Integrated Foundation Year alumna’s debut graphic novel shortlisted for industry awards
19 June 2025
Integrated Foundation Year alumna Anna Trench’s debut graphic novel has already garnered praise from the likes of Sir Michael Morpurgo (War Horse, Private Peaceful) and Chetna Maroo (Western Lane) for being ‘tender and true’ and ‘alive with feeling’. Entitled Florrie, the novel is a story of football, friendship, and first love and is a celebration of women’s sport, set around the FA’s 1921 ban on women playing football.
Published with Penguin Books imprint Jonathan Cape this June, Florrie is an evocative story that touches on some of the self-discoveries Anna made during her time at Falmouth – from football to identity to honing her craft – and uses them to shape her debut into a book that has been shortlisted for the First Graphic Novel Award and LDComics Award.
We caught up with Anna to learn more about how her Integrated Foundation Year helped set her up for a career as an illustrator and writer, and how her student experience at Falmouth acted as partial inspiration for her debut novel.
How did you go about the process of creating your graphic novel? Did you start with the illustration or with the writing?
I’ve always loved playing football and always wanted to create a comic about it, but it wasn’t until I learnt more about the FA’s 1921 ban on women playing that I realised this was the story I wanted to tell. Dozens of women’s teams started in WW1 munitions factories, and by 1920 there were over 150 of them. I found the century-old photos of players moving: their keen faces, their muddy knees, their striped shirts. I wondered what it was like for those early players who had so many new possibilities opened to them - only to be shut down. A name that often came up on team sheets was Florrie.
In terms of process, the writing and the drawings are so interlinked, both took turns in taking the lead. As I got further into it, I wrote more as I needed to envisage the whole arc of the story, but the images, narration and dialogue all work to tell the story in different and complimentary ways.
You have said that your experience of playing football at Falmouth partly inspired this graphic novel. Can you tell us more?
Although I loved football when I was little, I had no opportunities to play in secondary school, but when I arrived at Falmouth, I saw an advert for a Tremough Ladies Football Team, made up of Falmouth students and locals, and everything changed. The players welcomed me onto their Lucozade-filled minibus as it rattled along the coast, and I loved every second of it. We played on village greens and clifftop pitches and drank ale and ate pasties after matches. And it wasn’t just the joy of playing a sport that I loved; I met openly queer women, and for the first time I let myself consider I might be one of them. I can’t run as fast as my protagonist Florrie, but her experience - being part of a team, self-discovery, playing football in the salt-sea air - has some overlap with mine.
What do you hope your readers takeaway with them after reading the book?
Florrie reveals the still-too-little-known history of women’s football, shines a light on queer love in the early twentieth century, and explores grief, friendship and family. If any of those aspects touch readers it would be amazing.
How did your time as a student at Falmouth help to encourage you to pursue a career as a graphic novelist?
I discovered some great illustrators and cartoonists while at Falmouth and loved having the time and space to develop my work. I remember listening to a lecture about graphic novels, given by an editor from Jonathan Cape, and hoping one day I’d write and draw my own.
After my Foundation I read English at King’s College, Cambridge, during which I continued to draw, including political cartoons for The Guardian, and then did an arts residency at Christ’s College, Cambridge. Although I didn’t do an art degree, I feel my time at Falmouth set me up well to continue with my practice independently, and the inspiration I felt there stayed with me.
Florrie: A Football Love Story by Anna Trench, published by Jonathan Cape on 19th June. Available for purchase now.
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