Emily Barroso

Emily Barroso is an award winning author of several books, including After the Rains, set during a time of great political upheaval during the Rhodesia/Zimbabwe civil war of the 70s. It explores the formation of Jayne Cameron's social and political identity - an identity distinct from that of almost all her family and her relationship with Enoch, a young man who is a worker on her family’s farm. The book examines the motivations and inner turmoil experienced by both blacks and whites in the war. The South African Newspaper says this about it: “After the Rains is a great novel and well worth reading. Barosso explores relationships between black and white, right and wrong, and the reader is left with a grey area called life and the fact that ‘It’s all vanity, it’s all an illusion, everything except that infinite sky’ (Tolstoy)” Though it is a coming of age novel, After the Rains is one of those rare books that appeals to readers from 14 to 84, across political and social divides. The book is ‘page turning’ and 'plot driven' but also 'compelling literary writing' and as such has been the subject of book clubs in the UK and America. One reviewer said “she was laughing out loud at the dialogue one minute and weeping during a scene the next."

Emily Barroso has a BA (Hons) in English Literature and an MA in Creative Writing with Merit. Emily was nominated as her university’s postgraduate ‘writer of the future,’ which led to her winning a national Jerwood/Arvon book award for her first book. Her subsequent books are Big Men's Boots, an exploration of the mystical events that took place in a small mountain quarry mining town during the 1904-1906 Welsh Revival as experienced by the young Owen Evans; and Unless a Seed Falls to the Ground, which continues the story of Owen Evans as he loses his faith during his traumatic experiences in the First World War and goes on to experience a bohemian London in the 1920s before being forced to flee to a monastery on the Orkneys after finding himself involved in the criminal underbelly of the city. Her third novel in this series of three standalone novels, is due to be published in early 2025, and sees Owen Evans travel to South Africa in the early days of apartheid as a priest who becomes involved in a socially forbidden relationship and a dangerous political plot that challenges his faith and leaves him irrevocably changed.

Barroso's poems have been highly commended and her poem Scapegoat was published in The Edge. She is also the author of the plays The Call and Children of the Revolution, both of which were shown at arts festivals in Wales and London. She is a book developmental editor of over two decades, occasional journalist, and her film that covered the stories of Burmese dissident writers on the run from the Junta was shown at the English PEN event, Freedom Writ Large. Emily has a special interest in the arts for wellbeing, and taught the arts in therapy at the Creative Arts Trust (London) for many years. Her award-winning blog is Em-Phatic. Emily is also a teacher of Creative Writing a writing coach who works at writing retreats around the UK. She is a former publisher who loves working with writers and storytellers to help them realise their creative vision. As an award winning visual artist and songwriter, she has worked across the creative spectrum and now consults businesses and other organisations on creativity.

After the Rains has been described by industry experts as “Very impressive. This is compelling literary writing, no doubt of that. The historical moment is also fascinating – Rhodesia/Zimbabwe at time of change.”

“A powerful book. So much to enjoy – both the sense of Jay as a young woman who is not fully grown in either her political, social or sexual identity and its sense of the late seventies as a time in which things could have gone otherwise for Zimbabwe were it not for the unwise counsel prevailing on all sides,”

“It is brilliantly written, with a striking and memorable voice.  I love the setting, and the increasing darkness that unfolds, which balances the colourful, often funny family story.  There are so many good things about this novel."