Thrilled to have been awarded First Prize in the 2022 SWWJ Elizabeth Longford Poetry Competition with my poem ‘Raw Material’. ‘I carry the weather in my mouth. / Sometimes a damselfly / lands on my shoulder. / There is always so much sky …’ & also to have won the 2023 SWWJ Elizabeth Longford Poetry Competition with my poem ‘The Surgeon Wife’.

Also delighted that ‘Yield’ made it onto the poetry shortlist for the 2021 International Rubery Award. Congratulations to the Category Winners and the Book of the Year; it was an honour to be in your company. Grateful for the book being described as containing ‘a compassionate and perceptive intelligence’.

‘Intriguing and elegantly written. Claire Dyer has written a novel that is both captivating and compulsive. I turned the pages desperate to discover the secrets of Odie May and her significant others. The story is about love and loss, atonement and hope. It’s about coming to terms with who you are. ~ Jenny Quintana, author of ‘The Missing Girl’, ‘Our Dark Secret’ and ‘The Hiding Place’

Published on 28th July 2021. Available via Amazon, Troubador and Waterstones.

I like love stories and cheese and my publications include The Significant Others of Odie May, The Last Day, The Perfect Affair, Falling for Gatsby and The Moment (fiction). My poetry collections, Interference Effects, Eleven Rooms and Yield, are published by Two Rivers Press, who have featured me as a Poet of the Week here. A further collection is forthcoming with Two Rivers Press in 2024 and a novel, ‘What We Thought We Knew’ is forthcoming from Pegasus.

My bio is as follows:

Claire Dyer’s poetry collections are published by Two Rivers Press, her novels by Quercus and The Dome Press. Her latest novel, The Significant Others of Odie May is published by Matador. She curated Reading’s Poets’ Café from 2016 to 2021 and co-hosted Poets’ Café Online from 2020 – 2023. She teaches creative writing and runs Fresh Eyes, an editorial and critiquing service. She has an MA in Creative Writing from Royal Holloway, University of London, has been a regular contributor on BBC Radio Berkshire, is the SWWJ’s Council Member for Poetry, and has a further poetry collection forthcoming with Two Rivers Press in April 2024 and a novel, ‘What We Thought We Knew’ with Pegasus.