Reading, not writing

I am such a bad, bad person. Too busy to blog! What kind of an excuse is that? Sadly, one all too many people can identify with, I’m sure. Apologies for my long absence.

In November we had the grand judging of the Dangerous Liaisons short story competition. If you’ve been to the Fiction Feedback site recently, you’ll know who carried off the prizes: Corrinna Toop, of Aylesbury, with The Plum Orchard; Steve Brodie, of Lytham, with Facing Up; and John Dixon, of London, with Comrades. All three winners explored the theme of Dangerous Liaisons in imaginative and exciting ways and wrote involving stories; congratulations to them and to the writers of the remaining five shortlisted stories. They can all be read in Aware, the publication by Chorley & District Writers’ Circle, accessed from the Fiction Feedback site: www.fictionfeedback.co.uk

Reading stories has to be a good excuse for not keeping up with this blog, but a better excuse is writing them. So all hail to the winners above who – whether or not their peripheral activities suffered – focused on their writing and created fascinating stories for others to enjoy.

Dangerous Liaisons

Every year, Fiction Feedback sponsors a national competition with Chorley & District Writers’ Circle, with which I’m personally involved. The shortlist has now been decided and I have to say, the process is very exciting. The competition, on the theme of 'dangerous liasions', garnered over 50 entries and it was great fun reading all those wonderful stories. A lovely labour, too, with quite a generous word limit of 3,000 words.

If there hadn’t been a theme, I honestly don’t know how we’d have created a shortlist that didn't comprise at least three quarters of the stories sent in. There were some fabulous stories: moving, exciting, original, humorous, and all beautifully written. However, a lot had obviously been entered simply because their authors had them ready to send and try their luck at the next comp, and they weren’t geared to the theme. The connection was weak, tenuous or even non-existent. So they missed out. It’s a sadness to see so many terrific stories fall by the judging wayside, but as I say it made our job easier.

I won’t publicise the shortlist here as the final judging has to be made anonymously, but watch this space once the prizes have been decided.

Meanwhile, if you’re considering entering a writing competition, and it has a theme, do be aware that it’s there to make the judges’ lives easier (as well as more pleasurable, ‘dangerous liaisons’ was mined in all kind of fascinating ways). Crafting your story tightly around the theme will increase your chances of a prize maybe more than you’d realised.

The Word is the place this Saturday

Looks like The Book Show at Luton on the 22^nd that I mentioned in a previous post has been cancelled. Perhaps that £90 ticket price was a bit too hefty?

A better bet should be The Word festival at Astley Hall in Chorley, Lancashire this Saturday, 22nd September. Big draws include short story expert Clare Massey and Kerry Wilkinson, the guy who sold so many books on Amazon (250,000 downloads in six months) that he attracted a six-book deal from Macmillan. For many writers, that’s a dream come true, so I’ll be going along to mingle and network and also to find out the secret of his success – and report back for Fiction Feedback.

I think there are just one or two tickets left (at a reasonable £20, including lunch) if you want to join me.

http://the-word.org.uk/

http://thelancashireword.eventbrite.co.uk/