Louise's debut novel races out of the traps
Worth a tattoo or two
The Star Pelaw greyhound racing stadium at Chester-le-Street probably hasn’t hosted a literary launch before – but there’s always a first time and it’s my bet that Underdogs, by Louise Powell, is a novel with legs.
I’m not the only one who thinks it’s worth a punt.
The book’s published this week by John Murray as a JM Original, the imprint it set up in 2015 “to champion distinctive, experimental, genre-defying fiction and non-fiction”.
It comes with ringing endorsements from fellow authors: “Beautiful, heartbreaking, uplifting, funny” – Jenny Knight; “An original, authentic and distinctly northern tale delivered with a strong sense of compassion for its characters and their community” – Shaun Wilson.
And they’re not wrong. Set in the 1990s, in the now vanished world of unlicensed greyhound racing, it introduces us to 10-year-old George and his out-of-work dad, Reg, of whom he is touchingly protective.
On the unlicensed, so-called flapping tracks, there are fortunes to be made or lost.
Louise brings to life a world of winners and losers where George and Reg, struggling to make ends meet, get caught up in a war between bling-laden gambler Bertie and bookmaker Baz.
Written in dialect, Underdogs does indeed have the ring of authenticity.
It’s a handsome book with smart cover illustrations by young illustrator Ellis Crossley – and that’s probably just as well because Louise’s dad, David, has had the front and back covers tattooed on his arms.
Not content with that, he has also gone for
‘My Daughter is an Author
“Underdogs”
By Louise Powell
2nd July 2026”
There it is for all the world to see… a red letter day inked in black. Has any debut novelist ever enjoyed such parental support?
I first met Louise when she was about to be presented with her certificate for winning the Sid Chaplin Award which is aimed at working class writers and was established in memory of one who helped to blaze a trail. It is managed by New Writing North.
That was in 2023 and Louise, who grew up and still lives in Middlesbrough, had been working on her novel for four-and-a-half years.
Growing up “below the poverty line”, there had been no silver spoon or golden ticket to smooth her path. On the idea of becoming a writer, she said the attitude was: “Well, you might as well go and be an astronaut. It’s not a real job.”
Winning the prize, she said, would make a huge difference. In fact, it already had.
“Sitting down to write since I’ve known I’ve won this, the feeling is so different. Before, I felt a lot of anxiety. It was weighing on me… is anyone going to be interested in this?
“Loads of people have said, ‘No-one’s interested in your stories. Why are you writing them? It’s pointless. And you’re in your 30s now.’
“It’s really hard when you’re working class and breaking new ground.”
Louise had taken on the role of carer for her father when he was diagnosed with cancer (he recovered to put some work a tattooist’s way) but had still managed to pen 50,000 words of her novel.
“Hopefully this award will help me finish it and get it where it needs to be and out to agents,” she said.
That didn’t take long. As Louise explained when I spoke to her again recently, an agent was in touch the day after she received that certificate and a contract with John Murray was duly signed.
And so here we are… with Thursday’s launch party at Pelaw ‘dogs’ – where every winning owner will get a copy of the novel - and another event lined up at Newcastle Greyhound Stadium on July 9.
It’s all in aid of a novel by a writer whose hard-won success you could never begrudge.
“It really has been a labour of love and of self-belief and confidence because I didn’t see stories like mine represented when I was growing up,” said Louise.
“I didn’t actually realise writing was a career until I was 27. Then you have to fight through a sense of imposter syndrome in the sense that you think your stories don’t belong.
“Then it took me such a long time to find the right way of telling the story – the right voice. It took me nine drafts before I got it right.”
She credited Pig Iron, by County Durham author Benjamin Myers (another supported by New Writing North), as a huge influence.
“I hadn’t realised before I read that that you could write in a County Durham dialect and it was so powerful for me to see places I knew, like Wheatley Hill, on the page. I’d never seen that before.
“I think I’d always had a strong sense of voice but then I really started to craft the dialect. It’s written as though George is speaking to you and that might sound straightforward but actually there’s so much you’ve got to consider – the rhythm, the repetitions and the musicality of the East Durham dialect which I think is so beautiful.
“Creating that took a long time.”
Louise said she deliberately made her main character a boy but agreed there were overlaps between George’s fictional life and her lived experience.
“He’s bullied at school and I was. George loves maths and spelling and I was the same. He also has this awareness of his dad’s mental health struggles and that’s something I was conscious of growing up.
“He is definitely part of me.”
Despite the problems she faced growing up, Louise said her parents were always supportive (Underdogs is dedicated ‘For my Mam and Dad’).
She remembered that when she was six she was given a diary for Christmas, a fluffy yellow one with a padlock. Her first entry was ‘Watched Brookside with David (also her brother’s name) while Mummy and Daddy argued’.”
Her mother found it and laughed.
“It was good that she found it funny but it made me aware that people will read the things you write and that writing could make people laugh.”
Also when she was six, a story she had written about an invented “tough and cheeky” Mister Men character got read out in class.
“It had people in fits of laughter. Even the teacher was laughing so that was really nice.
“I’d always been interested in writing but there was never any sense that writing could be a career, especially when I got to secondary school. It was just this weird thing I did.”
This ‘weird thing’ has taken her a long way.
Louise, a talented grafter, now has an MA from Durham University and a PhD in English from Sheffield Hallam. She has had plays performed on stage and on BBC Radio 4 Extra and contributed to Common People, Kit de Waal’s acclaimed anthology of working class writers.
But always she has retained her affection for where she grew up – and for the sport of greyhound racing, now the preserve of tracks licensed by the Greyhound Board of Great Britain.
When she was born, Louise told me, her parents had a greyhound called Fly and were worried about how it would react to a new baby.
“But actually she used to lie down next to my cot and look after me and make sure I was all right.
“Some of my earliest memories are giving her a bath, walking her out on a summer’s day and going to the track with the other dogs.”
Louise’s own first dog, who raced as Hard To Please, gets a mention in her novel.
She has held a trainer’s licence but her last intended runner, she admitted ruefully, although “beautifully bred” was more interested in wagging her tail than chasing a fake hare round a track.
But success in writing hasn’t eluded her and having a book published, she said, was “on a completely different level to anything I’ve done before.
“When I got the news of the offer I was really happy but I was also worried in case it fell through for whatever reason. That was the pessimist and the worrier in me.
“It didn’t really sink in until I went to London and was given a finished copy of the book. That was a very surreal moment.”
Louise, confounding everyone’s expectations except possibly her own, is now making a living as a freelance writer, forever keeping several literary plates spinning at the same time.
“I’ve done the groundwork for two other novels and John Murray have an option on my next work of literary fiction,” she said.
I reckon they’re onto a winner.
The event at Newcastle Greyhound Stadium, Fossway, when Louise will be in conversation with Shaun Wilson, is on Thursday, July 9 at 6pm. Tickets from New Writing North.
Find details of this Thursday’s (July 2) launch party on the Star Pelaw website.
Louise is also due to speak at Collected, Durham’s independent bookshop, on Monday, July 13 at 7.30pm. Tickets from the Collected website.