Florrie

Charming and incredibly moving. I loved it from start to finish and cried at the end. – Rachel Ramsay, director of Copa 71Such a moving and heart-warming book. A poignant exploration of the worlds of freedom that open and close around us, both in our futures and in our pasts. Most of all, Florrie is bright with the feeling of liberation, and the risks and joys of following your heart. – Seán Hewitt, author of OPEN, HEAVENI enjoyed every page. So good to see a bande desinee book as fine and original in terms of story and illustration, and in England. I thought it tender and true. Remarkable. – Michael Morpurgo[It has] the emotional intelligence and sharpness of Paula Knight and Alison Bechdel… so beautifully captures the experience of playing, belonging… The book is so timely….I so admire the way this book has found a way to bring this history into public view as a part of the conversation about the game now. – Claire Lynch, author of A FAMILY MATTERBetween the - beautifully drawn and deceptively simple - lines of Florrie there is a world of suppressed desire and yearning. Florrie longs to play a forbidden game, to be in love, to move through terrible grief. Anna Trench vividly recreates the sadness and shock of the post-Great War era, when the FA banned women’s football, and skilfully entwines it with a queer love story and a young woman becoming herself. – Miriam Gold, author of ELENA: A HAND MADE LIFEA triumph for the art of the book, the women’s game, and queer love. A quirky classic. Everything about it is wonderfully done - the drawings, dialogue, period detail, mischief and fun. I loved it. – Diana Souhami, author of NO MODERNISM WITHOUT LESBIANSFlorrie is a gem of a novel imagining the forces that give shape to a life as the young Florrie steps out into the world. Every page is luminous - delicately, thrillingly, alive with feeling. – Chetna Maroo, author of WESTERN LANEIf you put Alison Bechdel’s Fun Home in football kit, you might come up with something like Florrie. It reminds me of the very best graphic novels - elegantly emotive, spare and vulnerable. – Zing Tsjeng, author of FORGOTTEN WOMENFlorrie will take you on a journey with the power to imagine and play at its core. Football is a game but it is also a dance, a connector between each player on the pitch, and in Florrie the characters dance across time together… Anna Trench shows us the importance of a connected queer history to allow us to dance across our pitches today. – Tash WalkerQuietly beautiful… The power of this story is very much in its understatement, making the social injustices of the time it is set in feel all the more pronounced for its nuance and subtlety. – Andy Oliver * Broken Frontier *A very moving story, told with immense wit and charm… informative and revelatory about the glorious success of women’s football – Mark Wallinger

Anna Trench is an illustrator, cartoonist, writer and teacher based in London. Florrie is her first book. It has been shortlisted for the First Graphic Novel Award and the LDComics Award.