To live is to lose, to grieve is to be human. Part elegy, part lament, part love song; Julia Webb's fourth collection Grey Time is a powerful examination of what it is to love and lose, of our relationship with both grief and the dead. Exploring the many facets and nuances of loss, Webb explores what happens before and after the sudden death of a loved one and how our relationship with them changes over time as new secrets are revealed and old hurts heal. This book is not defined by death, however, as these refreshing, evocative poems study and witness the myriad losses of a lifetime. Julia Webb turns her forensic eye on the complexity of unresolved relationships; on what is said or not said, how people behave under duress, how violence can creep into our lives, as well as exploring her own recently discovered neurodivergence. Grey Time is a revelatory collection that takes bold leaps, binding the strange and surreal to the everyday - to make possible a place where a one mother turns owl, and another mother will teach her son how to fly.

Julia Webb is a neurodivergent writer and artist from a working-class background. She has three poetry collections with Nine Arches Press: Bird Sisters (2016), Threat (2019) and The Telling (2022). She has had two poems highly commended in the Forward Prize. Julia has taught creative writing for organisations such as Lapidus, MIND, Norfolk County Council, and The SAW Trust. In 2024 she was commissioned by The National Centre for writing and Living wage Foundation to write a poem for Living Wage Week. She is steering editor for Lighthouse - a journal for new writers. Julia lives in Norwich.