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A £3300 grant fell through for us recently – the money we needed to sustain our work for the year. Please help us finish our book projects!
Lucent Dreaming started as a book publisher in 2021, founded by me Jannat Ahmed.
Our first book project, Maps and Rooms: Writing from Wales, came out in June 2022. Since then we have published 142 (!!!) people in book form, largely focused on folk who have been historically neglected by or excluded from the publishing industry in Wales.
In 2025, we made the uncomfortable (and best) decision not to apply for core funding for our small publisher on the basis that inadequate support would undermine our work. More info here: https://lucentdreaming.com/thoughts-on-the-future-of-publishing-by-jannat-ahmed/
This meant our existing full-time staff (including me) no longer had jobs. However, a small team of volunteers has remained, and it's through our volunteers our books have continued to publish.
We chose to continue to apply for discrete funding for individual projects. However, this has recently caused more unpredictability. A pause on a £3300 grant over the summer for our anthology of South Asian women has meant things now look particularly bad for us. It was the cash flow we needed to finish the book projects we've wanted to fulfil this year – from an inspirational self-help book for young people, to a debut novel about life, love and death, to an anthology of work by writers of South Asian heritage. One book funds another, after all.
If you've followed our journey over the years, you'll know the kind of book projects we've put our heart and soul behind. The only thing ever missing was the resources to make them sing loud. In hindsight, it's clear what we've been able to achieve at Lucent Dreaming with limited resources is impressive. One of our anthologies this year was shortlisted at The British Book Awards. This was an incredible achievement and I am so proud of the editors who made the book happen.
I've held off on a crowdfunding like this all these years. We've had a Patreon (thank you to everyone who has supported over the years – it really has kept us going); we've accepted donations through PayPal on our website; we've even had support from an in-person fundraiser from one of our authors, but so many people I've spoken to about our struggles this year have told me we should just go for it ourselves. Even £500 would help.
The communities and individuals I connect with as Lucent Dreaming are the most important thing to have come out of the work. And I want to honour those relationships as best I can. I am hoping I can lean on you now to help make 2026 financially bearable, the same way you know you've been able to rely on me when I had the resources.
I'm so grateful for the brilliant friendships, beautiful books, and so much love and creativity Lucent Dreaming has been involved in over the years. But we want to finish the year right. All the money raised will help us keep the dream alive, give us breathing room to restructure properly, and look afresh at what is possible in a brand new year.
Please help us to survive to December and finish working on the books you've been waiting for!
Funding method
Keep what you raise – this project will receive all pledges made by 4th November 2026 at 5:12am