The new committee members will work alongside existing members Helen Docherty, Alan Gibbard, Philip Gross and chair Christopher Meredith on future campaigning, advocacy and guidance for authors in Wales.

Cath Barton

“I’m delighted to be joining the Society of Authors in Wales Steering Committee. Thanks to all who put their trust in me by voting for me. I look forward to playing my part in supporting other writers in Wales and endeavouring to ensure that all have equal opportunity in the often-daunting world of publishing.“

Cath Barton (she/her) is an English writer who has lived in Abergavenny since 2005. She won the New Welsh Writing AmeriCymru Prize for the Novella 2017 for The Plankton Collector, which was published by New Welsh Review in 2018. Subsequent publications of novellas are In the Sweep of the Bay (2020, Louise Walters Books) shortlisted for Best Novella in the Saboteur Awards 2021, and Between the Virgin and the Sea (2023, Novella Express, Leamington Books). Cath’s short stories have been published in The Lonely Crowd, Strix and a number of anthologies. She was awarded a place on the 2018 Literature Wales Enhanced Mentoring Scheme to work on a collection of short stories inspired by the work of the sixteenth century Dutch artist Hieronymus Bosch. She is working on a novel set in the circus.
https://cathbarton.com @CathBarton1

Aaron Kent

“I’m immensely proud to have been selected to join Society of Authors Wales steering group, and hope to be a voice for working-class writers, to widen access to the arts, and to ensure the myriad voices that need to be heard are heard. I’m very much looking forward to connecting with the other members of the group, and to help with the wonderful work they’ve achieved so far”

Aaron Kent is a working-class writer and insomniac from Cornwall. Aaron’s work has been praised by the likes of JH Prynne, Gillian Clarke, Andre Bagoo, Andrew McMillan, and Anthony (Vahni) Capildeo. His new book, The Working Classic, will be released with the87press in December 2023 and concerns how working-class voices are ignored unless those voices are an act of appropriation by middle and upper-classes. Aaron was awarded the Awen medal from the Bards of Cornwall in 2020 for his poetry book The Last Hundred (Guillemot, 2019), then subsequently suffered a brain haemorrhage a few months later. Coincidence? Probably.