Dan Howarth

It’s here.

A new novel. Finally…

Coming 21 November 2025, Lionhearts is about to hit the shelves.

This book is a rough one. I’m billing it as This Is England meets Taxi Driver. This book is my answer to the state this country (and indeed, the world) finds itself in.

When Henry Oswald loses everything in a gas explosion in his hometown, he stumbles from disaster to disaster before being picked up by a local community group full of good intentions. Yet beneath their veneer of benevolence lies hatred and division. Half-in and half-out of the group, Henry must make a choice between redemption and darkness, knowing that violence will come with either. 

Lionhearts is a violent trip into the backwaters of Northern England, exploring the rage and isolation of the population and delivering a timely message for this broken country of ours.

The explosion in the book was a real-life event which tore our local community apart. The aftermath filled me with rage, something which the current rise of the far-right in the UK is only serving to exacerbate.

This book is my way of fighting back, of saying enough is enough. This book is David Peace meets Shane Meadows. This book is baying for blood.

Lionhearts has simmered and bubbled away for five years and now is its time to be unleashed into the world.

Get your copy from Amazon or treat yourself to a signed paperback directly and exclusively from Northern Republic.

So… It’s April and I’ve not updated this website once in 2025. Absolutely shameful. It’s almost as if I’ve been too busy living and too busy writing. The lack of updates is down to the huge amount of things happening and projects cooking away.

Where to start….

Let’s start with the big writing win of the year. At the back end of 2024, I found out that my short story “Off Book” was chosen to be included in the anthology Motives Unknown: New Northern Crime from the magnificent Dead Ink Books. Dead Ink are a press I’ve admired for ages so I’m thrilled to be included in this one.

My story is about an actor auditioning to play the part of a notorious serial killer and finds himself dragged a long way off-piste with his research.

The book is out on 1 May with a launch event in Liverpool on 2 May and one in Stockport on 6 May.

Newstone…

Work is going on behind the scenes for Newstone, the retro sci-fi/horror I’ve been working on with Stewart from Hartmann Films. The script is complete and edited and almost perfect. There’s a lot of “film stuff” like equipment and casting to be done, but I’m at arm’s length to this. Probably for the best.

Novels…

Damn. So much going on. Encouraged by an agent, I’ve written Off Book up to be a full novel of addiction, illness, murder, and chaos. It’s very nearly finished in first draft as we speak.

On top of that I need to do some work on Lionhearts, which I would like to get out at some point this year but it needs a couple of changes making. I’ve also had some great useful beta reader feedback on Limited Series, a novel I’ve written set on a film set. On top of that, I’ve got edits to think about for The Beacons – think The Shining meets Threads.

So much to do. So much to write. So much to edit.

Hopefully, so much for you to read. Very soon!

Dan