The Thorny Issue of Writers and their Muses, and the Sex thereof...

The Thorny Issue of Writers and their Muses, and the Sex thereof...and Writing Like a Man (grrrr...)

I dunno – been reading all these posts from those who must mean well, and no doubt seek to redress a perceived imbalance in male v female publishing opportunities. But really, do publishers seriously discriminate? Don’t they just want to sell books and stay in business? Why would they discriminate if more women buy and read books than men? Doesn't make sense to me. But then, it also does not make sense for people to whinge that more review space is given to male writers. Is it? Pick up a women's magazine and the books reviewed will be mostly by women. Are the blokes screeching about that? Maybe, just maybe the books that came in that week to the broadsheets, by men, were more interesting reads for the reviewers? Oh my gad the sacrilege.
My shelves are groaning with male writers because in general, over the years, and with some notable exceptions, I have preferred their work. Sorry and all that, if I am offending any delicate sensibilities. I am being honest, if that's OK?
But while looking at one of the early articles that flagged the need for female writers to ‘write like men’ if they want to get on, (whatever that phrase means) here, in Washington Post of December 30 2009 the old brain was working overtime... one minute I was wanting to laugh, and the next, not...and at the same time I was also reading about the poet M A Griffiths today, an Anglo-Welsh female poet who published her work solely on the internet, and sadly died early... but her work was so loved by her colleagues that they have collected it all together. ‘Grasshopper’ is published by Arrowhead Press.
But what interests me about her, specifically here is not how lovely her work is (and it is) but the fact that many of her colleagues on poetry forums thought she was a man – when all they had to go on was her work, or her forum monikers – Maz or Grasshopper. Read this here, from one of her female colleagues, Rose Kelleher:
Why did they think she was a bloke? Having read round this a bit - I think it is because of her boldness with language, and her interest in many many things, her need to write about them, from the intimate themes to the wider ones. And no doubt lots more reasons.

I used to take great pleasure in colleagues thinking a piece of my work posted anonymously for feedback, was by a male writer. Why? I’ve been thinking about that – and I think the answer is, because the stereoptype I would least want to fit is ‘ the woman writer’ because that stereotype (in my head - OK...)is a female who is mostly preoccupied with the things I am not.
Yes, I know, I AM a woman and I am a writer. But I would really hate it if anyone said – ‘Oh yes, I knew immediately I read your work – it’s got ‘written by a female’ written all over it.’

But then I re-read Rose Kelleher’s post about M A Griffiths. ‘Maz and the Male Muse...’ and I started thinking about the muses. Mine is not, never has been and never could be a female. Maybe the muses were depicted as females because they were invented by – er- men??

So what sex is your muse? Are you a woman writer who writes with one of the female muses wafting about in your study? Or are you, like me, fed by someone different? Is your muse something intangible, of the air? Or is it a solid person? The great painters had them. Why not us lot?!

Lots of links to M A Griffiths here by the way.

Added:
A quick peek at The Bookseller Top 20 booksales this week shows female writers on 12, men on 8. Maybe the statisticians need to get on with something else. Or get a bloke to do it? We all kow us girls can't add up for toffee....Bookseller.

Congratulations to all on Willesden Herald Short List...

Oodles of congrats to everyone on the Willesden Herald short story comp shortlist, selected by the inimitable Maggie Gee! The announcement was made today, and here is the link to the complete post on Willesden herald blog
Delighted as I am for everyone, I am particularly pleased to see a few names I know on here - Teresa Stenton, whose work rose to the top at Bridport in 2009. Adnan Mahmutovic, who read at Pages of Hackney only last Saturday, and stayed with us on his way back to Stockholm where he teaches at the University. Nemone Thornes, with whom I have crossed writing-swords more than once, Emma Martin, erstwhile writing colleague from New Zealand, and Andrea Ashworth, facebook writing friend. My goodness. The short story world is very small. This is going to be some party!

"Apartment" by Y.J. Zhu
"Blue Raincoat" by Teresa Stenson
"Dancing with the Flag Man" by Nemone Thornes
"Gusul" by Adnan Mahmutovic
"Homecoming" by Alex Barr
"Out of Season" by Mary O'Shea
"Overnight Miracles" by A.J. Ashworth
"Set Dance" by Angela Sherlock
"The Bedroom" by Michael Coleman
"The Place" by David Frankel
"Thingummy Wotsit" by Adrian Sells
"Victor" by Emma Martin

Of book jackets, statues, feathers and so forth

This is 'In Labore Benedictio' by a sculptor named Picciole - a small bronze that stands on an old chest in the corner of my living room. I don't think Picciole is particularly good - most of his other stuff seems to be a bit saccharine, from researching what turns up at auction and in antique/junk shops.
However. I love it - because it was obviously modelled on this: Dalou's larger-than-life sculpture of 'Le Grand Paysan, in the Musee D'Orsay, Paris.

There is a statue in The Coward's Tale. This was at the back of my mind when that statue was there, on the page. Perfect. Absolutely perfect. So Bloomsbury got a photo of the Dalou when wanting to know if I had any thoughts about the cover. of course, I did - this, and what about some feathers?? And bless the designer, he is there, on the jacket, beautiful and absolutely perfect. But I'm not showing it yet, until one tweak is done, I think...

I talk more about the process of The Coward's jacket on his own blog, HERE

Editing, rewriting, revising the manuscript...

I have just finished the little tweakings (sounds like an address in Surrey...) on The Coward. They took me a couple of sessions, one at home, and one at the British Library, to get away from the internet, phone, cat and various others.
And no, that does not mean that was all there ever was to do!
I found myself approaching this piece of work differently - it is the first time I have written anything so long, so involved, and the process became very different to my writing of a short story - something that tended to need to be all there in draft form before I tried to bash it into shape at all, or I'd lose something, freedom, flow, air... something.
Over the four/five years it took to write The Coward, I polished as I went. Literally, and obsessively. I would write the opening to a section and worry at it for days, reading it out loud, changing a word here, there, and only when I had it as right as I could, did I go on to write more of that section. The process would begin again - reading the whole thing, as far as I had it, out loud. Smoothing, changing, swapping paragraphs over to see if that made it different, better, worse -before continuing.
Sometimes, this process was very necessary. There were great gaps in writing anything of the novel, thanks to external factors. No - I am not whinging - just explaining my process, to myself as much as anything. And to be able to return to the place I was at creatively became quite a leap, very often.
I found reading out loud, slowly, really listening to the words, the rhythms, helped to ground me in the work over and over again, and was also a necessary part of the editing process.
The first draft was completed at Anam Cara in February 2010... and when I came home, I sent it to the marvellous Maggie Gee, with whom I was working on final polishing, thanks to an Arts Council grant. This was the first time anyone had read the whole manuscript right through, apart from its author.
'About 80% of the way there. Publishable already, but will be so much better if you do this, that and the other...'
That was marvellous to hear.. I was getting there. I have to admit, looking back, that there was a bit of me that wanted to hear, 'This is perfection. No need to do anything, oh a typo on page 234...' but I knew it wasn't, and never would be perfection - but it absolutely HAD to be the best it could be before sending it out to my agent.
The world is tough. If I sent him a 'less than' manuscript, and he had ten pieces of work whose authors had taken the trouble to polish, polish, polish on his desk - see the issue?

So how did I approach the polishing process? Maggie prepared detailed notes, pointing out those places where her response to the book became 'teachery' as opposed to 'readery'. That I understood completely. We would discuss the bigger issues, and I would go off to sort out the solutions. It took a long time - working up to a final read from Maggie in the late summer, a final list of notes, and a couple of weeks in Ireland, chipping and chipping away.

Many times during the process, I would print off the whole book, read it through, trying to keep a distance, treating it as a whole, to see what effect this or that change had on the whole thing. In this way, reading it through again, and again, I picked up more little nits and nats and changed those too.
And by October I had a piece of work I felt was right to send to my agent. The attention to detail, obsessively ironing out the nits, guided by a seasoned, marvellous novelist, (also, incidentally first female Chair of the Royal Society of Literature) paid off. He wanted no revisions, and sent it straight out and the rest is history.

So what tweaks can my editor want? As many as she likes, actually - she is so in tune with the book, I have no qualms about anything, and trust her judgement. But there are so few, thank heavens. The process this time was this - to get Helen's suggestions via email. To read carefully - and sit on them for a few days. Then print out the novel again (!) and consider each suggestion separately. And tweak. Often, all it took was a single phrase added. (But of course, I would always end up reading out loud to make sure the phrase fitted absolutely!)

So the only tip I can end on, is this.

If you are not normally an obsessive personality, there is one time you absolutely must be one. And that is when you are editing a novel.

PHILOSOPHY and THE NOVEL

One of my favourite blogs, where I can always find something fascinating, thought-provoking – is that of Norman Geras. (linked on the right – if you don’t know this one, go and see... it’s the best). Earlier this week, he drew our attention to a fascinating question. The relationship, if any, between philosophy and the novel - let's extend that here to fiction in general, shall we?.
A précis then, here – Gera’s article is much better.

James Ryerson, writing here, in the New York Times,
raises the question, “Can a novelist write philosophically?’ and quotes Iris Murdoch as saying absolutely not. In her view,

philosophy and literature were contrary pursuits. Philosophy calls on the analytical mind to solve conceptual problems in an “austere, unselfish, candid” prose, she said in a BBC interview broadcast in 1978, while literature looks to the imagination to show us something “mysterious, ambiguous, particular” about the world. Any appearance of philosophical ideas in her own novels was an inconsequential reflection of what she happened to know.

I have to say, this fascinates me, and I’m not sure what to think. Here are eminently clever people arguing that fiction and philosophy are polar opposites. The more I do think about it, I come to the conclusion that someone’s wrong.

What is philosophy? I guess we can trust Wikipedia here: "Philosophy is the study of general and fundamental problems, such as those connected with existence, knowledge, values, reason, mind, and language."
Couldn’t it be argued that if a novel or indeed any fiction, does not touch on issues connected with existence (or otherwise), knowledge (or otherwise), values, reason, mind and language – it’s fairly inconsequential? And actually, even ‘inconsequential’ reads, what are they dealing with if not one of these at some level?

Maybe the issue is one of ‘study’? That philosophers seek to give us the answers themselves. Whereas creators of good fiction seek to open our minds to possibilities we’ve not thought of perhaps, and draw us into the debate?
And anyway – there is an argument that says (re: the Murdoch quote above) that fiction written in unselfish, candid prose works better in many ways than deliberate obfuscation.

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Edited to add: Thanks Tim Love for this link, to an article today (oddly..) in Times Higher Ed Supp, Here.. Fictive Narrative Philosophy... well, hey chaps,, isnt that what strong lit. writers have been doing for ever...?
To quote:"Fiction that only imitates nature or seeks to provide entertainment without making a claim about facts or values in the world is not fictive narrative philosophy. It is just a story."

Reading, reading, reading ...

Oh isn't this lovely! I am reading... no pangs of guilt that I need to be doing my own writing instead. No imp on my shoulder telling me to watch for craft issues - although I do that a lot - I fall into elephant traps easily if they are there. So - on my new Kindle, I have now read 'The Finkler Question' By Howard Jacobson, and 'Room' by Emma Donoghue. Hmm. Which, I ask myself, would I recommend if you could only read one? (That's the test, isn't it?...) And I think it would have to be 'Room'. Not because the other isn't great - but because 'Room' will give you far more to get worked up about - and why bother to read unless it's to shake ourselves up a bit, up and out of little leafy lanes in deepest Sussex, where the most scary visitor is the milkman.
Things you can get worked up about, if you read 'Room': its inspiration - the Fritzl affair, for a start. I've already heard other writers saying Donoghue had no right to exploit the misfortunes of others in this way. Huh? I bet they wouldn't have said that if they'd got there first. Donoghue says 'Room' was triggered by the Fritzl case, after she read about the five-year old lad who had never seen the outside world. It is very good - storywise. Really not easy to write a whole novel from the point of view of a five year old, without it palling badly - and she does it well. the voice wavered a few times, for this reader - but hey - it's a ripping yarn, and I hadn't read a book that kept me up until 2 am for yonks.

Yes, I enjoyed Finkler - it is another eye-opener, in a way, beautifully crafted, humorous, slightly self-consciously clever. Did it make a deep impression on me? No, I can't say it did. Maybe because I didn't 'care' about the subject matter so much, interesting as it is.

I've read Jo Cannon's marvellous collection 'Insignificant Gestures', slowly, cover to cover.
I love Jo's work, and have been watching her successes pile up for a while now. We used to be writing colleagues in The Fiction Workhouse, and when she told me Pewter Rose Press were publishing her collection, and then asked me to endorse it, I was really pleased! Many of the pieces I recognise, of course - and it was simply lovely to be able to read and savour them again, whilst meeting many many pieces that were new to me. Jo is a GP - she has spent some time in African countries during her career as a doctor - and many of her stories explore issues from that perspective. Her characters are so well drawn - there was not one story where I felt wrong-footed - on the contrary, was always surprised when I got to the end, how far away from my settee or study I'd been transported. It's particularly interesting for me, as a writer - Jo works in a very different way to me - we've been on a week-long writing retreat together in 2009 - and to see her moving, beautifully wrought stories emerging painstakingly carefully, was terrific. I will talk about this one again - I'm hoping to get Jo to natter here, if I can drag her out of her surgery...

I'm also reading poetry by Seamus Heaney. I bought 'Human Chain' in e-book format, and know something - I don't think poetry is so successful on the Kindle. Oh, that's not a reflection on the work - here's a review on Guardian Online by Colm Toibin, who says it is one of Heaney's most powerful collections yet... but it's more to do with the coldness of the medium, the screen, it fights the work. Anyone else find this? It ought to work well - mostly the poems fit on a single screen... maybe it's just me.

I have started Dante's 'Divine Comedy'... in the free verse translation as opposed to rhyming lines - I find those so hard to get past..anyway, something I've been meaning to dive into for a while, and again - Dante on Kindle, I don't think so... (Sorry about the 'see inside' sticker - it doesn't work!)
And a teaser...sometimes, reading for pleasure turns into reading for review, or the other way round. I am delighted to have finally sent in to The Short Review my write-up of a collection that I wanted everyone to read when I discovered it a couple of years back. Writing and things got in the way - but finally, I got back to it, and had the huge pleasure of reading again. What is it? Ha! You'll have to wait until the next Short Review -but here's the author...

.......
and money? Oh yes. I sent my final ACE grant budget breakdown to the Arts Council, as reported, ... and had confirmation that the final 10% has been paid into the bank. Yippee.

Author's Photograph

This is copied from The Coward's Journey - a blog following my novel through the publication process...HERE!!
Ahem.
And along came the inevitable request for a high-res photo of meself, to adorn or otherwise the catalogue, the book, the Bloomsbury website.

Oh how tempted I am to copy other authors and dig something out from years ago, when my neck and chin didn't have constant illegible conversations, when there was space enough for a splodge of subtle but glorious colour on the eyelid and the eyebrows didn't insist on dropping in to see what all the fuss was about.
Wouldn't it be loverley to pop down to the local cementworks and order a facial. Then a makeover, where all the lines were filled with filla, hedges clipped, topiary toped. A quick blast of sellotape behind the ears to restore the jawline, a new drenching of the tired old locks. A streak or twain (not in the football sense of course..) and the subsequent hiring of a top photographer for a week.
A week? Oh yes. Then I could have photos of me in every mood. In every item of clothing I posess (a la OK!, or Hello!) black tee after black tee after black tee. Then the green one!
I could have images of moi, sultry in bed in the morning, dog's breath and all, wincyette nightie fetchingly askew. Moi at brekkie, chomping toast. Moi feeding the cat and the husband in that order. (Husband makes less noise). Moi on the phone to the GAP Year son Somewhere in India. Motherly love and red lipstick, black shiny phone. Cool.
Moi in black rollneck, posed lightly over arm of sofa. Taken from above, natch. Or moi carefully posed at desk, fixed, intelligent yet quizzical and beguiling expression on physog. Fingers( light pink nail varnish?) ready to type on keyboard... and on the desk, randomly scattered tomes that always live on my desk, of course, just found in a box in the roof - the poems of John Donne! Shakespeare! Roget's Thesaurus! A carefully angled silver frame, containing, if you look very very carefully, a signed photo of Martin Amis...or yet again, moi, with a wind-up clown, a pile of books, in an artisanal setting and wearing a blonde wig? Yes, I did, and no, never used it.

Oh fer gawd's sake.
I can't find me desk let alone me keyboard. It is under a heap of stuff. Mostly mine. Actually I lie - if I look down, I can see the following:
1. A Ordnance Survey Map of Pulborough, Worthing and Bognor Regis.
2. A pencil sharpener in the shape of a plastic Loch Ness monster wearing a tam, emblazoned Nessie!
3. A copy of 'Contented Dementia' - ( for my Dad's carer - but who knows, soon enough, for moi...)
4)Another pencil sharpener, in the shape of a cat. I won't tell you where you stick the pencil but it miaous piteously. (From GAP Year son, Christmas last.)
5) Papers, papers, papers. More papers. Hiding yet more.
6) A reel of white cotton.
7) A box of earplugs.
8) Nine more books slipping off the side - among them, The Biography of the Bible, the short stories of Flannery O'Connor, The Mapmakers of Spitalfields by Manzu Islam..
9) Notebooks, files, more paper.


See, that's me. What would a makeover do except make me look rather daft when I turn up to do readings or somesuch, without the makeup team in tow?
I'm using the same pic I used for 'Glass Bubble' and 'Storm Warning' -here you go. Taken in 2007, it made me look rather grown-up.
I've just about caught up with it.

Modernist Press - Art from Art Anthology

I was very pleased to hear from Steve Soucy this last week, with images of the cover art for the forthcoming Art from art Anthology, from his LA-based press, Modernist. I have a story in here, a reprint of 'The Return of the Baker, Edwin Tregear', one of my favourite stories from 'Storm Warning'. Writers could interpret 'Art' widely - and included in the list of inspirations were museums. The story is based on research done partly at the Levant tin mine in Cornwall, and partly from Lyn MacDonald's marvellous histories of World War I. It was great to know it will be published all the way across in California! It will also be fascinating to see what illustration, if any, the story is given.

This anthology has been on the chocs for a bit - we were paid for our work a while back - and I am excited to hear that it will be coming out in two different editions. Firstly, a limited-edition hardback coffee-table book, and second, a quality paperback with a slip cover. Smashing.

Smashing Reviews for ‘Storm Warning’

My poor little book. It’s got all sidelined in the fuss over the novel. However – reviews are coming in, and are great. Here’s a few.

First, on 'Under The Midnight Sun’ - the site of author Adnan Mahmutovic

“she made every aspect of story-telling appear so natural and unconstrained. It’s almost like slipping on ice...Since I have been through war, I can relate and quite appreciate the way Gebbie treats war...”

That is diamond feedback from someone who has first hand experience of war from a young civilian’s point of view, and it means such a lot to hear this. Read his whole review HERE. Adnan has also put this ***** review on Amazon UK

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Next, on Amazon.com (where the book seems to be unavailable from the publisher, sadly...) a real surprise to see another ***** review from the folks of GUD Magazine:

"Gebbie gives us little slices of insights into people's lives that are often so harsh that you want to look away, but also so honest and intimate that you feel looking away would be a betrayal...
The writing is clean and to the point with few words wasted. ... many of Gebbie's characters (have) something to hide. Out it comes, though, eventually, choking and gasping its way out into the night...
The characters in these stories are ordinary people. They could be us, or our close relatives, our friends, people we meet in the streets. The stories put us into their lives, and make them more real by only offering these slices, by eschewing backstory and long explanations.
With this volume, small but perfectly-formed, both Gebbie and Salt Publishing cement their reputations for producing quality short fiction that demands to be read."

Read the whole review on GUD itself, HERE

Thank you, folks at GUD (pronounced ‘good’ - Greatest Uncommon Denominator) is a fab literary/genre magazine based in the USA - I was lucky enough to be published in here once. Check it out HERE.. terrific stuff. Hard to get an acceptance, but worth persevering!

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On writer Shauna Busto’s site /:

“It is about conflict but at a deeper level than that of the physical battlefield - although "The Return of the Baker, Edwin Tregear" and "Gas Gangrene" among others involve very physical accounts of war - it is about human conflict both interior and exterior.”
And
“A number of stories are outstanding in the relatively slim collection. ... Just don't let the word "conflict" fool you - it is not just about war. It is about all of us.”

Thank you Shauna.

An early review, back in November, came from Judy Darley of the Essential Writers website.

“In a few, brief beautifully spare paragraphs she has the skill to utterly transport you, immersing you in lives that ring out with authenticity and enmeshing you in their emotions - all without a touch of sentimentality.”
And
“the tales bear an uncommon poignancy, subtly altering your perceptions of the world around you. It’s an uncanny power, but a welcome one”

Thank you Judy.

Tim Love, on Litrefs, says:

"In this book victims of military/religious conflict who have a weakened sense of the present become vulnerable to sudden losses of memory and invasion by the past. Dominant themes are beaches, feet/shoes, and smells, with several inter-generational relationships. This collection kicks off with "The Return of the Baker, Edwin Tregear", a strong 15 pager set in 1919. Next is the single paged "Storm Warning" featuring someone on leave from Helmand. Already we note that the theme doesn't over-constrain the pieces in style or content. Later we're faced by the Berlin Wall, S.E. Asia, concentration camps, etc."
and
"I'm reminded of Alan Bennett's Talking Heads, Studs Terkel, ghosted biographical material, stories/anecdotes by a guy at my local writers group. It's powerful stuff, though it doesn't have the variety of her first book (note: I overvalue variety)."

That made me grin - thanks Tim.
See the whole review HERE

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and last but by no means least, from Thomas Bunstead, writing in the local magazine, Viva Lewes:

"Powerful...technically adept...hard-hitting...authoritative...rich and deeply moving."

Thanks Thomas.

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Thoughts about theme in fiction...

Oh I spent ages trying to understand what 'theme' was, as opposed to 'subject' in fiction. Then one day it clicked. And much later, when I was asked, 'What's the novel about', I never knew whether people were wanting to know the subject matter, or what it was really 'about'. Maybe, neither did they.
This is the Bloomsbury catalogue entry for 'The Coward's Tale':

Poignant, poetic and spiked with humour: a novel about guilt and atonement, kinship and kindness, and the reverberations of the past.

Bear with me? Now - this is what I was doing in the first week of this New Year. Keep an eye open for things that might shape my view of the world... and might feed into my work?
I drove from my village in Sussex to a village in Suffolk, where for the first time, I met my youngest sister.
Charlie was over from New York where she is a freelance makeup artist, working with the great and the gorgeous, making them even more great and gorgeous. Here's Charlie discovering that I have our father's eyebrows, apparently (!) There are five of us. I was adopted at birth, as I decided to arrive before our parents were married, and that wasn't on back then. A bit of detective work and over fifty years later, we're finally together.
Or, sort of together. Three live in the USA, and have done for years. Susie (California) Charlie (Manhattan) Sally (Boston Mass.) One in Suffolk. (Phillipa). Susie was also over for Christmas. After a while, when the shrieks of excitement died down, we Skyped Sally
And this is the photographic evidence, chaps - all five sisters together... sort of!
What was that about theme? Kinship and kindness. Guilt and Atonement. The reverberations of the past. Only I turned mine into something different. Easy, really.
Cheers!!!

Round Up of 2010 - a bit late!

Novel
Top of the list has to be getting the Arts Council grant that allowed me to work with a superb writer, to shape and polish my 100,000 word pile of words. Enough to work with Maggie Gee for thirty hours - and that was split between full reads of manuscript, extensive comments, and face to face sessions usually at The British Library.
It wasn't without notes of sadness - the mentoring period had to be extended by six months in the end - the decline of my father, for whom the book was written, meant I had to focus on him for a while.
I finally sent it to my agent at the end of October, and had the fantastic but fantastic news within a couple of weeks that he loved it, didn't want any changes, and was going to send it out forthwith. By the end of November, there were two smashing publishers bidding for the book. After meeting them both, editors, sales teams, marketing teams, I decided to go with Bloomsbury UK and USA. And finally, finally, after eight years of slog, I am being paid something nice for my work. Yahoo! It's a bit invidious to say how much but 'solid five figure sum' seems to cover it.'The Coward's Tale' will hit the UK shelves in November this year, and the US shelves the following spring.

Teaching.
I spent a few wonderful weeks in Stockholm in the spring, teaching groups of students at the University. 'Short Circuit' was the intro here - and I used Freedom, the Anthology produced by Amnesty International, as a teaching text. I also led workshops in Ipswich at the University Campus Suffolk, in Exeter for Exeter Writers, and gave the annual Asham lecture at Sussex University.
Poetry
My forays into the poetry world continue slowly. I was lucky enough to have poems selected for publication in the 2010 Ver Poets competition anthology, and in the WordAid poetry anthology to raise funds for Children In Need. I've had a few publications online - at the smashing place, Ink Sweat and Tears. A couple of poems were also shortlisted at Bridport.
Prose
Ive had work published in 100 Stories for Haiti, and was asked to write the introduction for 50 Stories for Pakistan.
Retreats
I've had three marvellous stays at Anam Cara, where most of the novel has been written.

Arts' Council Evaluation

I am putting together the evaluation for the AC - I emailed a week or so back and told my contact the news that 'The Coward's Tale', as it now is, has found a great home at Bloomsbury. It is a sobering thought - I was lucky, and managed to secure a grant before the cuts in spending hit - and it was tough enough a year back, believe me. I can't help thinking that my grant was a tiny sum, relatively speaking, and how many wonderful pieces of work would be helped into the world if it was only possible to give a helping hand more often.
Maggie Gee, in writing her evaluation of the mentoring process, made the point that my grant money has enabled her go to New York to research her next novel. So that's two writers helped in one swoop, two pieces of work given a shove into the world.

I didn't have to send these documents in - but because it has been such a successful project, thought it was a good thing to do so. Who is to say - maybe it will encourage a purse string to be loosened a little? I was always a mad optimist.
Anyway, in the spirit of sharing as much as I could on this blog, here is my evaluation paper.

EVALUATION STATEMENT

When I applied for this grant to work with Maggie Gee, my manuscript was basically a series of short fictions, all set in the same town, with the same set of characters. I had created a thin and very last-minute ‘linking device’ based on conversations between two characters, and I knew that was patently obvious, and therefore unsatisfactory.
Working with Maggie Gee was marvellous. From the first read-through of the work, she seemed to understand exactly what I was trying to do, and saw some of the seeds of the solution in what I had already created. It was under her guidance and encouragement that these linking sections took on a depth and importance that strengthened the rest of the book, as the relationship between the two characters grew in the most surprising ways. The results have enriched the whole far more than I would have thought possible.
Maggie never told me what to do in terms of the plot. She would point out the issues, and we would discuss the implications of various suggestions, or possible solutions that appeared as we discussed. She wrote extensive and extremely helpful notes for all the manuscripts I sent her, showing me her reactions as an intelligent reader as much as a great teacher.
I learned the importance of creating a narrative thread that pulls the reader through a novel, and that events strung together, even though they are ‘saying something’ cohererent, are not enough.
I learned specific craft skills appropriate for a novel-length work, the necessity for example, to help the reader more than in a short story, especially at the beginning, to identify important characters by using small but definite details. That is a good example of learning to see the work from the reader’s perspective. Maybe it is easier to be more self-indulgent with a short story, but if I wanted to keep the reader’s attention for the length of a novel, I had to learn a few different tricks of the trade. There were plenty of places where the reader’s attention might slip – where I had overdone the descriptions and images, and there was not enough happening. That raised several issues - it was clear that I had overused imagery in places, such that one cancelled out another, and the overall effect was messiness, rather than what I was reaching for. It was marvellous to have those places pointed out – not specifics, necessarily, but passages where the tension slackened.
One very important discussion took place - the most uncomfortable - where the central image, a machine, and a marvellous metaphor, became the target of a possible scythe. This really was my writer's darling - the novel was called 'The Man-Engine' and there were careful descriptions of this device, that got clearer and clearer (at least that was the intention) as the book progressed. But... the book is about the echoes of a mining disaster. It is Wales. And this machine was not in use there. Yes, I could have put in an explanatory paragraph at the end to say I was aware, but this is fiction... but after drafting the said paragraph twenty times, I just couldn't do that. It seemed an image to far, finally. And when I realised that the movement of the machine had given me the structure of the novel - something the publishers commented on in the end, positively - it had done its job.
Did I do everything that Maggie suggested, then? No. For example, there were places where Maggie suggested dropping a specific phrase from the prose, here and there, and on consideration, I left some of them in, because to remove them would have had an impact on the voice and the rhythms. In those instances I tried to find another way of sharpening the experience for the reader in a different way. I think I have learned to listen to my own instincts more. To trust my own skills more than before. The seeds of the main narrative thread were all there – Maggie pointed out the importance of these characters, and their interaction – but also the relative thinness of these sections, as well. I like to think that next time, I will trust the process of creation more, and be able to expand on those things that are important more instinctively.
I learned how much work is necessary to create a manuscript I am really proud of, as opposed to an ‘it will have to do’ creation. I learned that when I thought it was finished, but was a little concerned still about the ending – Maggie picked that up, and I was right to be concerned. I learned that what one thinks is the last of all the many rewrites is never the last. Maybe a work is never ‘finished’.

Overall, as well as having tackled the craft issues necessary to turn a series of linked stories into a novel, I think I am a more confident writer at the end of the mentoring process. Working with Maggie Gee was terrific, and I am very grateful for that opportunity.

A Romantic Longlisting for Sally Zigmond

I’m enjoying myself – today I am waving a bunch of red roses in the ether in congrats to Sally Zigmond, for her news, a longlisting for her novel ‘Hope Against Hope’ (Myrmidon) in the Romantic Novelists Association Romantic Novel of the Year Award. Goodness me! The full long list is HERE.

Hope Against Hope is on Amazon, HERE

How To Get A Literary Agent, by Sarah Hilary

A couple of years back, I persuaded writer friend Sarah Hilary to come with me to the Fish Publishing award ceremony, part of the West Cork Lit Fest. (What, you haven’t been? Well poor you...) Sarah had won one of the prizes – and I could give her a lift from Cork airport to the lovely town of Bantry. We had a very happy drive, nattering away, and went straight to the library for the opening of the Festival. They’d pushed the moveable shelves back to make room for all the rows of chairs, and I was sitting next to one of the said shelves- labelled ‘Crime’.
‘One day, you’ll have a whole row of books in places like this,’ I said. Because she will. No question. How do I know – well, it’s not difficult – she writes intelligent, intriguing crime novels – good enough to be noticed by a top agent, even in those early days – and was stubborn enough, like Yours Truly – not to give up when it would have been so so easy to.
Getting an agent is tough stuff. Persuading someone that your work is good enough to represent, sell, spend time on, is tough. And giving up at the first fence ain’t an option – if you want to succeed.
So I was very very happy to read on Sarah’s blog that she has been signed – and in her inimitable fashion, she relates the stages of How To get An Agent – HERE!!! And not just any old agent, either... oh no.
Read and enjoy. Especially the bit about not giving up...
Many many congrats to Sarah.

TURNING POINTS - and WILLESDEN HERALD

I look back over seven years of hard work, and can see very clearly those turning points where my writing career took a leap forward. (If that’s not too many mixed whatsits…leaping, and turning, whatever next?)
The most important was winning (jointly with Mikey Delgado) the inaugural Willesden Herald Short Story Competition in 2006. I’d not heard of this – but had the details and entry conditions sent to me by various writing friends and colleagues late in 2005 – it suddenly appeared all over the serious short story writers’ networks, and created something of a storm, in a minor way.
Storm? Well, it was a bit different. There was no entry fee, for a start – they were asking for quality work, and had landed a very well known name as final judge – Zadie Smith.
I sent off an unpublished story, and as the guidelines said it did not have to be published by the comp after the judging if entrants didn’t want – that seemed a great deal. What was to lose?

Prize? Well – a mug. Wot, no cash? Nope, not then.

The mug is a much loved thing, and I am very proud of it. Winning the competition started a friendship I value highly with Stephen Moran and his wife Tess, and there was another prize – although I didn’t realise that at the time. Zadie Smith’s judge’s comments – a paragraph about my story.
Being able to quote from such a highly regarded writer was priceless. Worth more than lots of cash. Unquantifiable, actually… suddenly, I was taken seriously.

Why am I banging on about this, now? Because YOU have a week before Willesden Herald Short Story Competition closes this year. Before Stephen Moran reads YOUR story, and if it’s good enough – puts it on the shortlist that goes to the final judge.

This year’s final judge is Maggie Gee. She has a special place in my heart, this lady- she has just mentored me, thanks to the Arts Council, as I struggled to structure a string of short stories into a coherent whole work. She also gave me a generous endorsement for ‘Words from a Glass Bubble’ almost three years back, and again – the credibility that bestows on a not-yet-there writer is unquantifiable.

• There is a minimal entry fee. £3.00.
• Your reader loves short fiction with a passion. If it is good enough, it WILL get through.
• If it gets to the final judge, it will be read by an intelligent, lovely writer whose decision and comments might just be a turning point for you in your career, just as Zadie Smith’s were for me.
• What’s to lose?
• What are you waiting for?
• They’ve had 200+ so far – and already, Stephen is shaking his head, slightly. That means,
• GET YER STORY IN THERE, RIGHT???

Willesden Herald and competition details, HERE

Maggie Gee at Contemporary writers, HERE

.Cent Magazine Creative Writing commissions...

I can really recommend this commission (or call for subs) to writers. I sent them a short piece a year or so back... the magazine is wonderful. Beautifully produced, huge, thick paper, and each piece of prose has its own page, and illustration. In addition to the contributor's copy, they included a copy of your page - for the wall, a frame for Mum, whatever...
Submissions close on 12th december - here is the original email:

"For those new to the .Cent creative writing commission: the content of each new biannual issue is split up into chapters. For each chapter we welcome writers to interpret the title in a piece of work. Every chapter is introduced with one of your submissions.
For issue 17 the chapter titles are:

Strange Paradises
Everything is Connected
Crossroads
Recording the City


If you’d like to submit your writing then the brief is as follows:

· Strict maximum word-count of 350.
· Submission deadline is Sunday 12th December 2010.
· You can submit poetry/prose/script.
· You may submit to as many chapter as you wish.
· Submissions and work are on an unpaid basis.
· Please state if work has been previously published elsewhere. The work will still be considered however we’d like to know in advance.
· Please feel free to interpret the title however you wish, although it is worth bearing in mind that .Cent will select the piece that best encapsulates the chapter theme.
· The chosen submission will be printed in the issue. If it is yours, we’ll let you know and send you the issue + tears.
· Submissions that are not selected for the magazine could potentially be published on the website.
· .Cent reserves the right to make the final decision.


To submit work:
· Please email submissions to cent.writing@gmail.com by no later than 12th December 2010.
· Please state how you’d like to be credited- your name (as you would like it to appear in print) + mention a website? Or a current project? Perhaps published work? However we can support you.
· Please include alongside your submission your contact details- email, address and phone number.

Website HERE.

And lovely news: my novel 'The Coward's Tale' is to be published in UK (Nov 2011 hardback, and paperback Spring 2012) and USA (Spring 2012) by Bloomsbury. Am thrilled and rather wobbly at the moment. More later.

.

Pending...and 'A Razor Wrapped in Silk', by R N Morris

Pending…. (there is some very nice novel-type news on the horizon, of which more when things are finalised…)
But what do you do when you have finished something that took you years to write, when that has been read and loved by more than one great publisher, and you are buzzing about publicising your just-out second short story collection?

One, you get off the planet for a break. I am at Anam Cara, the best place in the world, my writers’ retreat in Ireland. With two great friends also here, who could ask for more.
Two, you also start feeding the empty well, filling up those spaces that feel so raw, after scouring everywhere you can think of inside yourself, to write as well as you can for such a long time.
First task then, was to find a novel to read. I am always reading short fiction, and love it – I wanted a single something to sustain me for longer…Oh there are lots out there, but this had to be something different. I needed the equivalent of a gym workout on my creative places. Then I read a post on facebook, from facebook friend Roger Morris. That's him up there... He is the author of three historical crime novels – and he was asking if anyone would like to read to review on their blogs… perfect.
Now – I don’t read historical fiction. I actually don’t go for it, because much of what I have read is so stuffed with unnecessary research details that these completely cloud the story.
So I was deliberately taking myself out of a comfort zone, and Roger’s novel, “A Razor Wrapped In Silk” which was kindly sent to me by someone at the publishers, Faber, would have to work quite hard to make this Doubting Thomas sink into it.

We are in St Petersburg, mid 19th century. The novel starts in a horrific cotton-mill, in which looming machines clank and roar, and young children are ‘employed’ to work inside the guts of the machines, mending broken threads. We meet a young lad, looking forward to his one joy in life – his after-work school hour, making his way through the misty streets. And he never gets there….
We are then transported to St Petersburg society – a palace, opulent in the extreme, where very different people are celebrating, at a private theatre. The chill and darkness of the fist scenes are beautifully contrasted in the colours and richness of this second…and the blood on the carpet is rich and dark… Unlikely as it may seem, the events that play out at these two very different places will come together as this novel unfolds.

The book’s synopsis is this: (taken from Faber’s webpage, link below)

St. Petersburg. 1870. A child factory worker is mysteriously abducted. A society beauty is sensationally murdered. Two very different crimes show up the deep fissures in Russian society during the late tsarist period. The first is barely noticed by the authorities. The latter draws the full investigative might of St Petersburg's finest, led by magistrate Porfiry Petrovich. 

The dead woman had powerful friends - including at least one member of the Romanov family - so when the tsar’s notorious secret police become involved, it seems that both crimes may have a political - not to say revolutionary - aspect, which takes Porfiry inside the Winter Palace for a confrontation with the Tsar himself. 

The usually incisive magistrate grows increasingly unsure what to believe, who to trust and how to proceed. His very life appears to be in danger, though from whom he can't be sure.

Porfiry Petrovich is a magistrate, inspired by the character of the same name in Dostoyevsky.
I have not read the Dostoyevsky (sorry…) but in Morris’s capable hands he is a richly layered and complex individual, just as this is a richly layered and complex novel, without ever tipping into the self-aware morass of extraneous detail that seems to weigh down other historical fiction that has had the misfortune to be read by me.
I’m not going to give you any plot spoilers. Suffice it to say that I almost missed a train stop thanks to this book.
St Petersburg is a gorgeous place, and a glossy one hiding a dark underbelly, seems to me – I’ve spent a little time there, and know it has many different faces, even now. Morris conjures the city as it surely must have been well over a hundred years ago. He conjures it at a fascinating time, politically, and weaves a complex crime scenario into the tapestry of mist-wrapped streets and gilded palaces.
Having admitted I HATE extraneous material, I was on the lookout. I was watching for anything that held up the story, that didn’t ring right, that wasn’t organic. And after a few pages, I forgot to watch for any of that because it just aint there.
Morris writes fabulously well. The narrative voice is cleverly pitched to evoke a different era – but only just – at no time did I have to make an obvious effort, and it added to the seduction of this reader into another world. And what I wasn’t expecting, was the humour. In places, even though this has very dark shadows, I laughed out loud. It’s a joy to read.
My goodness, I’m glad I answered that facebook post.


The books webpage on Faber’s website is here: http://www.faber.co.uk/work/razor-wrapped-in-silk/9780571241156/

November November.... you busy month.

What to do when life becomes too busy for blogging – or at least when you’ve got other things to do that are more important. Like what? Well, here’s a short list and quick descriptions.

1) Saturday 6th November – the launch party for ‘Storm Warning’ with squillions of friends crammed into my house. Wine, food and friends, what better combination is there? Delighted to see those who had come from a long way, making the journey specially – Jon Pinnock, Jenny Barden, Margot Taylor, Jo Cannon, Tania Hershman, Carloine Davies, Stephen Moran and Tess, most of whom stayed the night and much fun was had by all in Dormitory Three…

2) The NAWE Conference, in Cheltenham, at the Barcelo Hotel. (National Assocition of Writers in Education) on 12th 13th 14th November. A great few days in the company of many many writers who teach writing in schools, universities and colleges up and down the UK, and abroad. I attend very much as a writer rather than a teacher, although it is interesting to share ideas and exercises. Especially marvellous to attend the workshops run by the senior staff from Columbia University Chicago. A different way of running workshops – coming away from the Iowa model. Very very interesting and felt right to me.

3) Mondays for the last few weeks (four in all) have been poetry days. I have been to Tate Modern each Monday attending the workshops run by poet Pascale Petit. We have worked in the Gauguin exhibition, in an installation by Joan Jonas based on a Grimms Fairy tale – ‘The Juniper Tree’ in the Surrealists, and back last week in Gauguin. We have been inspired to write when the Tate is closed, when we’ve had these marvellous exhibitions to ourselves. Such a huge privilege.

4) Judging the NYC Midnight Flash Challenge. Over the last couple of months this challenge has been running with several hundred entrants, gradually being whittled down as each round passes, to the final 25. I’ve just read and enjoyed the last pieces of work, and have my fingers crossed for one of two stunning flashes to win the overall prize of $1500. Its been fascinating. And a handy bit of cash before Christmas.

5) Spent an evening talking about short fiction to the lovely and welcoming Uckfield Writers.

6) My own writing – it has all been poetry. I have started the next novel – but its not easy to focus until I know what’s happening with the first one…


As we go into National Short Story Week, my week looks like this:
Tuesday 23rd:
Brighton launch for ‘Storm’ at Nightingale Theatre, 6 pm, with two fantastic professional actors (one was in Coronation Street, I gather) doing dramatised readings of three pieces from the book. I appear to be the only event in Sussex, which Im sure ain't right!
Wednesday 24th:
Train to Bristol, and a marvellous event, reading at Bristol Blackwells, 6.pm, a special event for this special week, organised by Tania Hershman, with Margot Taylor Anna Britten and Sarah Hilary among others. Staying over.
Thursday 25th:
Train back in time to go out to Lewes Live Lit in the evening to see some short stories by Catherine Smith turned into plays…
Friday 26th:
Up to see Susannah Rickards at the Claygate Short Story Festival, where I’m leading a flash workshop in the evening. Staying over…
Saturday 27th: drive home, pack, and train to London to see Sue Guiney. Large glass of red wine on order! Staying over… (I feel like a real sofa-surfer…)
Sunday 28th: Off to Heathrow, and a flight to Cork - Anam Cara for ten days… with Sue, and Tania … and we will have earned it!


Don’t Forget…

FISH SHORT STORY COMP- (If you come second, you win a week at Anam Cara plus spending money!) Get in there. Details HERE http://www.fishpublishing.com/short-story-competition-contest.php

Oh and, talking of Anam Cara – I am running a week-long short story workshop there next May.
Details are:

Short Fiction: So Much More Than It Seems...


One-week Residential Workshop Retreat

Arrival: Saturday, 28 May 2011

Departure: Saturday, 4 June 2011

A chance to explore in depth the craft of short fiction in all its challenging guises, in one of Ireland's most creatively exciting venues. A chance to focus on acquiring skills that will maximise the chances of your work rising to the top and standing out for the right reasons not only in publication slush piles but also in competitions.

In the company of a well-published, multi-prize-winning short storyist, who is also an experienced tutor, this will be a focused, collaborative workshop retreat during which you will create not only complete new work and the seeds of many new stories, but you will also discover tried and tested strategies for editing and revising your existing work to make it as good as it can be.

Although biased towards the art and craft of short fictions, we will also be able to explore the relevance of the craft issues to poetry, prose poetry and longer works.

For this and all other info, Anam Cara website is HERE http://anamcararetreat.com/

The eleventh hour of the eleventh day of the eleventh month

Please read this, it is really smashing. A wonderful piece of writing for today by Oscar Windsor-Smith.

I am tempted not to post this...

As I say - I am tempted not to post this, but I shall! A writers fellowship, at the Arvon centre in Scotland, near Loch Ness.
One whole month, from 1st - 27th March 2011 - a whole month to write - at the most stunning place. A small stipend, travel expenses covered. And the wonderful and not so onerous task of a few sessions at local schools to spread the word.
It is called the Jessie Kesson fellowship, and it is worth finding out about her.
Details for applications HERE.

Novel update

OK - novel was sent to my agent a fortnight ago, and I had a lovely message a couple of days back to say that he loved it. That he did not want any revisions, and he's going to send it out.
I am surprisingly calm about this, and being very businesslike, putting literary CVs together, and having to reformat the file.
Wot? reformat file? Entire novel? Aye - this wally had only sent him a document with all the markups showing! I am a hopeless techie-person as anyone who has worked with me can attest. So I had a play with Word and sent it backwards and forwards from laptop to PC a few times until all the markups disappeared. Ahem.

1st November news and sports round-up.

Storm Warning
Is here! My copies have arrived for the private launch party next weekend, and over half are sold already. Thank heavens – nowt worse than an old fart of a writer with old cardboard boxes full of unsold books in the garage.
I have organised absolutely nothing for the book – apart from a lovely offer of a blog visit from a writing friend – yes please! And any other offers?
It must be quite strong stuff – well, it is about war, and echoes thereof… a nice lady neighbour told me she started it and had to stop, it was ‘too strong’. Ah. Well, it is not called ‘Storm Warning’ for nothing. It is meant to make you stop and think. Er… not just stop…oh well. You win some you lose some.


There will be a public launch on 23rd November at The Nightingale Theatre,
Brighton, courtesy of New Writing South, at 6.30 pm flyer here:

I’m also sharing a launch in Ireland on 6th December at Anam Cara Writers and Artists’s Retreat with Sue Guiney and her marvellous new novel ‘A Clash of Innocents’.


It’s that Bridport Time again!

Where to start? Firstly, congrats to Alison Fisher, who has won the 2010 Bridport Short Story comp. £5000 for a short story, ain’t bad. I saw Alison at Small Wonder Festival a month ago – she turned round from the row in front, and whispered, ‘Do you remember me? I came to one of your workshops…I’ve just had some lovely news…’
Nah – I’m not saying it was the workshop that made her win it. But it might have helped a little on the way, ‘Writing for Competitions’ it was called…Must run that one again and charge a mint and a half. That was the two weekend workshops the organisers managed never to pay me for - a couple of years back… see other blog for gory details. (!!) Nice to know something good happened…
And congrats too to Claudia Abbott (Claudia Boers) for her finalist place, and look forward to reading these stories in the 2010 anthology.
Congrats too to those writing friends, colleagues and so forth including facebook mates, who were short-listed for story, poetry or flash. Carys Davies, Joyce Russell, Jon Pinnock, Sheenagh Pugh, Wena Poon, Valerie O’Riordan, and I’m sure there are other lovely writers I’ve missed out.

It’s all down to hard work, much of this… hats off to all. All the info is here

Judging Flashes
I am one of the judges for a flash challenge … quite a big one – its still under way so I wont post links. It is extraordinary to see how many pieces come in at 999 words (limit is 1000), and how many are seemingly unedited for bagginess. Makes me realise yet again just how difficult writing a good flash actually is.


Article on Flash Fiction at Essential Writers
I have been discussing flash fiction in a series of Q and As for the lovely site Essential Writers – the result is here: What is it, how did I discover it, how to write it, where to publish, and lots more.



"A Clash of Innocents" by Sue Guiney
The husband and self went to a marvellous book lunch, at Asia House HERE to celebrate and wish God Speed to A Clash of Innocents by writing friend Sue Guiney. I have the book all signed and waiting on top of the pile. But all indications are that it is marvellous and vibrant read, thought-provoking too. You can read about it on the blog tour discussions all linked on Sue's blog HERE, and on the publisher's website. Ward Wood HERE.


Teaching at Exeter and Ipswich
Early October saw me up in Ipswich at the rather gorgeous University Campus Suffolk, teaching a large gang of terrific creative writers. The workshop focussed on character, and we had great fun as fresh and interesting characters rose up through the fog to take us over. Marvellous stuff.
And I visited Exeter Writers a few weeks later, my old stamping ground, as I was brought up nearby and went to University there…we had a fab afternoon’s workshop, again on character but with a different slant, over three hours. Exeter Writers is a focussed and hardworking group, including many well-published and prizewinning writers. They run a short story competition – and having worked with them for the afternoon, I reckon they will be very tough but fair judges.
Exeter Writers Short Story Competition HERE:



Novel Update
The manuscript has been sent to my agent, finally. Its had a long gestation and birthing process, this one – light and dark – some bits have won competitions, bits have been written between late 2006 and late 2010 in Ireland (mainly), England (with difficulty) Scotland and Wales, one bit had an unfortunate experience, some bits make me laugh, others make me cry. I still shake my head at the brain that produced some of this work, forgetting it is mine… The whole is still a matter of bemusement – the opening line (which then led me to the themes, the title, characters, and some storylines) appeared over a cup of machine coffee in a garage, while reading The Daily Mail (never!) waiting for my car to be serviced. Such a romantic process, writing.
In the end, its been a fascinating old journey. It has been an enormous privilege to be awarded an Arts Council grant to work with the gloriously clever and generous Maggie Gee to polish and finish the work. I now wait to see what my agent thinks, fingers crossed – I feel it is now time to get on with the next project. Although it is only sensible to expect to have to do more on this one, if ….


Reading at Bristol Blackwells
On 24th November, 6 pm to 8 pm, with Tania Hershman, Anna Britten, Margot Taylor and others. There is also an open mike slot afterwards… rollup!


WordAid poetry anthology for Children In Need
"Did I Tell You..? 131 Poems for Children In Need" is here:
Poems from all sorts. From somewhat brilliant ones like Andrew Motion and Catherine Smith and Clare Best and Sarah Salway, to a very short one from me, which starts with the immortal line:
“There’s a chest she had. ‘Breasts’ they were called…”! Lock me up someone. (No – that’s not part of the line….)


And 50 Stories for Pakistan is also here.
All profits will go to helping the foood victims of Pakistan. From the same big hearted editor who put together 100 Stories for Haiti. Never heard of that one? HERE. Go Get Em.

SMALL WONDER FESTIVAL and a small bit of poetry news

SMALL WONDER FESTIVAL
The Small Wonder festival celebrating the short story is the literary festival William Trevor loved: “The best literary festival I have ever attended,’ he said. He was there a few years ago – this year, there were others, and it was marvellous stuff. Highlights for me included Adam Marek’s and David Vann’s event, with readings of two of the shortlisted stories for the Sunday Times Short Story Competition. And two talks, one on D H Lawrence, by David Constantine, and one on J G Ballard. And A S Byatt in conversation, and and and… of course, being up there myself with my lovely talented friend Tania Hershman. Here’s some pics taken by Axel Hesslenberg, official photographer of the event.



Poetry news:
I sent a few poems to Bridport this year. Why? Dunno. I like to support, I think it is a smashing competition and have great respect for it, the organisers, the readers, who all work so very hard, to raise money for the Bridport Arts Centre. I didn’t win anything, not unsurprising – but I did, joy of joys, get two poems onto the shortlist. Now that shortlist is anything but short, but given the thousands of entries, (last year, over 8000 poems) there must be something OK with them. Trouble is – I have NO idea why they made it. Or what was wrong with the ones that didn’t…

Novel news:
Maggie and I met last Tuesday - I'm unhappy with the ending of the novel, and she agrees. So... Im still working on it. Plod, plod plod...