I’m sitting here in our library, with the clothes dryer whirring next to me. This room is no longer the domain of the kids’ toys and our books. It’s a temporary kitchen now, too, during lockdown, while our building work has been paused. We could have moved the books upstairs but this room would have… Read More Isolation and Writing
On Friday everything changed. Overnight the world had been bandaged in gossamer threads, as if a greater power had said, “Enough. Only compassion will emerge from this cocoon.” We clambered over silken fibres holding the earth together. Suspended above our heads, like baubles on a tree, were tanks, missiles and the emblems of big business… Read More Gossamer Bandages
I’d forgotten how much of a balm it is to write flash fiction when time is short. I like creating a tiny world from scratch without having to commit to a longer piece. This week I returned to Rebekah Postupak’s Flash! Friday, one of my favourite online writing communities. The prompts I chose were: a knight on a quest,… Read More Boomeranging Back to Flash Fiction
November is NaNoWriMo, when hundreds of thousands of writers across the world try to pen 50,000 words in a month. Crazy, much? This is my third time doing NaNo and while I’ve never quite made the 50k, I have loved taking part each time. In fact, I love all things NaNo: the forums; the extra… Read More NaNoWriMo Update and some Dark and not so Dark #FridayPhrases
#FridayPhrases As an appetiser before the main course, here are my #FridayPhrases from this week ;). For those of you who are new to this, check out @amicgood’s blog for the background and feel free to join in next week by using the #FP hashtag and re/tweeting a story or poem in 140 characters. The small… Read More Short Story: The Gilded Mirror
Some of my earliest memories are of long, joyous hours alone in my bedroom with magical characters and their imaginary worlds. The first book I fell head over heels in love with was Roald Dahl’s Matilda. I read indiscriminately as a child, borrowing books from friends and libraries and secretly from my mother’s bedside cabinet. … Read More What Makes a Book Lover?