The programme for Unbound is out so it’s time to tell you about our next event! Unbound is the Edinburgh International Book Festival‘s late-night Spiegeltent series.

Writers’ Bloc will be performing Electric Lit Orchestra on Tuesday 23rd August 2011, 9-11pm in the Spiegeltent in Charlotte Square. Here’s what the Unbound brochure says:

Electric Lit Orchestra

Why should the story stop when the band comes on? This local ‘spoken word performance collective’ are modern day champions of the often overlooked Scottish literary tradition – the fantastique. Edinburgh collective Writers’ Bloc presents an evening of new fiction about, and set to, music. Expect hidden nightclubs and soul trades, celestial harmonies and ram raids in this event where anything literal could literally happen.

Unbound events happen every night from 14 to 29 August in the Spiegeltent in Charlotte Square Gardens as part of the Edinburgh International Book Festival. All Unbound events are FREE and unticketed. To get in, simply turn up and walk in. All events start at 9pm so arrive early to get a seat and the bar will be open until 1am.

There are some great events in Unbound, so pick up your programme in The Skinny, or check out Unbound on the EIBF website.

Mr Big Society is tonight: 8pm at the Wee Red Bar, Edinburgh College of Art. If you move quickly you can still book your ticket online for a discount and a free Mr Big Society badge. Or, it’s £4/£2 on the door.

Bloc is presenting an all-new illustrated Mr Men story, featuring appearances by several characters you may not remember from the first time round. Other stories feature improvised weaponry in Asda, warring troops of worthy youth organisations, William Burroughs, rooftop gardens, eerie doors, rage, and Edinburgh City Council. The lineup is:

Gavin Inglis reads Mr Big Society
Stuart Wallace reads Break On Through
Morag Edward reads Eat Your Greens
Helen Jackson reads Banana Republic

Gavin Inglis reads Mr Big Society
Bram E. Gieben reads Small Utopias
Mark Harding reads 28 Minutes Later

Gavin Inglis reads Mr Big Society
Andrew C . Ferguson reads Die Hard by George
Kirsti Wishart reads Operation Fairycake

Follow the adventures of Mr Big Society and his friends!

Yes, it’s the Writers’ Bloc contribution to the big debate of our time. All the things you really wanted to know about The Big Society but were just too sensible to ask.

Original, unscholarly research on the key economic questions: What happens if you literally pay peanuts? What happens when ‘Fairy Cakes for Fire Engines’ collides with ‘Lemoncake for Lifeboats’? Is The Big Society fact or fable? Bird or plane? Can you return it if it’s the wrong size? Will Mr Big Society, Mr Banker, Little Miss Librarian, Mr Jihad and all the other friends have the best time ever? Or will there be tears before bedtime?

A revolution of the Public Services and Charity Sector – what could possibly go wrong? Or to be more accurate, what could impossibly go wrong?

The Writers’ Bloc Think Tank will present a night of unlikely social policy – short stories that blur all distinction between fact, fiction, sense, nonsense, inaccuracy, good ideas and bonkers brainstorming sessions.

Having trouble understanding The Big Society? Just wait until we’ve finished! *

Writers appearing at Mr Big Society will include: Morag Edward, Andrew C. Ferguson, Gavin Inglis, Jane McKie, Andrew J. Wilson and Kirsti Wishart plus new comrades Bram E Gieben, Mark Harding, Helen Jackson and Stuart Wallace.

8pm, Wednesday 1st June 2011, Wee Red Bar, Edinburgh College of Art, EH3 9DF. Admission is an affordable £3 if you book your ticket online, or £4 (£2 concessions) on the door.

Newsflash: Writers’ Bloc bribery scandal. Buy your Mr Big Society ticket online through WeGotTickets and receive a limited-edition Mr Big Society badge on the night. Possibly in a brown envelope.

* Not approved by the IMF, OECD or The Institute for Economic Affairs.

No Country for Dead Men: New Stories for Samhain

Edinburgh, 2nd November, 2010 – Fresh from a barnstorming performance at the Edinburgh International Book Festival’s Unbound programme, Writers’ Bloc announces an evening of spoken word with an uncanny twist.

Expect new stories about: Gertrude Jekyll and Mr Hyde; a board game played with real human beings as the pieces; not-so-little green men; and the Hound of the D’Urbervilles. All will be performed with Bloc’s trademark energy and verve.

No Country for Dead Men takes place at the Ghillie Dhu, 2–6 Rutland Place, Edinburgh EH1 2AD, on Tuesday 2nd November from 8 p.m. Admission is an affordable £4.00 (£2.00 concessions).

We’re pure-mad excited over here at the Bloc Command Bunker. The next show is in the offing and it’s set to be the mutt’s proverbials. Planet of the Apps will be about all things techy, social media, webby, and with buttons that are just too small. Expect new stories about: next-generation Nigerian 409 scams; burlesque-themed alien abductions; stalkings via social media; park keepers dealing with digital debris; and a steamy extension to the Dewey Decimal System, all performed with our trademark energy and verve.

Planet of the Apps takes place at the Ghillie Dhu, 2-6 Rutland Place, Edinburgh EH1 2AD, on Wednesday 21st July from 8pm. Admission is an affordable £4 (£2 concessions).

We’re trying something new too! We plan to have a live twitter feed during the show and we want you to get involved. As well as your general Bloc chat, we want you to submit twitter short stories leading up to and even during the show. The best story will receive a prize (more about that soon) and we’ll publish our favourites on the Bloc site.

Even more fun than that, we’re handing creative control to you, our beloved audience. As you may know, the titles for Bloc shows are rigorously researched months in advance, and much care and deliberation goes into the choice of theme and title…… honest.

Anyway, we want you guys to submit your ideas for themes and or titles for the show following our signature Halloween show. We’ll let you vote on the night for the best title/theme and we’ll make that the focus of our post-Halloween show. You have been warned.

You can follow us on twitter as Writers_Bloc_UK and use the hashtag #blocshow for all your tweets.

‘App killed App! App killed App!’

Which of our writers — photographed at their recent chapbook launch — seems more comfortable brandishing a sharp kitchen knife? You decide.

Use this information in the future, when you decide how vigorously to applaud each reader.

to everyone who came along to Easter Road for the chapbook launch last month. Loads of new folk in the audience, who we hope enjoyed their wee taster of Bloc so much that they come back for our big show next month!

WRITERS’ BLOC presents

Nil by Mouth/The Secret of Scottish Football

• WHAT: Book launch, with live readings of original fiction

• WHO: Writers’ Bloc spoken-word performance group

• WHERE: Function suite, Easter Road Stadium, Easter Road, Edinburgh

• WHEN: 7.30 p.m., Thursday 27 May 2010

• HOW MUCH: FREE

• or follow us on Myspace, Facebook or Twitter

Writers’ Bloc is pleased to announce the launch of two new chapbooks, and has secured the function suite at Easter Road for the launch!

Andrew C. Ferguson’s The Secret of Scottish Football is a soccer book with a difference. Fife has spawned many famous footballers, but it’s also had its share of the supernatural. As these stories show, when the two collide, the results can be more surprising than the half-time pies at Stark’s Park.

Scotland on Sunday described one of these tales as having “all the energy and vigour of early Irvine Welsh, but with far more humour and nuance”. In his foreword, Pat Nevin says, “Harsh reality sits side by side with sometimes even harsher fantasy, in a long Scottish tradition that echoes much of the work of Robert Burns…”

Continuing the culinary theme, the stories in Morag Edwards‘s Nil by Mouth are a dark, spicy mixture, topped off by recipes and Mo’s own fantastic artwork. Just make sure you follow the haggis recipe very carefully…

www.Booksquawk.com calls this chapbook “a fantastic example of the darkly witty Scottish sense of humour and a punchy little collection of stories that can be devoured in a lunch-break”.

The event starts at 7:30 p.m., and there’s a pay-as-you-go bar. Even Jambos will be made welcome.