Michael Paul Marshall Smith (born 3 May 1965) is an English novelist, screenwriter and short story writer who also writes as Michael Marshall, M. M. Smith and Michael Rutger. Biography Born in Knutsford, Cheshire, Smith moved with his family a ...

Academic career

Royle was a Senior Lecturer and then Reader at the Manchester Writing School at

Manchester Metropolitan University Manchester Metropolitan University is located in the centre of Manchester, England. The university has over 40,000 students and over 4,000 members of staff. It is home to four faculties (Arts and Humanities, Business and Law, Health and Educat ...

From 2006 to 2022 and was Chair of Judges for the

Manchester Fiction Prize The Manchester Fiction Prize is a literary award celebrating excellence in creative writing. It was launched by Carol Ann Duffy and The Manchester Writing School at Manchester Metropolitan University in 2009, as the second phase of the annual Man ...

from its launch in 2009 until he left the university in 2022.

Bibliography

Novels

* ''Counterparts'' (1995 – K Penguin ) * ''Saxophone Dreams'' (1996 – K Penguin) * ''The Matter of the Heart'' (1997 – K Abacus) * ''The Director’s Cut'' (2001 – K Abacus) * ''Antwerp'' (2005 – K Serpent's Tail) * ''Regicide'' (2011 – K Serpent's Tail) * ''First Novel'' (2013 – K Jonathan Cape)

Novellas

* ''The Enigma of Departure'' (2008 – K PS Publishing) * ''The Appetite'' (2008 – K Gray Friar Press)

Short story collections

* ''Mortality'' (2011 – K Serpent's Tail) * ''Ornithology'' (2017 – K Confingo) * ''The Dummy & Other Uncanny Stories'' (2018 – RE

Swan River Press Swan River Press is an independent Irish publishing company dedicated to gothic, supernatural, and fantastic literature. It was founded in Rathmines, Dublin in October 2003 by Brian J. Showers. Swan River publishes contemporary fiction from arou ...

) * London Gothic (2020 – ISBN 978 0 99559 66 6 5 K Confingo)

Personal life

Royle has two children and lives in both Manchester and London. Royle shares his name with a Professor of English at the University of Sussex (born 1957) who is an authority on Jacques Derrida, and the author of textbooks, including ''The Uncanny'', and a novel, ''Quilt''. The two writers are often confused with each other.

Notes

External links

* *
Interview with ''3:AM''
21st-century English novelists 21st-century British short story writers Writers from Manchester 1963 births Living people Academics of Manchester Metropolitan University English male novelists 21st-century English male writers English horror writers {{UK-novelist-stub