Jonathan Walker Writer

I began my career as a historian of Venice. My first book Pistols! Treason! Murder! is a non-fiction account of the career of a seventeenth-century Venetian spy, Gerolamo Vano.

I subsequently became a writer and photographer. My first novel Five Wounds is a dark fairy tale set in an alternate version of Venice, created in collaboration with the illustrator Dan Hallett.

My second novel The Angels of L19 is a work of weird fiction set in an evangelical church in 1984 Liverpool, a world I grew up in.

My third novel Push Process is based around my photographs of Venice, and was published on 6 March 2024.

Five Wounds is available exclusively via this site as a print-on-demand paperback – see the book's page in the 'Publications' section.

Pistols! Treason! Murder! is currently out of print, but will be reissued at some point in the near future, either by myself or someone else.

I've also produced two photography zines; and I've written several academic articles on the history of Venice: details and links under the 'Publications' section.

All photographs on this site are by the author (apart from the cover of The Angels of L19). All other illustrations are by Dan Hallett.

Push Process

More speed, more light, more time. But this is the fastest possible film, pushed as hard as it can be pushed; the lens wide open to catch every drop of brightness; the slow exposure shaking the image apart. Right up at the edge. Go farther, closer.

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The Angels of L19

There’s more than one way to be born again. Liverpool, 1984. The teenagers at Garston Chapel are the same as the rest of us: The Smiths, U2, crushes, football, mates. The grimy, low-down politics of the Thatcher era casting deep shadows in this proud and broken city, but the kids have got other things on their minds … Jesus Christ Our Lord for one.

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Five Wounds

A cruel and arbitrary world, where disturbing lapses in logic are commonplace. A city built on water. Five people, isolated from those around them, but mysteriously connected to one another.

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Pistols! Treason! Murder!

The year is 1622. Rumours of treason flourish in the city of Venice. The noble Antonio Foscarini stands accused and pays the ultimate price. Gerolamo Vano, General of Spies, provides the evidence. But who is really guilty? Within a year, Vano is swinging from the gallows in Piazza San Marco, and Foscarini is absolved posthumously.

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