Writing Magazine April 2020 [PDF]

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LING BESTSEL MAGAZINE

HELPING YOU BECOME A BETTER WRITER

WRITING

APRIL 2020

COMPETITION

SPECIAL Get creative with our guide to

over 750 comps to enter

Spring clean your style Clear your writing of clutter

Fiction How to stay on track, and motivated, for a 150,000+ word spec fic epic

JOURNALISM How to write for niche pet magazines

10 new ways to

get publicity KATHY NOW WITH REICHS

Opportunities to get published Competitions to enter Reader success stories Insider know-how and more…

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E D I TO R ’ S L E T T E R

LING BESTSEL MAGAZINE

Welcome...

HELPING YOU BECOME A BETTER WRITER

WRITING

APRIL 2020

COMPETITION

SPECIAL Get creative with our guide to

over 750 comps to enter

Spring clean your style

Dear Reader

Clear your writing of clutter

Fiction How to stay on track, and motivated, for a 150,000+ word spec fic epic

JOURNALISM How to write for niche pet magazines

10 new ways to

get publicity NEWS YOU CAN USE

KATHY REICHS

Opportunities to get published Competitions to enter Reader success stories Insider know-how and more… 04> 9 770964 916266

£4.25

Crime writing secrets from the Bones bestseller

Published by Warners Group Publications plc, 5th Floor, 31-32 Park Row, Leeds, LS1 5JD, UK Main office: 0113 200 2929 Fax: 0113 200 2928 Subscriptions: 01778 392 482 Advertising: 0113 200 2925 Editorial: 0113 200 2919 Marketing: 0113 200 2916 Creative Writing Courses: 0113 200 2917 Website: www.writers-online.co.uk Publisher: Collette Lloyd Email: [email protected] Editor: Jonathan Telfer Email: [email protected] Assistant editor: Tina Jackson Email: [email protected] Senior designer: Nathan Ward Email: [email protected]

Regular readers will remember that last month, I was droning on in this letter about how Eoin Colfer had found his writing groove by making it fun for himself and not being afraid to be diverted. Now, I’m pleased to be able to highlight the opposite case. This month’s star writer, Kathy Reichs, has forged an impressive career by writing exactly what she knows. Originally intending to raise popular awareness and understanding of the forensic anthropology career she so obviously loves, Kathy decided to write a novel drawn from her own experience and expertise. So rather than widen her focus to write a novel, she actually narrowed it, homing in on the topic she knew so well, and which so few other authors would be able to do justice to. It just goes to show that there is no ‘one size fits all’ as far as the right approach to writing goes. When giving advice to freelances hoping to write for WM, I often come back to the idea of the writer’s unique angle. What’s the topic you can write about that nobody else can? What makes your journey down a familiar route different from anybody else’s? What can you alone tell us? Identify that, and your article or story is already half sold. Nathan Hill, editor of Practical Fishkeeping, echoes that advice for us this month, with a thorough and practical exploration of how to give magazine editors what they want – worth a careful read, regardless of whether you have the fishy expertise. So what are you waiting for? Find your niche, and make the most of it!

TAP HERE TO WATCH A WELCOME FROM THE EDITOR

Jonathan Telfer Editor

Editorial designer: Mary Ward Editorial designer: Rajneet Gill Editorial designer: Jackie Grainger Marketing: Lauren Freeman [email protected]

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Advertising sales manager: Sarah Hopton [email protected]

NATHAN HILL

SIMON HALL

GILLIAN HARVEY

Advertising sales: Louise Clarke Email: [email protected]

Nathan Hill is a lifelong aquarist-turned-writer who now edits Practical Fishkeeping magazine. His background includes public aquaria, retail management, lecturing, writing and editing. His work has been published in magazines including Landscape, Excerpt, Welcome Welcome, Moon and Bandit Fiction, and the anthology Ten Legged Tales. He is currently working on a collection of short stories.

Simon Hall is a crime fiction author and BBC TV news correspondent. His novels are about a television reporter who covers crimes and gets so involved in the cases he helps the police to solve them. He has contributed short stories to a range of magazines and is also a tutor in creative writing, teaching at popular writers’ schools such as Swanwick, Fishguard and Winchester, on cruise ships and overseas.

Gillian Harvey is a freelance writer who lives in Limousin, France, with her husband and five children. She writes lifestyle features, real-lives and short stories for a range of UK publications. Before becoming a professional writer she worked as an English teacher. Her first novel, Everything is Fine, is due for publication by Orion Fiction on 28 May 2020.

Subscriptions: [email protected] Creative Writing Courses: [email protected] Competitions: [email protected] WM Competitions, Warners Group Publications plc, The Maltings, West Street, Bourne PE10 9PH, UK. Typeset by: Warners Group Publications plc, 5th Floor, 31-32 Park Row, Leeds LS1 5JD Printed by: Warners (Midlands) plc, The Maltings, Manor Lane, Bourne, Lincs PE10 9PH Distribution: Nikki Munton Email: [email protected] Tel: 01778 391171 Warners Group Publications plc, West Street, Bourne, Lincs PE10 9PH

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APRIL 2020

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IN THIS ISSUE 16

32 60

62 INTERVIEWS AND PROFILES

CREATIVE WRITING

16 Star interview: Kathy Reichs As you might expect from a forensic scientist, the crime writer takes a practical approach to her bestselling Bones series 24 How I got published: Julie Shackman The Scottish romance author talks about how hooking an Australian agent led to publishing success

32 Beginners: The finishing line Finish what you started – it’s the only way to see if it’s got legs 38 Under the microscope The beginning of a reader’s memoir goes under our editorial eye 58 Masterclass: What’s in a name? Exploring the significance of names in your fiction

36 Shelf life: Adam Macqueen The journalist and author of fiction and non-fiction shares his top five reads

60 Writing for children: Being different The importance of representing children with additional needs

40 Beat the bestsellers The style and technique of Ben Macintyre

62 Fiction focus: Spring cleaning Give your manuscript a good spit and polish

45 Circles round up Writing groups share their interests and activities

64 Fantastic realms: On a grand scale Get skilled up to write a fantasy epic

WRITING LIFE

46 Subscriber spotlight WM subscribers share their publishing success stories 74 Author profile: Amy McLellan The debut psychological thriller writer teaches us a new word

12 Publicity: Think outside the box Unorthodox approaches can be very effective in getting the word out about your book

96 My writing day: Ana Johns The US writer on how a life-changing diagnosis led to a novel inspired by real events

20 Magazine journalism: Fish for a writing gig Could you make money writing for a niche magazine about a specialised interest?

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APRIL 2020

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CONTENTS

66 29

26

52

WRITERS’ NEWS 76 Your essential monthly roundup

of competitions, paying markets, opportunities to get into print and publishing industry news

53 Poetry in practice Plan a new poem round the months of the year

26 Screenwriting: In the frame Author, screenwriter and director Andrew David Barker explains how writers can turn into filmmakers 42 Away from your desk Get out of your garret and be inspired by these events and activities for writers

55 Poetry launch: The great Romantic Points to consider in your entry for our William Wordsworth poetry competition 56 Poetry winners: Getting festive The WM poets really captured a sense of seasonal magic in their Christmas poetry competition entries

COMPETITIONS AND EXERCISES 66 Talk it over: Lost for words A recently retired writer has lost her flow adjusting to a big life change 68 The business of writing: You can bank on it The pros and cons of having a business bank account for your writing 98 Notes from the margin: Male order A dressing-down for writers who unwittingly fall into gender stereotypes

29 Free range writing: Animal spirit Four writing exercises to celebrate National Pet Day 33 WIN! Cash prizes and publication Enter WM’s latest creative writing competitions 34 Short story winners Read the winning entries in WM’s competition for 500-word stories

ASK THE EXPERTS 10 From the other side of the desk: With you in a jiffy Piers Blofeld wishes publishers would make agents’ lives just a bit easier

44 Writers’ circles: Testing times Test your characters by placing them in alternative realities in this writing group exercise

REGULARS

14 Ask a literary consultant Advice for a debut writer planning a visit to the London Book Fair 6 Miscellany The wide world of writing

30 Writer’s voice: Literary legacy Explaining what the SoA does to keep author’s works alive

8 Letters 70 Research tips: Crime and punishment Writing a crime novel? Tarja Moles offers the clues and leads you need to research the criminal underworld and the forces of the law

72 Editorial calendar 81 Going to market Essential advice for freelances

71 Behind the tape Expert advice to get the details right in your crime fiction

87 Novel ideas Bright ideas for fiction writers

POETRY 52 Poetry workshop: Time & place Exploring the way a poem can capture a particular moment in time

91 Travel writing know-how Tips from our freelance pro

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APRIL 2020

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MISCELLANY

THE WORLD OF

WRITING The wide world of writing is a curious place where fonts get fan mail, Poet Laureates play pub gigs and bookshop burglars get boozed up

Ask any designer what they think about Comic Sans and they’ll look at you as if you’d thrown up on their artfully arranged desk. But beyond the elevated aesthetics of design professionals, whoever expected fonts to trend on Twitter? When author Sean Richardson ((@ Southlndtabby) tweeted ‘Please reveal the deepest part of yourself: Which font and which size do you write in?’ on 26 January, fonts went viral, with the Twittersphere awash with writers proclaiming their favourites. Times New Roman came out as top of the font pops. The serif typeface was commissioned by The Times in 1931 and designed by Stanley Morrison and Victor Lardent of Monotype. The Times stopped using Times New Roman in 1972. Despite a dignified and illustrious history that includes being the font used for the Encyclopaedia Britannica, Twitter user @ MaryAnne summed up its appeal by saying ‘It’s all about that adorable lower case f ’. Though to be fair, no-one’s ever going to say that about Comic Sans.

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Plastered pilferers The forces of the law had no problems catching burglars intent on stealing from Gay’s the Word bookshop in London in February, because the wouldbe thieves had uncovered a stash of booze and drunk it. When the police arrived the intruders were found in the Soho bookshop polishing off a bottle of prosecco, having already finished the leftover tequila from a staff member’s birthday. ‘They seem to have been boozing mid-burglary, which probably wasn’t the most prudent thing to do,’ bookseller Uli Lenart told Pink News. ‘Shop in a bit of a mess,’ tweeted Gay’s the Word on 9 February. ‘Getting ready to clear up. We may open later today – depends on police. At least it’s not a hate crime.’ Independent bookshop Gay’s the Word, which featured in the 2014 film Pride as the HQ of 1980s activist group Lesbians and Gays Support the Miners, has repeatedly been targetted for attack since it was founded in 1979.

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Gay’s the Word CC BY-SA 3.0 Ross Burgess; prosecco CC BY-SA 3.0 Agne27

Fonts have fan clubs

MISCELLANY

Divisive dark horse

Poet post-rock We’re no strangers at Miscellany Manors to performers or artistes from other disciplines deciding to try their hand at a bit of poetry, or writing a soon-to-be-remaindered novel, but you don’t often see the trend in reverse. In this case, perhaps we could have expected it – his memoir Gig said it all in the subtitle, ‘The Life and Times of a Rock-Star Fantasist’ – but the news that Poet Laureate Simon Armitage has created a post-rock band still came as something of a surprise. Not least because we really rather enjoyed it. LYR sees Simon enlist musicians Richard Walters and Patrick Pearson to create a background for his spoken-word performances of ‘ambient post-rock passages, jazz flourishes and atonal experimentalism’. The songs started out as ‘sort-of poems, hybrid things between songs and lyrics and poems’, Simon told the Guardian: ‘I quite

often read them at events, but I think they were reaching out for tunes and musical setting. This allows me to indulge an aspect of lyricism which is generally not available on the printed page.’ The debut single Never Good With Horses, is out now, from Mercury KX. Watch the video here, https://writ.rs/postrockpoet Each of the ten tracks on the upcoming album, Call in the Crash Team, adopts the perspective of a different character, ‘monologues or soliloquies from people in personal crises’. ‘We’re not the sort of band who are going to be playing in the back of a pub on a Tuesday night in Stalybridge,’ said Simon. ‘We want to make events out of the music.’ LYR are playing their first gig at the Brudenell Social Club in Leeds. It is, Simon will no doubt be happy to hear, on a Monday.

Agatha Christie traditionalists were left bemused and confused by writer Sarah Phelp’s recent atmospheric adaptation of The Pale Horse for the BBC. Less cosy crime than folk-horror hallucination, it was: ‘A place where scheming murderous toffs get the rope, or locked in a bunker, or condemned to a looping purgatory nightmare in which they’re stalked by a 1950s doo-wop hit and a giant turnip king,’ wrote Digital Spy. The two-parter’s murky Wicker Man ambience and an ambiguous ending left fans of the original 1961 novel confused. ‘Another Christie classic ruined by the BBC’, chuntered one on Twitter. ‘Why even pretend this is an Agatha Christie?’ offered another. But viewers were divided in its favour. ‘If you didn’t like that adaptation of The Pale Horse then stick David Suchet on and be done with it,’ tweeted Debbie Downer. ‘I thought it was great.’

Critic’s critique, criticised It was either asking for trouble or shooting fish in a barrel, depending on which side of the review desk postbag you sit. When veteran book critic Peter Conrad was given Inside the Critics’ Circle: Book Reviewing in Uncertain Times by academic Phillipa K Chong to review by the Guardian, he found himself adrift in a world of academic argot. Phillipa, an assistant professor of sociology at McMaster University has a PhD from the University of Toronto and her website biography says ‘her empirical focus has been on book

reviewers as market intermediaries in the cultural market’. Her book about reviewing books includes phrases such as ‘cognitive heuristic’, ‘homophilious logics’ and ‘the genderisability of the framework.’ ‘I may be a shallow fellow, but I’ve never worried about what Chong clumsily describes as the “lack of groupness” among reviewers,’ wrote Peter. ‘Who cares that no certificates of “accreditation” enrol us in “the institution of literary criticism” or that we “inhabit nonprofessional spaces”? I also hadn’t realised that I was supposed to function as a “market intermediary” or – with luck – as a “cultural consecrator”. Peter, whose many books include The Everyman History of English Literature and a critical history of Orson Welles, has had

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journalism published in the newspapers and magazines including the Observer, The New Yorker, the Guardian, and The New Statesman. While Phillipa sucked all the fun out of the critic’s art in her jargon-laden prose, Peter put it all back in by tearing her book apart. ‘If a book is bad it’s bad,’ he decided about Phillipa’s efforts. ‘And if it’s merely an exercise in academic pseudointellection it’s even worse.’

APRIL 2020

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TITLE

LETTERS TO THE EDITOR We want to hear your news and views on the writing world, your advice for fellow writers – and don’t forget to tell us what you would like to see featured in a future issue... Write to: Letters to the editor, Writing Magazine, Warners Group Publications plc, 5th Floor, 31-32 Park Row, Leeds LS1 5JD; email: [email protected]. (Include your name and address when emailing letters. Ensure all

STAR LETTER

letters, a maximum of 250 words, are exclusive to Writing Magazine. Letters may be edited.) When referring to previous articles/letters, please state month of publication and page number.

Gatekeepers of opinion

Psyching yourself up In my recent writing practice I’ve been struck by how much effort and energy it takes to put yourself out there. Writing is one of those things that most people consider a highly introverted activity, yet the acts of sending letters out, entering competitions, or even publishing on your own website can be a mountainous undertaking of extroversion and ego. There’s a lot of advice in Writing Magazine about inspiring your writing, what the industry is looking for, and how to connect with it. I’d be interested in the magazine’s take on how to psyche yourself up and inspire your self-confidence! I’ve been trying to step up my game recently with letters and competition entries. I’ve been spurring myself on with mantras of ‘Just a little more! You can do it!’ and ‘Get out of your own way!’ but sometimes it’s been a real effort to think positively and get over the mental blocks in front of query-letters and competition entries. Much like the writing work itself, it’s greatly helped by just getting your bum in the seat and getting it done. Emptying your mind of what might happen and focusing on the task at hand. There’s nothing like the sense of completion and feeling of power that comes once it’s done. Once you hit send and the email goes, or the envelope disappears into the postbox. All there is to do then is wait, and try not to imagine all the different ways you could have done it better. ERIN WRIGHT Cleethorpes

Writing as an agent, Piers Blofeld (From the other side of the desk, WM, Mar) suggets that publishers tend to have a leftish, metropolitan worldview and incline to publish work that appeals to readers who share it. This is also true of literary agents. One might argue that far from being reactive to its broader market the whole book-producing industry determines what that market shall read – or ought to read. In the same issue, a letter from reader, Eric Olsen (Does Age Matter?, p9), touches on agents’ attitudes to the age of those submitting work to them. This is usually put down to concern about investing in a rapidly wasting asset, but may also be attributable to contempt for those whose written English dates from before these agents were born. ALAN HAMILTON Bridport, Dorset

The star letter each month earns a copy of the Writers’ & Artists’ Yearbook 2020, courtesy of Bloomsbury, www.writersandartists.co.uk

Cuttings book My husband bought me a subscription to Writing Magazine as a gift. As a new writer, I have written a children’s story which I have just sent out to publishers and have just entered two writing competitions for this magazine. I love writing and especially love Writing Magazine. I have created a scrapbook full of the great advice and tips contained in each edition I receive! JULES McBAIN Hanworth, Bracknell 8

APRIL 2020

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Horse’s mouth I could not but agree with the points made by the article Go to the dogs (Fiction Focus, WM Feb) about animal characters: they add a lot to the story, and often steal the show. I realised that when almost every reader who gave me feedback on my novel stated that the character they liked the most was neither the hero nor the heroine. It was the horse. And not any old horse: a greedy, grumpy, talking racehorse. Everyone loved the horse. Everyone was delighted that the horse could speak (did I mention that this novel is historical fiction in a realistic setting?) I was shocked that no one questioned that. I had expected some raised eyebrows. But no, nothing. A particularly critical beta reader pointed out that one character’s speech was unrealistic, because it did not reflect his social background. That same reader did not think that this character having conversations with a HORSE was unnatural. Though they did state that the fact this horse’s mane had been ‘cut’ when it should have been ‘pulled’, was not accurate or acceptable. Animal magic indeed... This horse bewitched readers, and left me wondering if my book might have been more successful had I cast him as the hero (and his human as a supporting character). MAY BERMONT Paris, France

L E T T E R S TO T H E E D I TO R

Writing to the finishing line New Year brings yet again the same resolve – that I will make the time to write regularly. Over the last fifty years there has been the occasional flurry of activity, a column in the local newspaper, a column in a national farming monthly. That lasted only three issues as the magazine ceased publication (I don’t think my effort was responsible.) A handful of plays for local am-dram, a self-published book, several hundred copies of which still lie under the bed. An afternoon play on Radio 4, but that was over 25 years ago. Sporadic the output has been, but constant has been my unrequited yearning to write more, always frustrated by excuses that something else has always more urgent. Now the realization that in The Grand National of life I am coming into the home straight demands that procrastination is no longer an option. Time to once again turn to my long-time mentor and inspiration – Writing Magazine – the personal trainer who has never failed to keep me connected to the world of writing. But the creative cog wheels are a bit rusty, so for lubrication I am going to use the exercise of entering the WM competitions but first let’s start with a letter of thanks to WM for always being there. HARRY SEAR Bedfordshire

Words, unleashed For years writing a book had been an ambition of mine, but the years passed, and I had never found the confidence to begin. Then my husband and I bought a crumbling old farmhouse in Tuscany and moved our young family out to Italy. Months later my father died unexpectedly, and there I was, thousands of miles away from friends and family, trying to hold my family life together and survive the grieving process. By chance on a return visit to the UK I bought a copy of your magazine last March, and it has really transformed my life. Inspired by the wonderful articles and advice of other writers, I have thrown myself into my first novel, set here in Italy. Writing has been a hugely cathartic experience and escaping into the world of my novel has really helped me process my feelings throughout this difficult period in my life. I would like to thank you for this gift that has helped me to finally see myself as a writer. ANNA HOOKE Montaltissimo, Italy

Free your mind As a busy single parent I must confess to usually skipping the prompts and exercises in Writing Magazine on the basis I don’t have time to start anything else. However, having experienced severe writer’s block since the birth of my daughter, I decided I had nothing to lose by giving some of the Free Range Writing exercises a try. At first the words trickled painfully, but then - the flow. My coffee was left forgotten and an hour later I had two poems to share with my writing group, a plot for a short story, a piece of memoir which had given me personal insight and four article pitches – two of which were later commissioned by magazine editors. Not bad for an hour’s free-ranging. I’ve vowed since to start every writing session like this and have been much more productive as a result. Thank you. VICKY BOURNE Kidderminster, Worcestershire

COMPETITION OVERLOAD I approach my desktop with sweating brow and nervous twitch, opening my well-edited specimen with trepidation. Deleting and rewriting many times; playing obsessively with punctuation until commas and semicolons push each other out of the way, until I feel dizzy. Emblazoned in words of fire in my brain, the mantra: is it good enough? Sighing, I close my eyes, shake my head and shudder. ‘Come on, you must get a grip,’ I wearily tell myself and go through the rigid rules and requirements. There are so many; original and unpublished work? Word count, font size/style, margin width, line spacing, the list is endless. Do I put my name on the work itself or on a separate sheet? Can I staple the details to the postal entry and my cheque? May paperclips be used? If loose, unnamed sheets are in the envelope, what happens if they get separated on opening? Can the contact details be matched with the work? Perhaps sending it by email and PayPal would make it easier? My mind blurs. Feeling faint, I clutch the keyboard, sinking slowly under the desk. When I finally open my eyes and reach up, I’ve sent it electronically, having no knowledge of the payment process. Staggering to find a darkened room, my head throbs as I try to think clearly. Perhaps after a few weeks of perfect calm and tranquillity, I will be able to consider entering another writing competition without screaming inside. JEANNIE ABBOTT Woodbridge, Suffolk

Words for a friend I read Philip Simon’s letter (Time To Think, WM, Mar), about the death of his beloved dog, with a tear in my eye (I’m sure I wasn’t the only one). Research shows that the loss of a beloved pet can be as hard – or even harder – to deal with than that of a friend or relative. Dogs are not just ‘best friends’ – for many, they are family too and a source of comfort, security and unconditional love, as well as the provider of a daily routine, all of which stops when the pet dies. So please, never say to someone ‘It was only a dog’. And Philip, I hope, when your heartache has lessened a little, you might consider letting another canine companion into your life. Not to replace your beloved Staffie but perhaps as a tribute to the love you shared with her. HELEN YENDALL Blockley, Glos

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APRIL 2020

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From the

OTHE R SIDE OF THE DESK

With you

in a jiffy

Small, specific things can make a difference, says Piers Blofeld, wishing publishers would consider making agents’ lives (just a little bit) easier when it comes to publicity

O

ne of the first things I do when a client of mine gets their first book deal is, once the champagne corks have landed, give them The Talk about how to manage their new relationship with their publisher. A key part of this is to say as unambiguously as possible that there will be times when they will be unbelievably angry with their publisher. Which is why it’s good to do it at the moment when the author is most inclined to believe that their publisher farts rainbows and can in general do no wrong: it means there’s no chance I’m going to be responsible for souring relations. Of course not everyone does get angry with their publisher, but most authors at one point or another do. It’s natural – author and publisher interests align, but not perfectly and that can be very stressful – after all for the author this will be the culmination of possibly a lifetime of hopes and ambition. But the fact is that only 10% of books really succeed – there’s a very large number of books which fall into a middling category of neither making much, nor losing too much and the authors who tend to get their contracts renewed are the ones who re good at getting on with the people who work at the publishers. Part of that process is about allowing the agent to be the person who has the rows – you don’t buy a dog so you can bark yourself – but also it’s about understanding the lie of the land. Publishing is a badly paid industry and by and large the best people in publishing are the dittos: they are doing what they love. The people in other departments may not have that passion and because of the pay scales may not be the very best at their jobs. Not getting too cross when that particular penny drops and in particular never, ever letting them know that is extraordinarily important. 10

APRIL 2020

All of this is a roundabout way of getting to the purpose of this column. One of the most frequent causes of frustration is that publishers can seem to do very little to publicise their books. As an agent one can (quite cautiously) ask what’s been done and I am generally met with the reply that press releases and book proofs have been sent out. This is where I grit my teeth: I have a few high profile authors and there are publicity departments who regularly send me books and proofs they think those authors will be interested in. That means I get a jiffy bag – which is seemingly designed to make it impossible to open without almost destroying, so that before I even have the book out of the bag I feel guilty at the waste. Inside there will be the book and a press release – and maybe a letter from the editor about why they loved this book. I – and remember this is happening in agencies across London every day: for some agents with really grand client lists half a dozen times a day – am then supposed to find a jiffy bag that I haven’t destroyed, dig out my client’s postal address and write out a new label to take down to the post room so that the agency can then pay to post it on. I hope I don’t need to spell out what is wrong with that scenario – or explain why it is that all those authors who the book has been ‘sent’ to never get back with that wonderful quote for the jacket. So, here’s what I’ve started asking: when publicists send out a proof, can they do with it the book already inside another jiffy bag, which has pre-paid postage and a label on it with the author’s name, so all I have to do is write out an address. It isn’t only about meanness – casting your bread upon the waters is an okay strategy, but I’m often rather busy, sometimes a bit tired and cross. Goodwill runs out and it is pointless to presume upon it when there is such an easy strategy to hand to resolve it.

10 –12 July, 2020 University of Winchester, UK Workshops, talks, and one-to-one appointments with top literary agents For emerging writers – from inspiration to publication Four writing competitions

Keynote speaker – Eoin Colfer, award-winning author of the Artemis Fowl series

Scholarships available

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Keynote speaker – Lissa Evans, bestselling author of adult and children’s novels

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Reliable and realistic advice on self-publishing from approachable and experienced professionals

Matador exhibiting at the 2019 London Book Fair

Whether it be writers’ services companies like Jericho Writers, high street and online retailers, literary agents, even other publishers – not to mention the Writers’ & Artists’ Yearbook... plus numerous authors who have already self-published with us, time and again Matador is recommended to those wishing to self-publish a book or ebook for pleasure or profit. In November 2018, Matador was ranked as the best self-publishing company (out of 80+ assessed) by The Independent Publishing Magazine. We produce books for authors to their specifications at a realistic price, as print on demand, or as a short or longer print run book. As well as high production quality, we also insist upon a high quality of content, and work hard on the marketing and distribution of self-published books to high street and online retailers.We also publish and distribute ebooks and audiobooks. “We've always liked Matador because they have the best values in their industry. Apart from anything else, they actually try to sell books. It sounds crazy, but most of their rivals don’t. They print ’em, but don’t care about selling ’em. Matador do.” Jericho Writers

Yet publishing a book is the easy part... getting it into the shops is harder. We offer a full sales representation and distribution service through our distributor and dedicated sales representation team. Ask for a free copy of our guide to self-publishing, or download a copy from our website. Or call Lauren or Hannah if you want to discuss your project with a real person.

troubador.co.uk/matador Ranked as the best self-publishing services supplier out of 80+ companies assessed by The Independent Publishing Magazine. Troubador Publishing Ltd, 9 Priory Business Park, Kibworth, Leics LE8 0RX T: 0116 279 2299 E: [email protected]

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Think

outside the box Unorthodox approaches can be very effective in getting the word out about your book, says Simon Hall in the second instalment of his two-parter on promotion

Spreading word of your book is critical in securing sales. The media, as I discussed in my previous article, are the conventional way of raising awareness of your work. But there are other methods, and happily these are only as limited as your creativity. Many revolve around social media, as that can be a powerful platform for promoting yourself. But there are other ways as well, and the good news is that most of them don’t have to cost you a penny. So to get you thinking how you might lure in more readers, here are ten creative tips for promoting your book, many of which have worked for me.

1 Guerrilla appearances Going on holiday? Heading out for a day trip? Or away for work? Take your book with you, and photograph it in interesting locations, then post the pictures on social media. I did this when I took my latest novel, The Editor, on a business trip to London, and it worked a treat. Lots of people commented, some offered their own photos, and I noticed a spike in sales. Photographs, particularly fun ones, can really increase engagement and interest on social media. But don’t forget to include a link to your book in all your posts. It’s a missed opportunity otherwise. 12

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2 Writing windows Everybody has a favourite shop, pub or café where they’re well-known to the owners. Why not get some posters printed and ask them to advertise your book? Modern printing technology means it’s not particularly expensive, but it can be an effective trick. You could also pop a copy of your latest book in the shop’s window. I did this with my barber, and they were very happy to help. They liked the idea of having an author who was a loyal customer, and it became a talking point as the staff often mentioned it to other people who came in. You could even ask your friends to put up a small poster in the windows of their homes, along with a copy of your book. It doesn’t take much effort, and might just get people noticing and talking.

3 Become a broadcaster These days, with smart phones, it’s incredibly easy to become a broadcaster. I know it might sound daunting, but look up how to use your phone to record a podcast, or video. It didn’t take me long at all to master the basics, and I’m no whizz with technology. You could just talk about your book to start with, but when you’re confident enough try interviewing someone who has read it. It’s a fun way of promoting your work, and the statistics tell us that videos always tend to attract more attention on social media. www.writers-online.co.uk

But don’t forget to include the right hashtags to help with your promotion work, tag in your friends and publisher, and anyone else who might share your post. In my experience, the writing community is wonderfully kind and supportive, so make the most of that.

4 Adapt your book You’ve written a cracking story, which you’re very proud of, so why confine it just to print? Why not adapt it to become a play, a radio drama, or even a TV or film script? I know it might sound far-fetched, but it can make an impact and really help to raise your profile as a writer. I adapted my first novel, The TV Detective, into a play to raise money for a local charity, and it was an incredible experience. I learnt so much about theatre and acting, which enhanced my understanding of characterisation, and so improved my writing as well. The play attracted media coverage, and lots of feedback on social media, which helped with sales of the original book. We also raised thousands of pounds for the hospice movement, an incredibly good cause. It was a real winwin adventure, one of the highlights of my writing career.

5 Your secret ingredients This is another idea which is made for social media.

PUBLICITY

Anything which gets a conversation going can really help to boost your profile online. My secret ingredient for writing The Editor was… wait for it… Waitrose All Butter Belgian White Chocolate Chunk Cookies. (And believe me, they are as good as they sound.) Whenever I felt my energy waning, it was time for a cup of tea and one of those excellent biscuits, and the combination seldom failed to work. Ask other writers what the secret ingredient which powered their book was, and you can get a buzz going on social media which can only help to interest potential readers in your work.

6 Offer events The Editor is set in Cambridge, with some well-known locations featuring. One of the most important is a business incubator, The Eagle Labs, so I mentioned to the manager that the offices had helped to inspire me. Part of the reason was that the boss of the incubator is a character in the book, and a bit of a wally. So I didn’t want the real life manager to take offence, as I like him a lot. Fortunately, he took the book in such good spirit that he promoted it in the incubator’s newsletter, and even invited me to sell copies in a lecture I did there on good communications. If your book is set in a real town or city, why not offer a reading or a talk at a place which features? Or if it’s set fictitious location, how about doing an event at a café, pub, or somewhere else you often went when you needed a break from the writing of your book, and which helped you along in your journey? You’d be surprised how enthusiastic some businesses can be. In a first for the company, I was asked by Stagecoach to become a Writer in Residence on their buses around Cambridge, talking to travellers about The Editor, and pointing out places which featured in the book.

comfortable sharing them?!) If so, they can be another powerful way of promoting your work on social media. These are just the sort of posts which encourage others to contribute their own stories, and so help spread the word of your book. One of my strange experiences was having to hang around Cambridge Police Station, noting when officers came and went, and looking at potential places to ambush someone who emerged from the doors. Just such a trap forms an important scene in The Editor, so I wanted to make sure I had the details right. In these securitysensitive days, I felt more than a little self conscious, doing my unorthodox research. But happily, despite the risks, no police officer stopped me to ask what I was doing, as I was worried my explanation might not have convinced them.

I wanted to thank the city, and its wonderful residents, for making me so welcome. But there was an alternative dedication which came to mind. It was rather strange, but tempting nonetheless. Every writer has their distractions, don’t they? No matter how much it might annoy their publisher. (I can just sense you nodding your head here.) As for me, I’m lucky enough that my garden has a lovely hedge running along it, which is home to a gang of effervescent sparrows. I often put down food for them, and, in moments when I needed inspiration, watched them hopping, fluttering and chirping their maelstrom of a way around the garden. Featuring your alternative dedications on social media is a good way to prompt a conversation, and so help to spread word of your book.

8 Behind the scenes

I don’t just mean any old holiday here, no matter how much your book might deserve it. I’m talking about writing holidays, like the wonderful Swanwick Writers’ Summer School, or the Writers’ Weekend in Winchester. There are lots of such gatherings across the country. Apart from being great fun, and an opportunity to share your passion for writing with like-minded souls, they also offer you the chance to promote your work. Many festivals are interested in writers giving talks, or holding workshops. If that’s something you fancy, it can really help you grow in yourself, and also has the added advantage of raising your profile, not to mention that of your book. Most have their own book rooms, where your pride and joy can happily be on sale. As I said at the start of this article, the number of ways to promote your work is only limited by your imagination. And the good news is that, as you’re a writer, that means it’s limitless. These are just a few unusual ways you might consider. I look forward to hearing about some of your own cunningly creative schemes to help make the world aware of your excellent work. Tag #writingmagazine on Twitter @SimonHallNews or contact me through the website www. thetvdetective.com (you can also order copies of The Editor!).

10 Take your book on holiday A glimpse of the reality of a writer’s life is always interesting, both for those in the trade and readers too. How about a tour of your study, paying particular attention to the important companions you simply can’t do without when you’re writing. You could do this as a video, or a blog, and then promote it on social media. It’s bound to spark comments and interactions. For my part, my desk is an utter mess, but surrounded by wonderful memories and supporters in the writing process. There’s my hedgehog, Bert, who’s now thirty years old, and goes with me everywhere. I can’t write a word without him, for reasons I’ve never quite understood. (Don’t worry, he’s not as grumpy as he looks.) There are also photos of some of the writing events I’ve done, and covers of my previous books. All those are great comforts when the words are failing to come, and sharing such insights can entertain, amuse, and help to attract people to your writing.

7 Strange stories

9 Alternative dedications

Every book has strange stories which lie behind the writing. What are yours? (And are you

The Editor is dedicated to Cambridge, where I moved two and a half years ago in a major life change. www.writers-online.co.uk

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? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ?? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? Ask a Literary Consultant ? ? ? ?? ? ? ? ? ? ? ?? ? ? ? ? ? ?? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ?

A debut writer planning to attend the London Book Fair gets sound advice on making the most of their visit from Helen Corner-Bryant ‘I’m a debut writer and would like to attend London Book Fair this year. Are there any tips you may have? Do I need to set up meetings beforehand or should I wait until I’m there and hope for a chance encounter with an agent?’ London Book Fair (LBF) is one of two main trade publishing fairs (the other one is Frankfurt in the autumn) and this year it’s based at Olympia London, 10-12 March. It’s predominantly aimed at agents, editors and publishing professionals from all over the world and it’s their chance to do business and forge relationships with one another. There are over 25,000 attendees – it’s vast, incredible, and hectic. It’s not really an opportunity for unrepresented authors to meet agents in the traditional agents’ floor set-up, sadly. [But don’t give up reading yet. There’s a more accepted way to catch an agent’s eye, see below.] Agents have their own domain in the International Rights Centre and it’s almost impossible to get in. And if you do manage to get in – we have heard of a few plucky authors who’ve managed it, generally more by accident than design – it’s generally frowned upon if you don’t have a meeting set up in advance. Setting up a meeting in advance would be the polite way but you may not have much luck. Agents are frantically busy meeting their published authors and negotiating deals and have very little space to entertain prospective authors (however willing they may be). As with everything, there are always the exceptions, but I wouldn’t go there with the goal of making that connection. If it happens then brilliant, but if not, don’t put undue pressure on yourself. Take LBF for what it is, which is a great opportunity to be exposed to the dizzying world of publishing and to equip yourself with information. So, historically, LBF hasn’t been too focused on authors wanting to attract an agent or publisher. However, in recent years LBF has dedicated a floor to indie authors – Author HQ – which

# 1 TR A N SATL A N TI C L I TE R A RY C O N SU LTA N C Y

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hosts a variety of seminars on how to get published or become an authorpreneur. There is also a dedicated area nearby called Writer’s Block, home primarily to companies that assist writers, such as the Society of Authors and Alliance of Independent Authors. We (Cornerstones) will be at stand 1F54 in Writer’s Block, and you’re welcome to come by and say hello – we’re a friendly team and would love to see you. We’ll be sharing the stand with our educator providers, Professional Writing Academy, who run courses for writers, including our online editing course, Edit Your Novel the Professional Way. If the prospect of developing your CV and skillset appeals to you then PWA are a great route forward. If you’re a would-be professional writer, attending LBF is, in my view, worth it. Once you’ve paid for your visitor pass there are a multitude of free seminars that you can dip in and out of, including a Dragon’s Den style opportunity, The Write Stuff, where writers will be pitching their stories to a panel of agents. There are also some dedicated conferences, such as the Writers’ Summit, which lasts for much of Tuesday, and I will be on a panel for the Insights Programme about the writing process – Playing with Prose: Plot, Character, Setting, on Tuesday 10 March, at Author HQ, 2.30-3.30pm. Do come and join in and bombard us with questions! (See the LBF website for more information: www. londonbookfair.co.uk/) If you do brave LBF but within moments feel overwhelmed, make straight for our stand in Writers’ Block. You can then take stock and plan your day. We’re a few feet from the main seminar area so it’s a good place to start. Some final tips: don’t forget to bring water and a snack (there are cafés but expect long queues during busy periods), wear comfy shoes, don’t bring a full copy of your manuscript, do bring flyers for your book and business cards, and bring a notepad and pen, plus a carrier bag for any spare books that come your way. We hope to see you there.

The UK’s leading literary consultancy

When I contacted Cornerstones I was assigned a fabulous mentor, who helped me to improve on my original manuscript with her winning combination of insight, knowledge, enthusiasm and a bit of tough love. Although it wasn’t always easy, it was worth it! I now have a three book deal, and have at last fulfilled my ambition to become a published author. - Chris Penhall, The House That Alice Built (Ruby Fiction, 2020)

”

Developmental editing and mentoring Copyediting and proofreading Scouts for literary agents

Call Helen Corner-Bryant +44 (0) 1308 897374 • www.cornerstones.co.uk 14

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A DV E R TO R I A L

Five secrets to a successful fiction series Some would say there’s no magical formula to creating series fiction. If your novels are planned to stand alone, you have to give enough information to satisfy the reader without any background. However, you can’t drop any spoilers that would ruin a reader’s experience if they go back and read the others in the series. So, creating a successful series requires skill and careful thought.

We think these five things hold the key to keeping your readers interested in more than one novel Secret 1:

Plan your book series from the start

Create a story arc for each book before you even start writing the first. Note down key points of action, the milestones affecting your main character, changes in their behaviour, new characters to introduce, and significant dates to keep the chronology clear for your readers. Research the background facts and add new information for each story. Helen Hart, Publishing Director at SilverWood Books, says, “Planning your book is the best way to get started on the writing. A stack of post-it notes or idea postcards can help you organise the flow. And if you find yourself adding too many action scenes in, you’ve probably got the beginnings of a series.”

Secret 2:

Get people to fall in love with your characters Whether you choose to write in the first or third person, always develop a deep understanding of your protagonist, building layers of their personality into each story. Readers need to identify with the main character, and each book in a series offers opportunities to help the reader get more attached and keep them interested. Historical novelist Lucienne Boyce’s series follows Dan Foster, Bow Street Runner and amateur pugilist. She says, “It’s important that the main character is appealing and interesting. Even an ‘anti-hero’ must hold some fascination. After all, you’re asking the reader to spend a lot of time with them.”

Secret 3: Create new

them slightly, so think about events and how they affect your main protagonist’s behaviour. Series author Wendy Percival uses family history to bring new developments into each of her Esme Quentin mysteries, which feature a genealogyresearching investigator.

Secret 4: Engage your fans with a strong theme Having a strong theme to underpin your series means you’ll never be short of content to share with interested readers. Family history is key for Wendy Percival’s series, and she’s also written a standalone novella, A Legacy of Guilt, to introduce readers into the world of Esme Quentin. Wendy also shares a weekly blog with her fans, updating them on her latest research into her own family history.

Secret 5: Decide on the style of your endings Do you love the suspense of a cliffhanger?

Or do you want your books to be truly standalone and tie up the loose ends in each story to satisfy the curiosity of your readers? Kate Mosse’s historical fiction famously carries an ending to each story – yet also a cliffhanger with some new information. However, this approach can frustrate readers, especially if the next book is not out for a while. Picking up a thread from another story is a great way to link your books, attracting readers to pick up the next one. This was done to great effect by Mary Wesley, who had common characters from The Camomile Lawn appearing in many of her other novels. It’s a personal choice which style of ending you want to use, but once you’ve picked, it’s a good idea to be consistent in the next book. Many readers appreciate familiarity.

Planning your next novel? We’d love to hear from you! SilverWood Books offers a complete ‘done for you’ self-publishing service that ensures you have a professionally-produced, retail-quality book you can confidently market to your target readership. Our friendly expert publishing team will support you throughout – from copy-editing, proofreading and book cover design, through to trade distribution, sales, and hand-formatted ebook editions.

developments to keep the writing flowing

Discuss your next book with Helen

When creating a single, central character, work on developing their personality through the series. Everything that happens changes

E: [email protected] | T: 0117

or Enya at SilverWood Books: 910 5829 | silverwoodbooks.co.uk

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BONING UP As you might expect from a forensic scientist, crime author Kathy Reichs takes a practical approach to her bestselling Bones series, she tells Tina Jackson hen most writers talk about the bones of a story they’re talking about the basics: plot, themes, setting, characters. When global bestselling crime writer Kathy Reichs talks about bones it’s in an entirely different context. As a forensic anthropologist, bones are her stock-in-trade, just as they are for her serial lead character Temperance Brennan, now in her nineteenth outing with A Conspiracy of Bones. ‘Forensic anthropology is the study of bones,’ says Kathy, just to make sure we’re getting the science right from the beginning. ‘It’s the exploration of the human skeleton. We’re brought in when a normal autopsy won’t work and we address questions of identity, cause of death, everything that we can tease out of the bones. We work very closely with forensic pathologists.’ Like Kathy – just like Kathy – Temperance is a forensic anthropologist. ‘Is she me? Professionally, completely. She goes to crime scenes. She works in a lab. For years I worked in a medical legal laboratory.’ Readers, she says, are drawn to Temperance because of her combination of intelligence, sass and sensitivity. ‘Temperance is

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smart. She’s independent and she’s able to do a difficult job in a largely man’s world. And yet she has flaws. She has weaknesses. She gets things wrong sometimes – which is realistic – but in the end she figures it out. Her personal issues she doesn’t always get right. She is layered. She can be impetuous. But she’s a pretty happy person.’ Temperance’s personal life is where her creator uses artistic licence. ‘She’s more risk-taking than me. She has a similar sense of humour. She has her own issues – she’s a recovering alcoholic, she has flaws. I wanted her to be approachable.’ Kathy is, famously, known for a tendency to answer interview questions with cool, scientific precision that some have found disconcerting, but she responds to WM’s questions with the friendliness and courtesy of an approachable expert. At the beginning of A Conspiracy of Bones, Temperance is at home in Charlotte, North Carolina, recovering from neurosurgery for an aneurysm and being frozen out of the Medico-Legal Lab at the Jeffersonian Institute in Washington DC since she clashed with a recently appointed colleague. ‘A number of things came together,’ says Kathy. ‘For the first time

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S TA R I N T E RV I E W

LISTEN TAP HERE

To hear an extract from Bones Never Lie

LISTEN TAP HERE

“The challenge is to present the science in a way that’s understandable: brisk and jargon-free. And I have to be entertaining. So these three elements have to come together. Keep the facts correct but keep it brisk, jargon-free and entertaining.”

To hear an extract from Bones of the Lost

I’d taken a year off and I had some medical issues – so I gave those to Temperance – she’s been diagnosed with a cerebral aneurysm and had surgery to correct it. She also has career problems – she has history with her new boss and they don’t get along at all. So she’s been barred. So she’s got this health issue and she’s working from outside the system.’ Temperance’s discovery of a body sends her off grid on her own investigation, A layered, intelligent, involving read, A Conspiracy of Bones touches on some disturbing contemporary issues. ‘She discovers this faceless corpse – no hands or face or teeth,’ says Kathy. ‘So Temperance wants to get this person identified but she has to work outside the system. I thought – one of the themes is what’s real and what is not real, given today’s atmosphere of fake news. I wanted her to rely on her own abilities and perceptions yet not fully trust them. I felt that she must rely on herself but not completely trust her own instincts as she had in the past.’ In part, Temperance’s shift in approach came about because Kathy was conscious that a long-running series needs to ring the changes to keep readers interested. ‘It is book nineteen and you can’t do the same old same old,’ she says. ‘The advantage of writing a series character is that people know her and they’re going to like her. The disadvantage is that A Conspiracy of Bones may be the first Temperance Brennan book that someone reads, so you’ve got to reintroduce them – but in such a way that the reader who’s on their nineteenth book in the series doesn’t get bored. You have to do it in a different way with each book, so you don’t bore the returning reader. So that’s a challenge. And you want her to be evolving throughout the series or readers will lose interest.’ But for this book, Kathy also wanted to explore the

ramifications, in this investigation, of the recent proliferation of widely transmitted information that appears to be true but has no basis in fact. ‘It is very timely. Hopefully. We’re living in a world where we’re constantly seeking to unravel what is real and not real. In today’s world it’s not like with newspapers, where everything is double-checked. Anyone can go on the internet and say anything they want.’ With each book, Kathy sets Temperance’s investigation within a real-life issue. ‘I try to set each book against the backdrop of this world we live in,’ she says. ‘In A Conspiracy of Bones it’s information that’s not true, and we’re constantly forced to filter through. I do like to have a broader theme. I’ve had human trafficking, trafficking in endangered species, human rights issues. There should be a broader message within. My first book was just a murder mystery story. But as I evolved as a writer I wanted to bring in these wider issues.’ Kathy’s crime novels go hand in hand with a career in forensic anthropology at the highest level: she was deployed to Ground Zero after 9/11, testified at the UN tribunal on genocide on Rwanda and was part of the team that exhumed one of the mass graves in Guatemala, which informed the plot of her 2002 novel Grave Secrets. Her first novel, 1998’s Deja Dead, was based on her first serial murder investigation. ‘I was working at the university and had been for many years and made full professor. So I was free to do whatever I wanted and I thought it was a way of bringing science to a broader audience. And I also thought it would be fun to write a novel rather than another textbook. And that’s what I decided. I sat down at my laptop and started writing. I didn’t have any formal training – I just started writing the kind of book I like to read. I like procedural fiction and the darker

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side. They say write what you know about so for me the easiest thing was to write about a forensic anthropologist.’ At that time, she believes forensic anthropology as an aid to detection was beginning to permeate the public consciousness. And those readers were ready for crime fiction with a new kind of investigator. ‘People were beginning to know about forensic anthropology – I felt that the general public were beginning to learn about it. I wanted to write a strong female character, and one with an expertise that was new. She isn’t a detective or a coroner, she was something completely new.’ She certainly piqued the popular imagination: the Fox TV series of Bones, based on Kathy’s books and starring Emily Deschanel as Temperance Brennan, first appeared in 2005 and ran until 2017. Juggling the roles of scientist and novelist, Kathy enjoys the imaginative freedom of writing fiction. ‘As a writer you get to make things up. As a scientist you’re not allowed to. I started out in archaeology, working on ancient skeletons. In forensics, you’re going to impact on people’s lives, so you have to be correct. That was the appeal – forensics had a relevance archaeology did not. You were going to research a specific issue for a specific individual.’ She appreciates the way genre fiction allows a resolution not always possible in real-life cases. ‘There’s a formula to writing thrillers. Whatever the issue is, you’re supposed to resolve it by the end. I like that, because in real life every case does not get solved. You can take a wrong-doing and the victim gets justice.’ In each of Kathy’s books, precise, accurate science is used to solve crime, but she says that’s only one of the necessary ingredients. ‘The main point to my books is the story. They’re good oldfashioned murder mysteries. In my books the solution is driven by science. There is police work involved but it brings together science. In each book I try to use a different forensic science – for

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example, DNA or bite-mark analysis. The challenge is to present the science in a way that’s understandable: brisk and jargon-free. And I have to be entertaining. So these three elements have to come together. Keep the facts correct but keep it brisk, jargonfree and entertaining.’ The bottom line is a good story. ‘If a reader is not entertained they’ll probably put the book down,’ she says. ‘You need to have characters people care about, and keep them evolving so readers keep coming back. Our TV show was on for twelve years, so how do you keep these characters fresh? You can’t do the same thing over and over again. As a crime writer your job is to be honest with your reader but keep them guessing. You can’t rely on coincidence. You want your writing to be satisfying but also surprising. Setting too – you want a setting that is appealing to a reader.’ With all this in mind, each new Kathy Reichs story involves fresh ideas and scientific developments. ‘I keep my eyes and ears open for what’s going to be in the general interest, down the road. Maybe it’s a case I’ve worked on that triggers an idea. This one was inspired by a case I’d worked on where a woman who’d been living with her lover was found – her corpse had been savaged by bears. I changed everything – sex, injuries. And then I combine that with an issue that’s going to be interesting down the road. I want to try something new each time. Beware of the formula. I want to use new science – I still attend professional meetings, I go to presentations in all the different disciplines – forensic disciplines – and look out for cutting edge developments and read the journals of forensic science and see what people are working on.’ Using science in crime fiction mirrors real-life procedure – and requires a rigorous professional approach, she believes. ‘A lot more books are driven by forensic science now than when I started writing. If you want it to be authentic, for today’s world, it would be hard to write an Agatha Christie-style book because it’s not how crime is investigated. But if you use science you have to get it right. If you get it wrong, that’s science fiction.’ If you aren’t a professional scientist, what would she advise?

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“The advantage of writing a series character is that people know her and they’re going to like her. The disadvantage is that A Conspiracy of Bones may be the first Temperance Brennan book that someone reads, so you’ve got to reintroduce them – but in such a way that the reader who’s on their nineteenth book in the series doesn’t get bored.”

‘Do your research. Talk to an expert in the field. Don’t rely on Wikipedia. Go to the proper sources. Go to a primary source and get it correct. Do on-site visitations. I once took Margaret Atwood on a tour of our morgue – I don’t know if she wanted it for a specific book.’ Her books are inevitably gruesome, but not for shock value. ‘I only put in what’s necessary to drive the story and make the setting authentic. I’ll never put in anything for sensationalism, to make it gory or bloody. But if I’m describing a crime scene or autopsy I’ll make it authentic.’ Death, trauma and dead bodies are central to her fiction, and very little is off limits. ‘I tend to be a little more cautious around children, but I have written about dead babies, based on an actual case I’d worked on. Not much is off limits, but I tend to treat some subjects more delicately.’ Not only is Temperance, like her creator, a woman operating in a world that has traditionally been male-dominated, but Kathy takes care not to gratuitously add to the body-count of women as victims of crime in her fiction. ‘There are a lot of female bodies in crime fiction,’ she says. ‘I actively think about, who will the victim be in this book. It can’t just be another dead woman. There has to be a light shone on all different kinds of crime and victims. I’ve had elderly, young boys, women. I do constantly think about that – I don’t just want it to be a woman taking it in the pants.’ Just as Kathy created Temperance as a strong female character, she also did the same with Tory Brennan, the lead character in the Virals series for young adults that she writes with her son, Brendan Reichs. Tory is Temperance’s fictional great-niece. ‘When I set out, I set out for Temperance to be a

strong female, says Kathy. ‘In Virals, with Tory Brennan, we wanted her to be a good role model, saying it’s cool to go into science and maths. They’re both good logical thinkers who think through the problem – it’s what we want to put out there for little girls.’ There is surprisingly little difference between writing for adult crime fans and teenage readers, she says. ‘Your dialogue has to be cleaner – you can’t have what a fifty-yearold homicide cop would be saying in a YA book. Kids talk differently from adults. And their social concerns are different. But the storylines, at least for YA and middle grade, are just as complicated. If you condescend, or talk down to them, boy.’ Kathy’s approach to crafting a novel has been honed by long practice: nineteen Temperance Brennan titles, a standalone, 2017’s Good Nights, six Virals titles and some novellas. ‘I do some outlining. On my computer I’ll outline 6, 8, 10 chapters so I know where it’s going. I do a character file and a timeline file. Then I jump in and start writing. I create an outline retrospectively – as I finish each chapter I put it into the outline. I’m a linear writer: chapter 1, chapter 2, chapter 3… It is flexible, as I’ll get an idea as I’m writing and go back and change things. At the end of the book I’ll have a complete outline. I don’t really do redrafts – I’ll edit constantly as I go. By the time I finish a first draft, it’s pretty finished.’ Her advice to aspiring writers is characteristically pragmatic. ‘Write. Write something. I don’t believe in writer’s block. Give yourself a designated block of time to write and don’t give yourself excuses. Just sit down and write. Even if you don’t like it you can hit the delete key. If you get in the habit of saying, today’s not a good day, you’ll never write a book.’

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Fish for a writing gig... Could you make money writing for a niche magazine about a specialised interest? Practical Fishkeeping editor Nathan Hill explains what he wants from new writers.

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s the editor of Practical Fishkeeping (PFK), a specialist pet care magazine, my main problem is sourcing gifted writers. While I’m graced with a healthy pool of individuals willing to submit, they frequently fall into one of two polarised camps; extremely focused aquarists with little to no writing background, or ‘chancers’ with a history of creative writing, hoping to hide their lack of subject knowledge with flowery passages and engaging similes. Like other editors of titles like mine, I want someone in that sweet spot, right in the middle. If you’re prepared to put in a little research time, that could be you.

The pitch The pitch is your one chance to attract an editor, and you waste it at your peril. More pitches to PFK receive a generic ‘thank you for your offer but…’ response than those I chase up, at somewhere around a 75/25 ratio. Of the rejected pitches, most can be summed up as ‘Hi, I’d like to write for you, if you want to tell me what to write about…’ This approach is a guaranteed pitch killer. Editors are extremely busy people, who already have people in mind for particular topics. 20

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www.writers-online.co.uk

Knowing what you want to write about in advance, and telling us, puts you above three quarters of your competing writers. Before you even consider pitching to a magazine like mine, ensure that you have read it and are familiar with both the house style and subject matter. In my publication’s case the practical aspects of keeping fish, as well as their habitats and conservation, feature prominently. Deciding on a fishy topic to write about need not be too hard. Be honest about your capabilities, and play to your strengths. In the first instance, current affairs are always good to hobby mags. Join some dedicated fish groups of Facebook, follow aquarists on YouTube and Instagram. Find out what’s hot, right now, because that is what my audience wants to read about. Alternatively, a lot in fishkeeping is cyclical, and fish tend to dip in and out of vogue over periods of several years. Source a couple of old back issues for pennies on Amazon or eBay, look at the main subjects and find out if they’ve been covered recently. I’ll repeat: play to your strengths. Perhaps you have a gift for interviews. See if one of the more famous YouTube aquarists is prepared to grant you a Skype call. I’d be interested in running an interview. Perhaps you’re proficient with data, in which case you could source

M AGA Z I N E J O U R N A L I S M

the numbers and types of fish imported each year into the UK. Pitch me that as the basis for an infographic. My readers would love it, and even if the wordcount isn’t high, you’d be generously rewarded for the work involved. Note that in any specialist magazine, it is almost certain that the editor knows more on the subject than you do. My own background includes studying fish, running public aquaria, running several aquarium stores, being a lecturer in the subject, and moving on to be an author and eventual editor of the subject. Be upfront about how much you do know about the subject you are proposing to write, because within one phone call we can gauge exactly how much you don’t know about it.

Getting your information There has never been such an incorrect source of information on fishkeeping as the mainstream internet. Social media fares little better, and while it has uses as a tool, it should not be relied upon for data. When writing about fish, there are few trustworthy sources of information, and fewer second-hand sources. Aim for the primary sources where possible. I’ve written many stories in the past where I’ve gone to ichthyologists directly, and found that what they tell me in person contradicts the information being virally regurgitated online. Your first ports of call when writing about fish are the websites fishbase. org, seriouslyfish.com and Eschmeyer’s catalog of fishes (https://writ.rs/ eschmeyer). Between them, these sites contain limited but accurate information on most fish species, and from these you can start on a web of investigation. If there’s something unique about the habitat, or the food the fish eat, the seasons where they live – any of these

TOP TIP! For any hobby title, write positively. Nobody buys a magazine to feel bad or be told that their topic of interest makes them a terrible person.

could be a stronger hook to the story. The last of these, Eschemeyer’s, is valuable when trying to find the correct name for a fish (fish taxonomy is somewhat fluid and amorphous) as well as the most recent scientist to work with that fish. This person, if you can speak to them, is the golden ticket to your feature. Editors love authorities. Authorities are your friends, and social media can be a great help in locating them. Many ichthyologists have accounts to communicate with hobbyists, and are delighted when someone takes an interest in their work. It can be harder to get a fish scientist to stop speaking than it is getting them to open up. If you manage to harvest an authority’s knowledge, then quote them heavily, and correctly. This will add intellectual weight and authenticity to the writing. Referencing is entirely unimportant for Practical Fishkeeping – the publication isn’t an academic journal – though if a publication requires it, more editors than not seem to favour the American Psychological Association (APA) method. Note also that Google Scholar is a great source of new information on old subjects, as well as introducing author names that may not show up on the above websites.

The voice of fishkeeping Gauging how much of yourself to put into a feature on fishkeeping rests heavily on how much of the experience is your own. In the sidebar are my own preferences to read in submissions. If you’re writing first-hand about a breeding or keeping experience, then the reader will expect a first-person narrative throughout: ‘I got the fish to breed by…’ and so on. This also works well for some tangible DIY pieces. For news pieces and instructional DIY, create something Vulcan-esque, emotionless and technical: ‘On Thursday of last week, the Chinese paddlefish was declared extinct in

HOW A SUCCESSFUL PITCH SHOULD LOOK • Be formal. Start with either Sir, Madam, or the name of the person you’re pitching to. Get an up-to-date copy of the magazine and check in the masthead panel. If the team is small like mine, maybe four of five in total, pitch directly to the editor. If the team is large, pitch to the second in command – usually the deputy editor or features editor. • Explain who you are and any relevant history. If you’re a seasoned seahorse breeder, or a close friend of a prominent aquarist, get this in early on. If you are the story’s hook, then I need to know that. • Sum up in a single sentence exactly what you want to submit, and a wordcount. For example: ‘I want to write 1,600 words on my experience breeding pygmy seahorses and raising the young to adulthood.’ No paragraphs of preamble, just tell us concisely what’s being offered. • Write a few sentences on how you think the feature will be constructed, noting the key points. For example: ‘I shall explain how to sex a pair, how to set up the aquarium for them, the water requirements to trigger spawning, the fry foods required and how to raise them, and the different sizes at which fry should be separated.’ Never use ‘etc.’ in a pitch as this suggests a lazy or unsure writer. • Explain in what format the work will be delivered. Will it be one solid block of run-on copy? Will it be divided into boxouts, graphs and charts? Will you provide annotations for pictures? This will help the editor plan where your work will sit within a completed magazine. • Offer a specific timescale for completion of the work. • If you have any writing already published (especially online) then offer a link to your best work at the end of the feature. Don’t broadside the editor with hundreds of links, as they won’t be opened. • Sign off formally. Use ‘sincerely’ or ‘regards’ as opposed to something like ‘cheers’.

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APRIL 2020

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WHAT IS THE APA SYSTEM? If you have the expertise and a suitable idea you would like to suggest, Nathan welcomes proposals by email pfkeditorial@ warnersgroup.co.uk

The APA referencing system works in two parts. The first is the citation within the copy body, directly after the sentence you’re quoting, and this is as straightforward as writing the author(s) surname(s), year of publication, and page or chapter in brackets, directly after the reference. For example: (Hill & Telfer, 2020, pp. 28-31) The second part consists of the full details given in an alphabetical list of references at the end of the feature. These details should include author surnames and initials, year of publication, title, subtitle (where one exists), edition, place of publication and publisher. For example: Hill, N., & Telfer, J. (2020), Writing Magazine, April 2020, (1st ed.) Bourne, Lincs: Warners.

ATTENTION TO DETAIL Pacing for a magazine needs to be fast and intense. As a writer for PFK, you will only have up to 2,000 words to play with, and only the most revered authors are granted wordcounts above this. This limit includes any fact boxes, roundels, lists and other accessories. Hunt out all and any redundant sentences and paragraphs and kill them so the editor doesn’t have to. The less editing of your work that needs doing, the more valuable you are.

FONT MATTERS Keep font simple on anything you submit. Calibri is fine. Don’t bother with quirky line spacing, bold passages, italics, underlines any other traits, as the first thing we editors often do is copy your entire document, pop it into TextEdit and convert the whole thing to plain text before passing it on to our production editors. Save yourself time and keep it basic, because we won’t even see those idiosyncratic flourishes.

FISH OR FISHES?

the wild…’ or ‘It is essential that the blue wires connect to, and only to, the thermostat…’ If you’re writing vicariously through an authority, then the safest approach is a mixture of technical writing and quotes. Remove yourself from the feature and use the authority as the voice, by quoting them in the first-person sense. ‘On Thursday of last week, the Chinese paddlefish was declared extinct in the wild. “I was disgusted to see it go,” says Quentin Scientist, the man who first discovered and named the species.’ Don’t add long passages that add nothing of substance – especially those pertaining to personal feelings. You can go ahead and pen down something like, ‘When I was seven years old I first gasped at the seraphic 22

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vision of Centropyge angelfish in their tanks, the electric shiver of their majesty carrying me on a transcendent journey far beyond a mere aquarium,’ but I’m cutting it and adding you to a contributor blacklist soon after. I don’t care, the reader doesn’t care. To use the old phrase, ‘Kill your darlings’.

How much will I get? Some work is more valuable in niche subject areas when you can also provide imagery, especially of rare and unusual subjects. Others may pay per word. Note that specialist magazines rarely have deep pockets, and so £200 for a 2,000 word feature may be especially generous. Don’t expect ‘red top’ rates, and expect considerably less (if anything) when submitting to a website or blog. www.writers-online.co.uk

If fish aren’t your thing, see p85 for more niche pet magazines looking for writers.

There’s often a blunderbuss approach to working with singular and plural with fish writers. Decide early on whether you’re going to write about a fish as an individual, or fish as a plurality, and then stick to that. Sentences like ‘The Otocinclus catfish is a great species for aquaria, but in the wild they are surprisingly migratory…’ are all extra time for the editor to fix. As an aside, ‘fish’ can be the plural of one species of fish (the shoal of herring numbered a million fish), while ‘fishes’ refers to a plurality of species together (the community tank was made up of dozens of different fishes).

-        

  

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I N S P I R I N G WO R D S

How I got

published LISTEN TAP HERE To hear an extract from A Room at the Manor

JULIE SHACKMAN

Scottish romance author Julie Shackman, tells Dolores Gordon Smith how she found an Australian agent.

‘M

y first two contemporary romance novels, Rock My World and Hero or Zero were published digitally by an ebook publisher based in London, but like many writers, I always dreamt of a traditional publishing deal. ‘From an early age, I loved writing and reading. I remember reading Princess Daisy by Judith Krantz when I was thirteen and I thought it must be wonderful to write stories and get paid for it. ‘I trained as a journalist and studied communication and media, but always harboured a longing to be a romance author. ‘I am an avid reader and love many genres, but my favourite by

far is romance – both reading it and writing it. ‘When I approached Australian uber agent, Selwa Anthony, with my third novel, A Room at the Manor, in April 2017, I honestly hadn’t expected to hear back. ‘I had read about Selwa’s phenomenal reputation in the Australian literary world, as well as her enthusiasm for mentoring and encouraging debut authors, but I assumed that with her impressive client list, she would more than likely reply with a polite decline. ‘I had submitted to agents, only to find that I was receiving positive comments about my writing but no offers of representation. ‘When I read about several UK writers who had successfully secured

TOP TIPS • I am a long-time reader of Writing Magazine and find the inspirational stories; advice and writing assistance invaluable. Getting to know as much as you possibly can about the writing industry and the publishing world can only be an advantage. • Never, ever, give up. It only takes one person to say ‘yes’ and persistence and tenacity count for so much in the publishing world.

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literary representation abroad, I decided to submit my writing to her. ‘These authors had spoken of finding no logistical problems at all with having an agent based internationally and said they simply exchanged emails as usual, and where telephone calls were required, they just arranged them with the time difference in mind. ‘I had based Thistles, my fictional tea room in the story, on my favourite tea shop where I write and wanted to look at what would happen when secrets and revelations come back from the past. ‘I thought also about my main character, Lara McDonald, and how she might react to having to assert herself in a very difficult situation – and what effect this would have on decisions she would have to make in the future. It was these ideas that formed the basis for A Room at the Manor. ‘I decided to approach Selwa and emailed her my synopsis and first ten pages of my novel on that Saturday afternoon, only to be lost for words when an email reply pinged in my inbox from her on the Monday morning, saying she enjoyed my writing and could I send her the full MS? ‘She added that she would get back

H OW I G OT P U B L I S H E D

Writing Retreat,

to me with her decision within fourteen days, so I spent the next week or so trying not to refresh my inbox every five minutes. I tried to feel quietly optimistic and told myself that even if she declined, having an agent of her stature ask for my completed MS was a step in the right direction. ‘Then, on day twelve, another emailed arrived from Selwa, asking if we could have a telephone chat? ‘When I spoke to her, I remember my heart leaping in my chest when she said my MS required some work but that she loved my writing style and the premise of my book. Then when she offered to represent me, I burst into tears. ‘After several rounds of edits, Selwa began submitting A Room at the Manor and within six weeks, she had secured me a publishing deal with Allen & Unwin – cue more heart hammering and tears. ‘She then informed me that she had negotiated an audio version of the book with Bolinda. ‘A Room at the Manor was released in Kindle, paperback and audio on 27 June 2018 in Australia and New Zealand and since then, it has also been released by Forever, the romance imprint of Ullstein in Germany, as an ebook on 4 March 2019 and in paperback on 2 May 2019.  ‘A Room at the Manor was also released in the UK by Atlantic Books on Kindle and in paperback on 1 August 2019. ‘The McKerron Castle is out now in audio book from Bolinda and my agent has just started submitting it to print publishers. I’m currently working on my next couple of books. I’m currently working on my next couple of books, but without Selwa’s assertiveness, passion and persistence, my writing dreams would never have got off the ground. ‘She believes in me – and for that, I will always be truly grateful.’

‘I do not receive unsolicited manuscripts. Most of my authors find me through my network. ‘Julie impressed me because she didn’t let the distance (Australia/ Scotland) stop her from finding a way to get my email address as I do not list it online.  ‘I asked her, “why me and not an agent in the UK?” She replied that my website states I like to discover and mentor new authors.  ‘I read her novel and saw the potential – a wonderful setting, good colourful characters and a very easy writing style. It needed work to take it up a notch (which Julie was willing to do) and it was picked up by Allen & Unwin Australia.  ‘The target audience is women of all ages who like to read novels that have a charming setting and wonderful love story.   ‘Julie loves writing this genre and has completed her second novel, The Legend of McKerron Castle, which is currently being edited.’ Website: www.selwaanthony.com.au

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Selwa Anthony, Julie’s agent, says:

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In the frame Author, screenwriter and director Andrew David Barker tells Gary Dalkin how writers can turn into filmmakers

T

here are very few novelists who are also film writer-directors. Perhaps the most famous example is Michael Crichton, who wrote the original novel Jurassic Park, and wrote and directed films such as Westworld and Coma. Once, like publishing, filmmaking existed in a walled garden. But now, just as ebooks and print on demand have enabled anyone to publish a book, so new technology has liberated filmmaking. So when I spoke to writer/director Andrew David Barker I was keen to find out how a novelist can become a filmmaker. In the beginning, Andrew says, ‘I had no connection to the film industry whatsoever. I grew up in Derby to a working-class family and the options I had when I left school, after getting a very poor education, where either to go and work in a factory or on a building site.’ He did both. With no money, but an ambition burning inside him to make a film, his feature A Reckoning came about because ‘I discovered an old abandoned RAF base just outside Nottingham. It was an entire village just left to the elements and it did 26

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look like the end of the world. So I decided to write to order – basically shaping a story around the location.’ This is Andrew’s first big lesson, use what resources are available to you. ‘I’ve always loved the postapocalyptic genre and the location made for a perfect fit for something in that area. So I wrote an outline for a story about a lone man in an empty world – eventually his mind begins to unravel and the crippling loneliness takes hold. I designed the entire thing

to be shot on next to no money, all in the location I’d found.’ Through writing for pop culture magazine And Cream, Andrew had the opportunity to interview the actor Leslie Simpson (Dog Soldiers). Afterwards he got his script to the actor, who agreed to star in the film. Andrew says that getting Simpson on board ‘changed everything. I did manage to get a bit of financial backing, and suddenly we were making the film.’

Andrew David Barker is the author of the novels The Electric and Dead Leaves. His new novel Mick & Sarah at the Pictures is currently being crowdfunded through Unbound. He wrote and directed the feature film A Reckoning (2011) and the shorts Two Old Boys (2018 winner of award for Best Comedy Short at the Independent Shorts Awards, Los Angeles) and Shining Tor (2018, winner of Best Fantasy Short, Independent Shorts Awards; Best Visual Effects – Midlands Movies Awards, 2019; Best Actress, Laura Rollins, The Short Cinema, 2019; Official Selection, That Film Festival, Cannes, 2019).

www.writers-online.co.uk

SCREENWRITING

He stresses that it is important to write your screenplay keeping practical limitations in mind. ‘I knew there was no electric at the location, which would mean that I’d need a generator to power everything, and generators are of course really noisy, so I wrote the film to have a voice over – we hear the lone man’s internal thoughts – and that enabled me to shoot outside using the generator and not have to worry about sound. I put that on in post-production.’ Knowing that everyone wants to be involved in a film, Andrew explains that, ‘We got students from Derby University to act as our crew and we shot in the middle of January for two weeks. About three days into the shoot, the snow came. It turned out to be one of the worst winters in England for years. But that was another thing I’d planned when writing – my structure was fairly loose. I left room for a lot of improvising, so we could accommodate the weather.’ Because the budget was so tiny the film was edited in the editor’s bedroom. This doesn’t need to be a problem though. With almost all filmmaking being digital now any film can be edited on a home computer. Most special effects can be done in software. As Andrew points out, ‘you can make films on your phone. The camera on my iPhone is better than the camera we shot A Reckoning on ten years ago, so it’s all about using the equipment you can get hold of and utilising it the best way you can.’ As an example of this, Steven Soderbergh (Ocean’s Eleven) shot his 2018 feature film Unsane entirely on an iPhone. Andrew is frank about one hard lesson he learned. ‘There was a stupid falling out with the folks that put up the money for the shoot. That was where I made the biggest mistake. There were no contracts. I was so thrilled to be finally making a film that it never even occurred to me – we were just all friends together going to do this thing. It got into a messy legal dispute about who actually owned the film, but because neither party had any money we couldn’t settle it properly – no one was in a position to take anyone to

court – and so the film was cast into limbo. I had film festivals around the world wanting to take it and a small distribution company in LA looking at it, but it all fell apart.’ In the aftermath Andrew walked away from filmmaking for a while but says, ‘films themselves never left me. All my novels have films as a backdrop in some way. The Electric, and my new novel, Mick & Sarah At The Pictures, are pretty much just set within the walls of old picture houses.’ Andrew clearly has a romantic nostalgia for the age of cinema before the multiplex. After writing Dead Leaves, ‘the itch started to return, but again I couldn’t figure out how to make something on no money. Those ideas – the ideas that are simple enough to shoot, yet strong enough to elevate them above their budgetary constraints – are really hard to find.’ This is one of the key differences to writing a short story or novel as a spectacular action scene costs a lot more on film than on paper. In 2017 Andrew got a job as a standby prop guy at the BBC in Birmingham, working on the daytime show Doctors. ‘It was my first time ever officially working in the industry. I was on set all day, with the actors, the crew, and it was there that the fire to start making films again really came back.’ It’s at this point that the writer-director explains how luck sometimes help out. ‘A mate of mine, Mick Walker, runs his own production company, mainly doing corporate stuff, and so he has pretty much got everything – cameras, lens, lights, editing software – and he wanted to make a narrative film as well. A drama... ‘I was thinking about older men I see in pubs – day drinkers – and thought I’d try and put two of these guys sitting over a pint and have them talk and see what happens. I sat down to write and this little film, and Two Old Boys took shape. I kept it short because really it has no story – it’s a snapshot of two working class blokes talking about a world they feel is getting away from them, and them yearning for the past. ‘So with Mick on board to shoot it, I asked an actor friend of mine, Mark www.writers-online.co.uk

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TOP TIPS Tunstall, if he’d be up for doing it, and he in turn suggested his friend Phil Molloy. Then I asked around a few pubs in Derbyshire, where I originally come from. Luckily we got a pub, for free no less, up in Heanor. We had the pub for the day, except it would still be open. This was something we just had to work around, again using the obstacle and making it part of the film in that we just had the background noise of the pub play as it happened. We just went with the noise and it ended up really adding to the atmosphere.’ Two Old Boys was shot in a day in April 2018 for ‘no money other than a bit of food for everyone. It’s important to always feed your cast and crew.’ Three months later, in June, ‘we were back filming Shining Tor. I allowed myself to think a big bigger. For starters Tor takes place outside, up the wilds of the country, so you’re at the mercy of the elements, and this one was a fantasy, which required some special effects. ‘Now I should say that I’m very much the writer and the director on these films, meaning, I don’t pick up the camera, I don’t know how to edit, or do special effects. I found someone better than me to do those things, and I think that’s a big part of it. You do have to find what you’re good at, don’t try and do everything yourself. I’ve been lucky that Mick is really good at those things. He won an award for Best Visual Effects for Shining Tor.’ The film was another example of where contacts comes into play. ‘I asked Laura Rollins and Ashley Rice, who star in Doctors, if they’d do my short and they said yes. Laura also won an award for her acting in Shining Tor, so that really paid off. But again, it was made on nothing more than sheer will and sheer goodwill. It didn’t cost anything really, other than time. And both films have played in festivals around the world. Shining Tor was even screened at Cannes in 2019.’ Reflecting on the films he’s made so far, Andrew offers that ‘shorts are a great proving ground – they’re a great place to experiment without too much weight on them. When I made A Reckoning, I was pretty much putting all my eggs in one basket, and I destroyed my life in the process. I went for broke and well, ended up 28

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broke. But with a short it’s much more manageable. They’re still quite an undertaking – any film is – but nothing on the scale of a feature.’ There is something else Andrew thinks new filmmakers should take into consideration – that in just the decade since he made A Reckoning, ‘times have changed. The entire landscape is different. Low-to-no budget feature films are a very tough sell. There is no DVD market anymore, not really, but I think streaming and the way we consume content now has opened up the market for shorter-length narrative films. Jeffrey Katzenberg, one of the co-founders of Dreamworks, is about to launch Quibi, which is all short content, and I’m embracing that now. I’ve shaken off my old Gen X ideas of a theatrical feature.’ Basically, Andrew suggests, unless you’re making a $200 million franchise movie, traditional cinema ‘is over, but all new options are opening up and it’s really exciting.’ In the end, Andrew says, ‘For now, I’m happy making short form narratives. I’ve written a couple of scripts for films made by other directors and that’s been exciting. We’ve got a sci-fi short coming in 2020 called Endling, which I’m really pleased about. I wrote it back in 2018 and a filmmaker named Rishi Thaker has directed it and I’m looking forward to seeing how it came together. I’d like to write more for other directors.’ • A Reckoning is on YouTube: https://writ.rs/areckoning • Mick & Sarah at the Pictures: https://writ.rs/micksarah

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for writing and making your film 1 Use what resources you have. Have you found a brilliant location? Write using it. 2 Write your film around your resources: locations, people, equipment, budget. 3 Build flexibility into your script. If shooting outdoors allow for what the weather might do. 4 Make contacts. Online there are whole communities of people equally keen to make a film. 5 Get to know people who already are filmmakers. Enlist their help. 6 Contact university film or drama departments. They are full of students looking for filmmaking experience. 7 Whenever money is involved have a contract. 8 Don’t try to do it all yourself. Know your skills and weaknesses and work with other people. 9 Feed your cast and crew. Like an army, a film production marches on its stomach. 10 Don’t give up, and don’t be put off.

l a m i n A spirit

FREE RANGE

writing

Think about connections with the animals that live with us in Jenny Alexander’s pet-themed creative writing exercises

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ational Pet Day is coming up in April. If you are a pet owner, it’s a reminder to check your pet’s health care is up to date, with vaccinations and so on, to clear out any toys that are no longer safe, update collar tags if you have changed your address and make sure your home is pet friendly. For anyone who doesn’t have a pet, it’s a good time to think about other people – family, friends or neighbours – who may need help looking after their pets due to travel plans, old age or illness. For free-range writers, National Pet Day provides a great theme to explore in different genres with this month’s writing workouts. The only rule is stick to the timings. Short, timed pieces mean you have to get stuck straight in, before your inner critic has a chance to interfere.

Memoir Start with a list of pets, your own or other people’s, from any period in your life. For me, that would include my grandmother’s elderly scottish terrier, Scottie, then Patch, the puppy my father brought home in his coat pocket, my best friend’s dog, my children’s house rabbits and Sabre, the unfriendly rottweiler that once lived next door. Choose one. What did it look like? What noises did it make? What did it smell like? What did it feel like to touch or hold? Use all your senses and make some notes. Add some thoughts about its personality, and how you related to it emotionally. Next, jot down some anecdotes from this animal’s life – any funny, touching, exciting or worrying moments that come to mind. Choose one and tell the story. Take fifteen minutes.

Memoir tip: Using all your senses is a key to more fully remembering the past.

Fiction Pets can feel like family members, or really important friends. This story will be about someone who either gains a pet or loses one, which can both be life-changing events. In my book Finding Fizz, a little girl who is being bullied at school finds an orphaned puppy, and having someone even smaller and more vulnerable than she is helps her feel stronger and the teasing less important. In my young adult novel Drift, the death of the dog is the first crack in the protagonist’s sense of family as a safe and loving place. In your story, who gains or loses a pet? Write a character sketch – name and age, physical description, likes and dislikes, situation. Make some notes about the pet as well – what kind of animal it is, its name, age and temperament. What is your main character’s life like before they gain or lose their pet? That’s the beginning. How do they find or lose it? That’s the action. In what way is their life different afterwards? That’s the ending. Write the story. Take twenty minutes.

Non-fiction Write a picture book text for young children about how to look after a pet. Most picture books are about thirty pages long, with a sentence or two of writing on each page, and part of the task is to make an artwork note where information can be conveyed in the illustration rather than spelt out in the text. The easiest subject to choose is a pet you have looked after yourself – for me, that might be rabbits, rats or hens. Then you won’t need www.writers-online.co.uk

to do any research. What sort of housing does this animal need? What food? And health care? How can you look after its emotional needs? Take ten minutes for a quick first draft, to get the content. Then take another ten to check the language, making sure it’s pitched at a level that young children can understand, with no long sentences. You can include some words that may be unfamiliar, such as ‘hutch’ or ‘dog basket’ if the picture shows the reader what they mean. Tip: ip: Writing for different readerships such as very young children is good practice for making you really think about your reader, what they will understand and be interested to know.

Poetry In this poem, the narrator is either a pet owner talking about their pet or a pet talking about its owner. Get some background first by imagining both the person and the pet, their names, ages and personalities; their physical attributes and how they feel about living with each other. Write some notes. Which one feels more interesting to you, the owner or the animal? That will be your narrator. Especially if you are choosing the animal, you might consider making your poem rhyme for comic effect but keep it free verse if that feels more natural. Take 15 minutes. Remember to give your poem a title. Poetry tip: B Because poems feel personal, we often assume they represent the poet’s own experiences, thoughts and feelings. Writing poems from a fictional point of view helps loosen up the way we engage as readers. APRIL 2020

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Find out what the SoA could do for you at www.societyo fauthors.org and get 15 months for the price of 12 with the code WRITIN GMAG

Literary legacy Sarah Baxter, who handles literary estates at the Society of Authors, explains the work they do to keep an author’s work alive for years after their death

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n 1945, playwright Bernard Shaw sent a postcard to the Society of Authors. ‘The time has come (I am nearly ninety),’ it read, ‘when I must hand over the management of my literary and theatre to some permanent agency… You intimated some time ago that [the Society of Authors] is game for the job. On what terms?’ A deal was done and, after his papers had been passed to us, we received another postcard from Shaw’s Corner: ‘Act as if I were dead, as I soon shall be.’ Bernard Shaw’s is one of over forty literary estates we represent today. Its impact over the years has been considerable. In fact in 1967 it enabled us to purchase one of the two buildings in South Kensington which served as our offices until 2019. The estate of Robert Louis Stevenson was one of the first. Many of the estates we represent are for authors who had close associations with the Society of Authors during their lifetimes: Walter de la Mare, Rosamond Lehmann and John Masefield served on our management committee, and Masefield, former Poet Laureate, was also the union’s President for thirty years (a role held today by Philip Pullman). Philip Larkin was a member and, never having an agent, relied extensively on our services. What began in 1912 as a service to writers nearing the end of their working lives today makes up a significant proportion of our annual income – supporting our day-to-day activities, maintaining relationships with industry, and enabling us to promote good practice. The income also helps us to support individual writers through grants and endowments awarded by two of our charities, the Authors’ Contingency Fund and PD James Memorial Fund.

How do literary estates work? For most estates we take on the role of agent. This means we handle a range of rights including stage, film and publication, and take a commission on income. For others, we are a beneficiary of the authors’ copyrights or literary income. Both setups are made possible by copyright law. UK copyright law protects your work for seventy years after your death, giving literary estates great potential to continue to generate 30

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income for beneficiaries. As agents we are mindful of an author’s reputation and an estate’s wishes, but it is our responsibility to take advantage of new licensing opportunities – and to embrace the occasionally weird and often wonderful requests that come our way. This might take the form of allowing a new stage adaptation of a much-loved children’s classic (as we did for Masefield’s The Box of Delights), or taking advantage of the strong interest in classic English literature by licensing titles like The Go-Between (LP Hartley) and Maurice (EM Forster) in markets that have previously been challenging.

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Rise, fall, and rise again Some titles seem to transcend fashions and remain popular throughout the term of copyright. The novels of EM Forster and Virginia Woolf have never been out of print in the UK, and in the case of Pygmalion, Shaw’s most popular play (along with its awardwinning musical derivative My Fair Lady), rarely off the stage. But fashions do change, and it is satisfying and sometimes surprising to see a long out-of-print book by a long-deceased author suddenly take flight and reach a new audience. Income can rise, fall, and rise again throughout the copyright period; it just needs the

right person with the right vision to make it work. Typically, income will diminish over time, but since your estate can be lucrative for many years, as a writer it is important to consider the management of your copyrights and papers after your death and make clear provision in your will. We have a guidance paper, Your Copyrights and Papers After Death,, which deals with – among other things – who inherits what, executors and ‘literary executors’, the future administration of your copyrights, and inheritance tax. It’s free to Society of Authors members from our website. Literary estates are also entitled become members of the Society of Authors and to obtain the same advice and assistance as authors are entitled to during their lifetime. #DeadGoodLit We would love you to share in our passion for the authors whose estates we represent by joining our new Twitter book club #DeadGoodLit. On the last Monday of every other month we discuss well-known classics and long-forgotten literary gems from our @Soc_of_Authors Twitter account. To find out more or sign up to our #DeadGoodLit newsletter visit www.societyofauthors. org/estates.

§ Detailed critical assessments and services by professional editors for writing at all stages of development, in all genres § Links with publishers and agents, and advice on self-publishing § Six one-to-one sessions with a professional editor, online or in person § Includes separate manuscript assessment and industry day with publishers and agents § Masterclasses and skills workshops § TLC Writers’ Day June 20th with TLC Pen Factor Writing Competition T 020 7324 2563 E [email protected] W www.literaryconsultancy.co.uk

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APRIL 2020

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It can also take the form of licensing work for new platforms as publishing technology evolves. For instance, ebook publication can be the most viable option for some of our titles. A good example of this is the work of Catherine Gaskin, who wrote popular romantic novels from the 1940s to 1980s. Her books sold over 40 million copies worldwide during her lifetime, but when she died in 2009, leaving her literary estate to the Society of Authors, all her titles were out of print. Corazon Books wanted to revive Gaskin’s work and went on to use an engaging mix of new publishing techniques and promotional ideas. This included dedicated websites and social media promotion, targeted live talks to organisations including the Romantic Novelists’ Association, running writing competitions, engaging directly with readers, and developing a Catherine Gaskin newsletter for her fanbase. Corazon Books’ dynamic approach was so successful that we went on to license Gaskin’s entire backlist to this ebook publisher.

BEGINNERS

e n i l g n i h s i n The fi Finish what you started, says Adrian Magson. It’s the only way to find out if it’s got legs.

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here’s some truth in the saying that goes, ‘If you finish what you started, only then can you look back and see how well you did.’ I don’t claim the credit for this. Maybe it was Confucius or one of those other Clever Dicks… or maybe it was a variation of a saying my father drilled into me, which usually went along the lines of, ‘Finish that and you can start something else.’ It made a kind of sense back when I was young enough to heed his advice, and because I couldn’t see the hitch coming, which was often another job he needed doing around the house or garden. But since the next job usually led to some kind of reward – he was a fair-minded employer – I couldn’t complain too much. It was a habit that followed me into my writing, because without finishing a piece, there was nothing I could do with it. I couldn’t tell whether the story worked; didn’t want to show it to anyone to see what they thought; certainly couldn’t submit it to a magazine editor (which it usually was when I started out in this strange business). I couldn’t even begin to derive any great personal satisfaction from it. Like a half-built wall, it stood but not all the way up. I come across people quite often who say they once started to write something but had never finished it. Sometimes the words come with a shrug and not a hint of regret, as if it was an effort of its time that carried no real chance of success anyway, so no great loss. Others carry an echo of something else; wistfulness, perhaps. I rarely know why they didn’t finish what they’d started, and it’s usually not my place to ask. It could have been a lack of conviction, or ideas or even the desire – that inner drive most writers have which draws them back to

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the keyboard or paper even when the world is in turmoil and there are countless other demands on their time. Starting out writing short fiction, the end was always somewhere in sight, or at least not so far off that it seemed an impossible task. Whether 1,000 words or 5,000 or more, it was achievable, even if only to be able to look back at the completed work and think about what to do with it next, whether it involved a stamped, addressed envelope (remember those?) or a quick flick of the lighter and watching the words go up in smoke. (Actually, I rarely did that – the fire bit, I mean – because I’ve never believed in throwing away any of my writing. To do so is to invalidate all the hours spent composing the words, and because I quickly learned that recycling them represented a lot of saved effort and time. Whether an idea, a paragraph, a character or a simple piece of dialogue, if I could use an unused piece elsewhere, I would try.) Writing books is a little harder to see the end, but it’s merely a question of scale. Each chapter has its own beginning and end, which can be judged as you go, and each chapter adds to the collective. Write enough chapters and you soon have a book. Then you can look back and judge whether what you have is a pile of manure or something worth submitting. And, yes, I’ve had plenty of manure along the way, usually consigned to a bottom drawer and later dissected for the odd nugget… which is probably a picture you don’t want in your head. Unlike some, and perhaps because of the ‘finish what you started’ credo, I’ve never been able to show my writing to anyone until it’s a done deal. Doesn’t matter whether it’s an article, a short story or a book, it has to be finished before I can even think of letting www.writers-online.co.uk

it out into the world without feeling my toes curling up in anticipation of derision. The only way I can do that is by finally writing THE END at the end. Then I know it’s done. Yes, there will be some re-reading and re-editing (I tend to edit a lot as I go, so it’s a rolling function), but the biggest part of the job is completed. Whether you edit as you go as I do, or at the end (as I also do because I’m never fully satisfied), you eventually have to say to yourself, ‘That’s it. Stop bloody fiddling and get it out there.’ By the same token, an agent or publisher, while prepared to look at a synopsis or the first few chapters, will really only be able to make a final judgement when they can read the finished work. They can get excited by a first sighting of a submission or even a synopsis, but they won’t give it a definitive ‘yes’ until they know what they’re dealing with. Even at this stage you might have to accept that it isn’t going to fly without some extra work. But that’s part of accepting someone’s judgement, of being a determined – and professional – writer; you pick yourself up and start again because that’s what we all do. And the bitter pill of junking something you aren’t happy with is more easily justified if you start writing something else instead.

Top Tips • Finish the job. You can’t judge a wall half-built. • Getting a complete view of a project is the only way to gauge its worth. • If a project stalls or fails, don’t dwell. Start something else.

0 0 5 £ ! N I W

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d e t n Hau Short Stor y

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‘Haunted’ is your theme, but whether you interpret that to mean a literal spooky story, skeletons in the closet or the ghost of lost love is entirely up to you. The winner will receive £200 and publication in Writing Magazine, with £50 and publication online for the runner-up.

The closing date is 15 May.

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FLASH FICTION COMPETITION WINNERS

Jeanette Lowe is a southerner now resident in South Yorkshire. She’s a former specialist literacy teacher who escaped the grind to do an MA in Creative Writing at the University of Sheffield, which she has now completed. She’s currently unemployed but trying to avoid going back to teaching.

1st place £200

n o i s r e v n o c t f Lo

by Jeanette Lowe

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’ve just had a pay rise, he says, and there’s your redundancy. Stop worrying. See your friends, go shopping. She does go shopping, she fills their wardrobe. She lunches with old work colleagues, pizza, tapas, and that new place, Turkish. They soon run out of things to say. The new clothes rustle and waft as she slides open the glossy doors. They dangle like demi-people, heads and limbs severed. Ghosts. She slides the doors shut again, roams the house, goes into bedrooms where snotty toddlers once crawled. Bathrooms, lemon-scented and gleaming from the cleaner’s buffing. The dining room, little used. The utility room, where the ironing gets done. His shirts, her silks. There are other places. The attic with a pull-down ladder. One day she yanks it free, climbs up and flicks the light-switch, wondering what’s in the boxes, why they keep stuff they never use. Her long painted fingernails prise open her

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old trunk, picked up at some junk shop years back. Decades. She stands and watches the dust float and swim. Then she looks inside. Fraying straw hats, and the black platform boots she wore when she was a teenager. The old rucksack she took to Thailand a year before she met him, dark blue canvas and cracked leather straps. A scrawny stuffed lion, browning paperbacks. Diaries she daren’t open in case the essence of her younger self escapes, wraps her, suffocates her. Her mother’s water-ringed bedside cabinet sits by the chimney stack. It opens with a little verdigris key. She brings up a bottle of whiskey, a tumbler, places them inside. Lugs up a fluffy cream-coloured rug, adds a satin cushion from the bedroom. Lies back, only aware of soft radio-voices in the kitchen far below. She pours and sips. Pours some more. Loses her sense of where she has belonged. She gets out of bed, opens the blind. There’s no sign of him. No towel on the shower room floor, no www.writers-online.co.uk

crumpled sofa cushions, no scummy mug on the coffee table. A text. Sorry darling, worked late, checked into the Travelodge. After her granola she goes up into the attic and reaches for the little key. Later, much later, she creeps back down with the rucksack, legs feeble. Dusk is settling, she doesn’t know how long she’s been gone, daydreamy, stuck. She lays the rucksack on the bed. Gives it a sniff, fiddles with the buckles and straps. It’s a little musty but it seems intact. She looks out the window, sees it’s been raining. She brings up strong coffee and opens drawers. T-shirts, sandals. Jeans, jumper. A waterproof. Phone and charger. Credit cards. She laces on her comfy walking boots. Lingering in the hallway, she considers leaving a note. She decides to text, Good luck, darling. She swings the rucksack onto her back, locks the front and posts the keys back through the letter box. Looks up. Day is sliding into night.

S H O R T S TO RY C O M P E T I T I O N W I N N E R S

Also shortlisted in the 500-word short story competition were: Sharon Boyle, East Lothian; Michael Callaghan, Glasgow; Kevin Cheeseman, Haddenham, Buckinghamshire; Kath Delaney, Lancaster; Alyson Hilbourne, Penrith, Cumbria; Sophie Holland, Bristol; Vanessa Jarrett, Lymington, Hampshire; Kerry Jeffs, Framlingham, Suffolk; Pat Metcalfe, New Mills, Derbyshire; Alexandra Nicholson, Weymouth, Dorset.

T he Game Annie Percik lives in London with her husband, Dave, where she is revising her first novel, whilst working as a University Complaints Officer. She writes a blog about writing and posts short fiction on her website (www. alobear.co.uk), which is also where all her current publications are listed. She likes to run away from zombies in her spare time.

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he children play in the dappled sunlight as their mothers chat from deck chairs arranged in the shade. It’s a complicated game. The rules were devised by Daniel, always the deep thinker of the group, but it’s clear that Annabel is the one in charge. ‘No,’ she says. ‘You need to stand over there.’ Ben, the follower, the meek one, does as he is told, moving to the designated spot in the centre of one pool of sunlight. Daniel nods in satisfaction. Annabel has understood his vision and is now

by Annie Percik

ensuring its implementation. All is good. The children have known each other their whole lives. It’s a group born, literally, out of a pre-natal yoga class their mothers all attended. Their birthdays fall within a span of six weeks and they have been in and out of each other’s houses as if they all belong to one big family. ‘Now you need to get to that spot without stepping on the dark bits,’ Annabel says, pointing. The wind rustles the leaves of the trees overhead, making the sunlit patches of ground ripple and shimmer. ‘Quick!’ Annabel shouts. ‘Before the ghost steals all the light!’ Ben scrambles to obey. The rules may be Daniel’s but the story is Annabel’s. She always takes the bare bones of what Daniel provides and turns them into an epic fantasy that transforms their games into adventures. Ben might not have helped with the creation of the game, but he’s by far the best at it. He doesn’t fully understand the rules, but Annabel’s instructions tell him what to do. He leaps from one circle of light to another, nimbly avoiding the

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2nd place £50 dangerous shadows where evil spirits lurk and lands securely at his destination. ‘Yay!’ Annabel calls out, throwing her arms in the air. ‘You’re safe! The ghost can’t get you now. But you can’t move until me and Daniel have made it too, or it’ll be able to find you again. And if we get caught, it’ll eat you too.’ Ben looks alarmed by this turn of events. But he stands firm on his spot and pulls Annabel to safety when she stumbles on the last jump. They arrange themselves at the edges of the circle, trying to make enough room for Daniel. But the wind is their enemy, shifting the parameters of their designated haven beneath their feet. Annabel topples first, pulling the boys down with her until they end up in a pile on the ground, shrieking and laughing as the ghost claims its victory. Their three mothers look over at the noise, quickly reassured by the sounds of joy beneath the imagined terror. They dream a future for their children. Annabel will be CEO, of course, while Daniel will head up the Research & Development division. And Ben? Nobody is sure where his strengths will lie yet. But he’s got time to shine. And whatever role he ends up taking, no doubt he will keep the ghosts at bay for his friends.

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Shelf life LISTEN TAP HERE To hear an extract from Beneath the Streets

ADAM MACQUEEN The journalist and now novelist shares his top five reads with Judith Spelman

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dam Macqueen is a journalist and author who has contributed to Private Eye magazine since 1997 and wrote the history of the magazine to celebrate its 50th anniversary in 2011. Between 1999-2002 he was deputy editor of The Big Issue. As an author his books have the most intriguing titles – The Prime Minister’s Ironing Board, The Lies of the Land: A Brief History of Political Dishonesty and The King of Sunlight. His first novel, Beneath the Streets, is a political thriller and published by Lightening Books in March 2020.

BLACK HEARTS IN BATTERSEA by Joan Aiken, 1964 ‘I’ve picked this because it’s a rollicking read, full of intrigue, adventure and excitement, and it introduces perhaps the greatest role-model in children’s literature, Dido Twite. But it has a particular significance for me now because it’s the first book that made me realise – decades ahead of Gordon Burn’s Alma Cogan and Robert Harris’s Fatherland – that you don’t have to stick to the rules: you can take the bits of history you want and reshape the rest into your own story, as I’ve done with Beneath The Streets. Aiken’s whole series takes place in an alternative England where James III is on the throne and dastardly Hanoverians are plotting against him, and where wolves roam the countryside, having entered the country through a channel tunnel completed a couple of hundred years ahead of schedule.

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MURDER MUST ADVERTISE by Dorothy L Sayers, 1933 ‘Judging by the shelves in my local library, mysteries account for an enormous proportion of the nation’s reading but I wonder how many people actually read them with their own detective hats on. I’m not sure I’ve ever worked out a murderer ahead of the final chapter, or even really tried to. I think the key to mysteries’ ubiquity is that they provide a ready-made framework on which to hang characters and explore more interesting issues. Dorothy Sayers has two of the most fascinating of the former in Lord Peter Wimsey and Harriet Vane (the latter only a background presence in this instalment): Wimsey’s deliberately-curated image as a foppish dilettante disguises both his intelligence and the lingering effects of shell shock in the First World War. This is at the heart of his relationship with his batmanturned-valet Bunter, just one of the supporting characters Sayers uses to interrogate and satirise Britain’s class system between the wars: Wimsey’s snobbish sister-in-law the Duchess of Denver, his sister Mary, married down to a Scotland Yard man, and in this book the employees of the Pym’s Publicity advertising agency into which m’Lord goes undercover as a 9-to-5 man (a deception boldly not revealed to the reader until five chapters in, though regulars will guess from the first line).’

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WRITER’S BOOKSHELF

DIALOGUES OF THE DEAD by Reginald Hill, 2001 ‘And here’s another prime example of my thesis: the most fantastically-contrived serial killer plot (no spoilers) which, when revealed, detracts in no way from a story which not only further explores some well-loved (and on occasion loathed) characters built up over some twenty or so novels that are nominally police procedurals, but also develops two new ones to the point that when they end up in inevitable peril you find yourself rooting for both of them, even though some expertly-employed dramatic irony means you really shouldn’t. And throughout it all – in this book perhaps more than any other in the Dalziel and Pascoe series – Reginald Hill is celebrating his love of the English language, making his own paronomasia (yes, you’re supposed to have to look it up, as you will with at least one word in every chapter of his books) explicit and as key to the plot as the increasingly baroque murders which punctuate the story. I read this whole series over and over again and find it genuinely painful that Hill’s death in 2012 means we will never see Andy Dalziel in retirement or know what Rosie Pascoe grows up to be.’

WATCHMEN by Alan Moore and Dave Gibbons, 1986 ‘I’ve concentrated so far on the books that have inspired aspects of my own writing: this is the one I could never hope to emulate either in form or scope. Moore takes the tropes of superhero comics and, rather than twisting them or spoofing them, somehow evolves them, giving us a group of jaded and long-pasttheir-best caped crusaders who are actively anti-heroic; explores the implications that superpowers and the granting of moral authority would have on all-too-human figures, and ties it all into an apocalyptic fable that is at once fantastical and utterly rooted in 1980s realpolitik. At the same time he and Gibbons manage to weave in vignettes of the ordinary lives that are always going on in the background and an entirely separate narrative (about cursed pirates!) which ultimately come together in one of the most devastating moments in literature, delivered in seven entirely-wordless panels. My university dissertation was on William Blake, and my big discovery (I’m not saying it was a good dissertation) was the way his illustrations subverted and questioned the text they wove in and out of: Dave Gibbons’ illustrations do something similar here, with the added onion-skin layers that you can never fully trust any of the characters delivering the dialogue within them either.’

‘I

’m lucky to have a job in journalism that pays most of the bills. Because Private Eye is fortnightly I do one week in the office cranking out stories about politics and the media with my blood pressure rising, and then a week at home working on books until I start muttering to myself and need to get back out into the real world again.  ‘I’ve always thought of my non-fiction books as an extension of my journalism: it’s about finding interesting stories people don’t necessarily know and telling them in an entertaining and unexpected way. Beneath The Streets, my first novel (not counting the two that didn’t find publishers) is an extension of that: it explores two historical mysteries that have never been properly cleared up to anyone’s satisfaction – the attempted murder of Jeremy Thorpe’s former lover and the sudden resignation of Harold Wilson as Prime Minister – and explores a world that existed in the shadows at the time and has largely stayed there ever since: that of young gay men in the 1970s at a time when their very existence made them illegal.   ‘Like most writers, I’ve got habits that have taken on the form of rules: I don’t work weekends at all if I can help it; am fortunate

INVENTING THE VICTORIANS by Matthew Sweet, 2001 ‘This is the book that inspired me to write non-fiction. Sweet sets out his stall in his first line – Suppose that everything we think we know about the Victorians is wrong – and then proceeds to demonstrate it through a series of the sort of eyebrowraisers you find yourself filing away to surprise people with in the pub later. The gruesome origins of the phrase “Sweet Fanny Adams”; the nonsense peddled about whether Prince Albert had a Prince Albert and the fact the entire idea of prudish patriachs covering up piano legs for fear they would inspire lustful thoughts was only ever a joke are all explored via liberal quotations from a popular press that sounds surprisingly contemporary and Sweet’s own generous modern-day anecdotage: it made me realise that I was allowed to use Alan Titchmarsh and Tara-Palmer Tomkinson to demonstrate points in my biography of Victorian ultra-eccentric William Lever (The King of Sunlight) and to hell with the reviewers who would be sniffy about it. There is no point writing books for people who know everything about a topic already: you want to grab people who never realised the subject could be exciting and deliver it in a fresh and unexpected way.’

enough to have my own study nowadays but have discovered I can actually bash away at the laptop pretty much anywhere; start every day revising and editing the day before’s words; can’t work without a deadline even if it’s one I’ve set for myself, and try to get to a daily word count, but I’m not saying what it is because there’s nothing positive to be gained by anyone else measuring themselves against it. ‘One thing I will pass on: once I’ve finished the first draft of any book I put it away and do something else, for months if possible, so I can get some distance from it and then do the fun bit, which is completely ripping the thing apart. Beneath The Streets lost three chapters once I was in a position to see the wood for the trees and the ending then got a comprehensive rewrite (including resurrecting a major character) thanks to the astute suggestions of my editor Simon Edge. I’ve yet to meet a piece of writing that hasn’t ended up better as a result of another pair of eyes on it. But I think the best advice I could pass on is to ignore all the above: the only thing you need to do to be a writer is to write. Just get some bloody words on the page. Usually you find more will follow, and some of them might even be quite good.’

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2020 APRIL 2017

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UNDER THE MICROSCOPE

Under the Microscope James McCreet applies his forensic criticism to the beginning of a reader’s memoir

LEAVING HOME It was 4 am in the morning1. I kissed my two young sisters on their foreheads as they slept, knowing that I wouldn’t be coming back.2 My older sister Linda had her own room, so I never got to say goodbye.3 My mum was waiting downstairs for me, nervously pacing the floor.4 “Come on Trisha”5 she tried to whisper to me,6 so as not to wake the girls up.7 Dad would be home in an hour, after finishing his night shift.8 Outside we could hear the sound of a car purring, waiting for us.9 I looked once more at the house I loved, that was home for the last seventeen years.10 When would I see it again?11 As we drove off, I looked at my mum, who suddenly seemed ten years older.12 I felt so sad and guilty that I had caused so much trauma to my family.13 The journey was long and painful.14 We drew up at the court.15 It must have been about 9 am now.16 Entering this large building we were ushered17 into a stark room, where we had to wait for another hour or more.18 I glanced around the room at the faces staring into space or at the floor.19 Everyone looking nervous or scared.20 It was time to be called in.21 As my friend and I stood in the dock22 I suddenly realised that this was no dream.23 I heard the voices talking about me, strangers deciding my future, people who knew nothing about me and my life before now.24 About my happy childhood, my lovely sisters and mum and dad, of the street we lived in where we had neighbours who were kind.25 I was upset to hear my poor mum26 speaking up for me, saying”27 she is a good girl really ... just easily led”.28

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Patricia Roberts recently joined a memoir class and is loving it. She left school at fifteen. The story she is currently writing is about herself aged seventeen in 1965, getting in with the wrong crowd and how her life changed after living with the Salvation Army.

1

You don’t need to say ‘in the morning’ if you use ‘a.m’. There’s also an argument that beginning a story with the time doesn’t have much impact on the reader unless it’s instrumental in the story somehow. The hour itself is less compelling than the detail that comes after it.

2

This is a good line. It has subtle emotion and the teaser about not coming back. That’s an effective hook.

3

The fact of not being able to say goodbye is another emotional jab. But the comma isn’t necessary.

4

I think it’s enough if she’s pacing. You don’t need to add that she’s nervous. Why else do people pace in their own house, unless they’re practising military manoeuvres? You also needn’t say it’s on the floor; gravity dictates that other options are unlikely.

5 6

7

Again, is it necessary to mention that she whispered for this reason? We already know the others are sleeping so we can figure it out. Moreover, not saying it adds a layer of subtlety. The comma isn’t necessary.

8

This seems like a pedantic detail rather than a useful one. It’s as if you’ve thought, ‘I’d better mention the father in case the reader has been totting up family members and wondered why there’s no father.’ This is not necessarily the case. It’s a minor point. More serious is the narrative tic that has developed in this first paragraph. Every sentence but the first has a comma and then a dangling clause at the end. There shouldn’t be a comma here.

9

And here is it again: comma plus clause. There’s some confusion over whether they are outside hearing the car or inside the house. In the former case, why can they hear it but not see it if the engine is idling and the car presumably parked?

There should be a comma after ‘Trisha’.

10

If she tried to whisper, does this mean she did or she didn’t? Was it a half-whisper?

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Okay, so they’re outside. The tense should be ‘had been home’ (past perfect) because the story is narrated in past simple tense. Once more, there’s the comma/clause tic.

UNDER THE MICROSCOPE

11

The first paragraph suggested that the character was never coming back, so this seems inconsistent.

12

The sentence is a bit clumsy. The dominant clause ‘I looked at my mum’ is in a sandwich of subordinate clauses that blur the focus. In such cases, it’s better to rewrite (see the rewrite). Also, the ‘ten years older’ thing is a cliché. What is a better and more striking way of describing the complex emotions being felt by the mother?

13

This is an important line, adding context at just the right point. However, it’s somewhat heavy handed: more telling than showing. I’d omit the baldly stated feelings of guilt and sadness in favour of mentioning the trauma caused. The reader will infer how tormented the narrator is.

14

What does this mean? It was a bumpy road? What we’ve seen so far has been a largely subtle evocation of a tense situation. Shorthand such as this minimises the emotion. Feel free to add a sentence or two for the reader on how long and strained the journey really is (without stating it too obviously.)

15

A good, short punctuating sentence that brings us to the destination and also reveals what’s happening here. Very economical.

16

Is the time important to the reader? We’ve already been told it was a long journey.

17

The grammar is confusing here. It suggests they were ushered into a room as they were in the process of entering the building when in fact they had presumably entered the building beforehand. A comma after ‘building’

would have been correct but not remedied the sense.

24

As with the car journey, time is compressed here. The character would know it was an hour’s wait only after the time had passed. Better to say that the waiting period was actually unknown. That makes it more stressful.

The punctuation could be tightened in this sentence, which appears to ramble a little (see the rewrite). Moreover, is it strictly true that these people know nothing about the narrator? It seems she has done something wrong to be in court so there must be case notes. What’s truer is that they don’t know the whole story.

19

25

18

This is a nice touch but I think you could take it further. Describing the harsh utility of such waiting spaces would enhance the sense of stress and expectation.

20

But avoid stating the obvious. Describe facial expressions by all means, but let the reader infer whether it is fear or nervousness. I also wonder if there might not be a few hardened delinquents who have been there before and are not perturbed by the experience. This would provide a good comparison with the sensitive narrator. Also, the sentence is not grammatical. It’s a fragment. This is permissible (if done on purpose, at least) but the correct version would be: ‘Everyone looked...’

21

It would help the veracity of the scene if we knew exactly how the ‘calling in’ worked. A bell? A barked order? A subdued comment or gesture? All of these little details enhance the atmosphere.

22

Wait... there’s a friend, too? Why has there been no mention of this friend up until now? Weren’t they in the waiting room? Were they the car the whole time but not speaking? There should be a comma after ‘dock’.

23

There has been no suggestion so far that any of this has been a dream or dreamlike. Indeed, it’s all been very real. It reads like a cliché.

The length of the sentence is good, evoking the emotion felt by the narrator. But the structure is haphazard. Note how we begin with ‘about’ but then veer into ‘of ’. The initial ‘about’ could have done the work on its own.

26

More telling. We don’t need to be told that the narrator is upset because everything so far has underlined that. Nor does ‘poor’ help us to understand the depth of the mother’s condition. It’s just a label. Describe how she speaks, her face, her mannerisms and let us perceive that she is ‘poor’.

27

You say she’s speaking, so it’s redundant to add that she’s saying something. There should be a comma (or a colon) after ‘saying’.

28

Capital letter for ‘She’. Also, people tend to use contractions when they speak, Thus: ‘She’s.’ There are different conventions on where to put the full stop in dialogue. I prefer inside the quotation marks.

CLICK HERE

’s To read James McCreet suggested rewrite of this extract

In summary When I first saw this piece, I rejected it as a possible Microscope because I couldn’t see enough wrong with it to justify an article. It reads well and the technical errors are relatively few: mostly incorrect punctuation. But then I read it again and realised it was a missed opportunity. The idea for the scene is interesting and has a lot of potential, but that potential is lost in poorly structured sentences, vagueness and some excessive telling. It needs tightening up.

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• If you would like to submit an extract of your work in progress, send it by email, with synopsis and a brief biog, to: [email protected]

APRIL 2020

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BEN MACINTYRE

To hear an extract from Agent Zigzag

Tony Rossiter examines a writer whose true stories read like fiction

‘I

f you’re looking for a good spy thriller, I definitely recommend this,’ said a review in the Daily Express. The book was not an invented spy yarn, but a true story – Agent Zigzag. Fact can be stranger than fiction. Ben Macintyre, historian and Times journalist, has written ten meticulously researched books about adventurers and eccentrics from the world of crime and espionage. They are gripping pageturners by an author who combines the disciplines and techniques of journalism with the flair of a natural storyteller.

How he began As a child, he was a voracious reader of Enid Blyton, Ronald Welch, Marryat’s The Children of the New Forest and the children’s histories of RJ Unstead. Educated at Abingdon School and St John’s College, Oxford, he graduated in 1985 with a degree in history. He has a high regard for Moby-Dick (Herman Melville) and The Great Gatsby (Scott Fitzgerald), and favourite authors include PG Wodehouse, Evelyn Waugh, William Boyd, Robert Harris, Zadie Smith, Charles Cumming and (surprise, surprise) John le Carré. After university, Macintyre became a foreign correspondent for The Times, working in New York, Paris and Washington. Since 1996, he’s had a weekly column, writing about history, espionage, art, politics and foreign affairs. His first book, Forgotten Fatherland: The Search for Elizabeth Nietzsche (1992), was based on interviews with descendants of the bizarre Aryan colony established by

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Friedrich Nietzsche’s sister in Paraguay in 1886. When she returned to Europe she inspired the cult of her brother’s philosophy, and she later became a mentor to Hitler. Macintyre has followed this with a string of bestselling spy stories, every one of them true. I’ll concentrate on three of the most widely admired.

Agent Zigzag Published in 2007, Agent Zigzag: The True Wartime Story of Eddie Chapman: Lover, Traitor, Hero, Spy is the story of a professional criminal who became a double agent during the Second World War. It’s an extraordinary tale about a complex man who had no compunction about burglary and safe-breaking, and combined this with a love of subterfuge, adventure and daring-do heroism. Eddie Chapman was both a villain and a hero. Before the war he was a safecracker with London gangs and spent several stretches in gaol. In 1939, arrested for blowing up the safe of the Edinburgh Co-operative Society but released on bail, he fled to Jersey, where he committed yet another burglary. This resulted in two years’ imprisonment, but it spared him the fourteen-plus years he expected to receive on returning to the mainland. Following the German occupation of the Channel Islands, Chapman volunteered to spy for Germany; he had extensive training in Germanoccupied France in explosives, radio communications and espionage techniques. In December 1942, he was flown to Britain and parachuted into the Cambridgeshire countryside, tasked with sabotaging the de Havilland factory in

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Hatfield. He immediately gave himself up to the local police and offered his services to MI5. A fake sabotage attack on the de Havilland factory convinced his German handlers that Chapman had accomplished his mission, so that when he returned to France he was rewarded, inducted into the German Army as an oberleutnant and sent to teach at a spy school in Oslo. He was able to provide MI5 with extensive intelligence about the German Army. In 1944 the Germans parachuted him back into Britain to report on the accuracy of their V1 flying bombs and on development of the Royal Navy’s hedgehog anti-submarine weapon. Chapman reported that the German V1s were hitting their central London target when they were in fact undershooting and landing mainly in the south London suburbs or the Kent countryside, causing far less damage. On his return to London, Chapman again became involved with criminal gangs in the West End; and in November 1944, MI5, being unable to control him, dismissed him from their service. He was given a pay-off of £6,000 and pardoned from prosecution for his pre-war criminal activities.

A Spy Among Friends There have been several books about Kim Philby, who was recruited as a Soviet agent in 1934. One of the Cambridge Five Spy Ring unmasked many years later, he worked as a journalist before joining the Secret Intelligence Service, MI6, in 1940. Thereafter, he was a double agent, providing his Soviet controllers with reams of increasingly

© Geraint Lew is/Writer Pictur es

LISTEN TAP HERE

The tech style niqu & e of

B E AT T H E B E S T S E L L E R S

important material as he rose up the MI6 hierarchy. The focus of A Spy Among Friends (2014) is Philby’s close friendship with Nicholas Elliott, the MI6 officer whose background and education were strikingly similar to Philby’s. Following the defections in 1951 of Burgess and Maclean (Foreign Office officials who had also been recruited as Soviet agents while at Cambridge), Philby was widely suspected of being the Third Man who had tipped them off about their imminent arrest. There was no proof of his guilt, but in July 1951 he was forced to resign from MI6. However, in 1956 he was publicly exonerated and resumed his earlier career in journalism, working for the Observer and the Economist in Beirut; at the same time he was paid a retainer by MI6 and provided them (and his Soviet controllers) with ad hoc intelligence. In January 1963, he was finally exposed as a Soviet agent. He escaped from Beirut on a Russian ship that took him to Odessa, and defected to Moscow. Nicholas Elliott, his close friend, was the MI6 officer who confronted him with the evidence in Beirut. According to Macintyre, a good many intelligence officers in both London and Moscow believe that Philby’s escape was suspiciously easy and had been tacitly encouraged by MI6.

The Spy and the Traitor ‘The best true spy story I have ever read,’ said John le Carré. He was talking about Macintyre’s Cold War tale The Spy and the Traitor (2018). Oleg Gordievsky was a senior KGB officer who became a double agent and for more than a decade supplied Britain with a stream of highquality intelligence from deep inside the Soviet system. He had grown up close to the KGB (both his father and his brother were KGB officers), but became increasingly disillusioned with Soviet communism, particularly after the Red Army’s action in Czechoslovakia in 1968 which put an end to the Prague Spring. As he rose up the KGB hierarchy he took extraordinary risks, providing his British handlers with increasingly important material. The story culminates in Gordievsky’s betrayal and his recall to Moscow, followed by the activation of an escape plan (code-named Operation Pimlico), given no more than a 20% chance of success by the MI5 officer

who devised it, which enabled him to be smuggled out of Soviet Russia. The bizarre signal to put this plan into action was a plastic carrier bag printed with the red Safeway logo. The gripping escape is so out-of-this-world that Frederick Forsyth has said ‘if any spy writer were to put it in a novel it would not be believed’.

How he writes ‘The history of intelligence is opening up as never before, as more and more secret material is released into the public domain,’ says Macintyre. ‘Writing about real espionage offers an extraordinary backdrop for exploring all the concepts that fascinate us in fiction: loyalty, betrayal, friendship, politics, and love.’ In what he reads and writes, he likes discretion and modesty, and has ‘an affection for the stiff upper lip, the emotion unvoiced, the desire undeclared’. Detailed, painstaking research is at the heart of Macintyre’s books. In 2001, MI5 began the selective release to the National Archives of previously classified information that could not damage national security or embarrass anyone still living. These declassified archives include hundreds of pages of documents relating to Eddie Chapman, and these provided Macintyre with much of the raw material for Agent Zigzag. They included reports, descriptions, diagrams, internal memos, minutes, letters, photographs, transcripts of interrogations and wireless intercepts. These gave Macintyre information not only about events and people in the Chapman case, but also about the minutiae of a spy’s life: Chapman’s handlers set out to paint a complete picture of the man, including his feelings, hopes, fears and contradictions. For Macintyre, this was a treasure trove of high-quality material. The second stage of Macintyre’s preparation is to talk to as many appurtenant people as possible. For Agent Zigzag he interviewed and tapped into the memories of dozens of people in Britain, France, Germany and Norway who had been touched, either directly or indirectly, by Chapman’s exploits (some of these sources are named, while others wished to remain anonymous). For The Spy and the Traitor, Macintyre made good use of the extended interviews he was able to have with Gordievsky. When it came to A Spy Among Friends,

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LISTEN TAP HERE To hear an extract from The Spy and the Traitor

Macintyre said, ‘being able to explore Kim Philby’s abandoned and derelict apartment in Beirut was probably the most atmospheric moment of the research process. I stood on the balcony, pitted with bullet holes from Lebanon’s civil war, from which he signalled his Soviet controller that he needed to flee. The next day, he absconded to Moscow.’ Macintyre had no access to MI6’s files about Philby, but he was able to speak to more than a dozen current or former intelligence officers. Although MI6 did not help him in any material way, they did not stop him. Surprisingly, he was also able to talk to several former KGB officers who were, he said, ‘pretty straight’ and keen to tell their side of the story. The subjects of all these three books – Eddie Chapman, Kim Philby and Oleg Gordievsky – produced autobiographies. But with their omissions, distortions, inaccuracies and inventions, none of these can compete with the true stories of Ben Macintyre.

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W H AT ’ S O N

Back soon!

Writers considering self publishing, head for the 8th Self-Publishing Conference at the University of Leicester on 25 April. The one-day conference is the UK’s only dedicated event for self publishers, with workshops, panels, seminars, and an appearance by bestselling author Sophie Hannah. Website: https:// selfpublishingconference.org.uk/

A half-day workshop from New Writing South for emerging crime writers on 4 April in Brighton, Delving into the Dark Side: What Crime Writers Need to Know About Research, with Sue Walker demonstrates how effective research can ing, enhance all aspects of your crime writ to ngs setti ting crea and ting from plot character development and more. Website: https://writ.rs/darkside

ere h w me ever o s Go ’ ve n you been 42

APRIL 2020

A guided retreat aims to unleash your creativity at Plane Castle in Stirling from 3 to 5 April with yoga from Braxton and writing guidance from author Angie Spoto. Website: www.yogaganesh.co.uk/ writingretreat

The author of acclaimed novel The Confessions of Frannie Langton, Sara Collins leads a Spread Your Word masterclass, Structuring and Editing Your Novel, in London on 4 April. Website: https://writ.rs/ saracollinswshop

Away from your desk

Shelley Weiner leads a TLC Fiction Masterclass, Finding Your Voice: Putting It on the Page, Sustaining Momentum, with particular emphasis on opening and endings at the Free Word Centre in London on 25 April. Website: https://writ.rs/tlcpage

Get out of your garret for some upcoming activities and places to visit

The acclaimed author and cultural commentator Rebecca Solnit will be discussing her new memoir about her formative years as a writer and feminist in San Francisco, Recollections of My Nonexistence, at Tyneside Cinema on 31 March. Website: https://writ.rs/solnit

Poet Anita John will be leading a Wildlife Writing Workshop for RSPB Scotland Loch Leven on 22 March for writers wanting inspiration from the sights and sounds of Loch Leven in springtime. Website: https://writ.rs/ writingwildlife

KA SPAR DE A! I NE W www.writers-online.co.uk

W H AT ’ S O N

Legacy Centre of Excellence in Aston celebrates black authors across all genres of literature on 25 April at the Black British Book Festival. writ.rs/bbbf https:// : Website

Events and activities to encourage children to read for pleasure at Blackburn Library for Blackburn Children’s Literature Festival from 23 to 25 April. Website: https://blackburncrf.com/

Cambridge Literary Festival’s spring edition takes place between 16 and 19 April and includes a Climate Crisis series of events guest curated by Caroline Lucas MP, including a talk with The Uninhabitable Earth author David Wallace-Wells. Website: www.cambridgeliteraryfestival.com

The prolific and much-loved author Alexander McCall Smith will discuss his career in A Celebration of a Writing Life, at the Sheldonian Theatre in Oxford on 3 April as part of the Oxford Literary Festival. Website: https:// oxfordliteraryfestival.org/

Historian Jill Liddington, whose research inspired the BBC /HBO series Gentleman Jack, traces Anne Lister’s story through the lens of LGBT+ history at Writing Anne Lister: An LGBT+ History, at the Portico Library in Manchester on 30 April. Website: https://writ.rs/ writingannelister

d o o e g ere!! m So s h a ide

The Spring School at Newcastle Centre for the Literary Arts (30 Mar-3 Apr) presents Bodies of Evidence: Life Writing and the Material World, a week of intense creative practice tutored by JohnPaul Flintoff, Cal Flyn, Daisy Hay (pictured) and Rachel Hewitt, focusing on using objects, bodies and places to tell the stories of human lives. Website: https://writ.rs/ nclabodiesofevidence

er ’s t i r W e!? t a d e coffe Join the double Booker winner Hilary Mantel as she launches the third novel in her Tudor trilogy, The Mirror and the Light at a Literature Live event in Manchester on 19 April hosted by Kamila Shamsie. Website: https://writ.rs/ eveningwithhilarymantel

T h is lo o ks g r eat !

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APRIL 2020

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WRITERS’ CIRCLES

TESTING times Have your characters got themselves stuck in a situation? Julie Phillips suggests testing what they’re capable of by placing them in alternative realities in this group exercise

W

e’ve all heard of authors who say that their characters have taken over the page. You may have even experienced it yourself. Instead of doing what the author wants, they go rogue and the author has no choice but to go with them. The story, they say, is almost always better for it. But what if our writing puts our characters in a place or situation where they and the writer are at a loss at how to proceed? They languish there, in limbo, shrugging their shoulders in an awkward silence, neither advancing the story or setting the scene. It’s the equivalent of the nautical doldrums. This month’s workshop is all about finding ways to give your characters the tools they need to deliver the reader the full-bodied reading experience they deserve. It’s about giving them the impetus and forward momentum to not only tell their story, but to tell it well. Your characters and readers will thank you for it. The first activity for your group is to make up a character and put them in a situation where they are a fish out of water. For example, a seventy-year-old,

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retired bricklayer being put in charge of an office whose workforce are all under twenty. Or a 25 year old fast-tracked woman who was the manager of a large distribution company, suddenly finding herself as an assistant, with no authority, in a local school, whose colleagues are all over 50. How do they react? Can they cope? Think about how they might have found themselves in those situations in the first place, as this will give you a clue as to how they may behave as a consequence. Do they blame themselves or someone else? What might be the difficulties they are faced with? It might be that they both feel frustrated because they are suddenly having to take charge and make decisions or they are enraged, having to bite their tongue, because they can no longer tell people what to do. This would more than likely lead to conflict in both the workplaces. Conflict equals story, but just because there is a story there doesn’t mean it will reach its full potential unless the characters are given something by the writer to work with. To help the group to do this, ask them www.writers-online.co.uk

to read out what they found to the rest of the group. Then try to relate it to their own experience and/or the characters in their current writing. Where they have come to a standstill, use the exercise to consider where their characters are in the story. If they don’t have any ideas they could work with someone who has. Ask them to think about why they think their characters are stuck. What happened earlier in the story that has led them to this stalemate? Where are they trying to lead their characters and what do the characters think about this? Are their characters behaving or does the writer have a mutiny on their hands? Next, task the group to take their characters out of their current situation/ sticking point and place them in a different setting with different issues. Are they using the right side of the character that will pull out their full potential or are the characters just coasting along being boring in their boring little world? If they are in the middle of the countryside would placing them in a bustling city up the ante, or vice versa? Have the group considered changing the ages of the characters or their social backgrounds? Perhaps thinking more about their motivations and what they want would help. What about the psychology of your characters? Are they currently inhabiting the correct headspace to be able to capture and keep the attention of the reader? Do we care enough about them to want to keep with them and read on? Perhaps putting them in different situations where they can exercise different facets of their personality will bring out the right combination of traits so that your character can fight their way out of any situation you throw at them. Finally, make a group list of what the group members have leaned about the process that was helpful so that you can use it for future reference. By trying out different situations or places you can challenge your character so that you can test how they react to new stimuli or conflicts which gives you a fuller picture of who they are, their motives, what drives them and how far they can be pushed. Placing your characters in alternative realities can stretch them into a more rounded and interesting persona that improves the overall structure and feeling of your book, turning the mediocre to the extraordinary.

WRITERS’ CIRCLES

CIRCLES’ ROUNDUP If your writing group would like to feature here, whether you need new members, have an event to publicise or to suggest tips for other groups, email Tina Jackson, [email protected] ASA

SPOTLIGHT ON… WESSEX WRITERS regularly to a writing magazine. Each month we share our latest news and any writing problems – there is always sufficient to keep us going. If someone has submitted a manuscript (previously to this meeting) this is given a careful critique. Then we discuss chosen topics in some depth before a final airing of suggestions for our free monthly e-magazine, The Voice. Group members (and subscribers to the e-magazine) contribute to The Voice, an exciting project our chairperson launched. The e-magazine, like our group, covers a variety of areas and ideas for both readers and writers: a literary quiz, writing skills, book recommendations, biographies and interesting quotations and snippets of information. Useful information, such as current competitions, is often included. It is open to innovation and new subscribers. Wessex Writers meets once a month in a Bournemouth hotel If you are interested in joining our list of subscribers (it’s free to discuss writing and books, supporting each other and with no obligations!) please contact Robin Dynes, our editor, on enjoying a cappuccino or a glass of wine at the same time, [email protected] writes Andrea Emblin. To find out more about Wessex Writers visit our website Although a small group, we are an eclectic one, ranging from a children’s writer, young adult, adult fiction, a variety of non-fiction www.wessexvoice.co.uk. To enquire about joining the group contact [email protected]. and short stories for magazines. Two of our members contribute

The Novel Pool We are a small group who meet fortnightly on Thursdays to discuss our work, writes Helen Cormack. We grew out of writing class which we all attended. When that closed, we decided to keep meeting – and that was five years ago. Our ‘process’ is that we nominate three people to prepare submissions for the next meeting. The weekend before we meet, we circulate this work. This gives everyone time to review and critique the submissions before the meeting. On the evening itself, we all have our say on each piece and suggest amendments, always in a spirit of constructive criticism, which the author is free to incorporate or ignore. Submissions vary from short poetry for children to sections of full length novels and everything in between. As a group, we also keep informed about events and competitions around the country, both at our meetings and through our private Facebook page. We have all travelled to retreats, readings and literary salons when the topics have been of interest to us. Instead of a Christmas night out, we have a New Year dinner where we have a secret Santa. Each member is allocated another and is charged with buying them a suitable book, based on their interests. This is a great cause for hilarity and also much gratitude when the book exactly suits its new owner.

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LEAKEY PENS GO INTO PRINT The Leakey Pens, East Leake’s group for writers, has just published its second yearbook, with the help of Rick Wood, a long-standing member and best-selling author, writes Johnson. Sandra Johnson The book, available on Amazon, contains 120 pages of original fiction and poetry, all of which, says founding member Paul Haynes, would not have existed but for the group.

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SAU B S C R I B E R S P OT L I G H T

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Share your writing success stories. If you subscribe to Writing Magazine and would like to feature here, email Tina Jackson, [email protected]

AN IDEA A DAY

Bowled over by book two ‘I self-published my first novel, Strong Undercurrents, in 2015 and have recently self-published my second.’ writes subscriber Carolyn Bartley. ‘I did try to find an agent interested in publishing my second book – Love Before Wicket – but as I had no interest, I decided to publish anyway. ‘Despite the work involved in self-publishing – a lot of self-promotion and self-publicity – I feel that it is worth the effort to see one’s work in print. As my previous publisher was no longer available, I searched online for another local company that was able to produce a number of hard copies as well as providing an e-version to sell online. Cardiff-based firm, Jelly Bean Books, were able to offer all the services I required, including a great edit and exactly the book cover I wanted. ‘The idea for the novel came from various articles I kept coming across about men having a mid-life crisis, so I thought it would be fun to write about a woman having one. Love Before Wicket is a warm, witty and wry look at marriage in middle age – the ties that bind, and the temptations that can lead us astray. ‘My local bookstore, Griffin Books, is incredibly supportive and held a recent book launch, which was well attended. My work now is to contact local press and other organisations to let them know about the book. Most of all, hopefully readers will spread the word that the story brings something new to how some women might manage to succeed at married life.’ 46

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‘All writers need ideas,’ says WM subscriber and contributor Patsy Collins. ‘We need topics and themes, prompts to get started and a little encouragement to keep going. New writers may be wondering where to begin, daunted by a blank page and want help to transform thoughts into fiction. Even the most experienced have dry periods when ideas don’t flow, or times when they appreciate a push to try something different. ‘These methods are proven to work. Each of the daily sets of prompts in this book have been used in some way, to create my own work. I need a lot of ideas: I’ve completed five novels, co-written From Story Idea to Reader (an accessible guide to writing fiction) and produced nineteen collections of themed short stories, averaging two dozen per book. Hundreds and hundreds of my short stories have been published – mainly in women’s magazines. I blogs, write articles, win competitions and I’m always working on something new. ‘Whether you’re a new writer, or a more experienced one temporarily out of ideas, have hours to fill or just five free minutes, you’ll find something in this book to help get you writing – every day of the year. A Year of Ideas is available as an ebook for £2.50 and paperback at £6, from her website: https://patsycollins.uk/

Doing the write thing ‘I retired only to be constantly asked, “What did you do before?”’ writes subscriber SE Morgan. ‘As if what I am now is irrelevant. I’m categorised as a retiree, end of. ‘My ambition was always to write. Lack of time was no longer a viable excuse. For the first time since O levels I took up my pen creatively, (well keyboard obviously) and began. It was hard, very hard. My previous career helped a little, but not much. Inevitably you’re still wondering; I was a doctor and civil servant. ‘Writing Magazine, books and internet courses were indispensable, as was joining a writers’ circle. Cardiff Circle gave me motivation, honest feedback on what I was doing wrong and encouragement. Listening to others read, hearing how well most wrote, reflecting on what would strengthen their work taught me even more. ‘My novel From Waterloo To Water Street, set in 1843 Carmarthenshire, is historical fiction and researching it was a joy. I immersed myself in online newspapers from the period, re-read Mill on the Floss and studied accounts by ordinary soldiers as well as diaries and Royal Commission reports on the Rebecca uprising. I visited villages and Carmarthen, used old maps, census details, the National Archive, and drew on verbal family history. It is truly amazing how much you can find online or order from your local library. ‘After eighteen months of endless redrafting and editing, it’s finally published. My tale is told. Now I say I’m a novelist, no more retiree questions! Website: https://semorganhistoricalfiction.wordpress.com

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Plotting the crime

AN HISTORIC ADVENTURE ‘After over 22 years in the writing, including two major reworkings (and a lot of minor edits!), The Raided Heart finally hit the electronic shelves on 15 November 2019,’ writes subscriber Jennifer C Wilson. ‘Not only is it great to have simply finished the book, I’m delighted that it’s also going down so well. ‘The Raided Heart is a historical romantic adventure, set in the harsh world of the border reivers, on the English-Scottish border. The reivers were a hardy bunch, who left us phrases such as “bereaved” and “blackmail”, and following Meg and Will on their journey has been as thrilling as running from a successful raid. ‘And the icing on this writing cake? In early December, I discovered it had been awarded Bronze in The Coffee Pot Book Club’s Book of the Year Awards Historical Romance category, as run by Mary Anne Yarde. ‘With this being my first “traditional” historical fiction, with no ghosts or timeslip to hide behind, I’m obviously over the moon with the news, and am already working on the second in this new “Historic Hearts” collection, published through Ocelot Press. Amazon Author Page: https://writ.rs/jennifercwilson

‘I’m like Donna Tartt, but without the same degree of either talent or fame,’ writes subscriber Jacquelynn Luben. ‘But, now, with my sixth book just coming off the press, I have to confess it is around ten years since I completed my last novel. ‘Lost Innocents is my first crime novel. ‘I read it out at my writing circle, and listened to the members’ suggestions. I worked my way through each set of comments. At the rate of a thousand words a fortnight, it took a long time to read out the whole book. Then I realised I wanted to adjust the structure to make it more suspenseful. It meant changing around the first third of the book, and when I’d done that, I wanted to know if it worked. Three writers read it through and made suggestions, and again I read carefully through the comments, at the same time as rereading it at the writers’ circle. ‘A year ago, I took a break from it, and brought out a book for small children, What Grandpa did next. But then it was back to the novel for more editing, revising, correcting and so on. When I read an article a few months ago (Moving on by Sophie Beal, WM May 19), which talked about an author’s reluctance to let go, I recognised myself. ‘Lost Innocents was written in a very different way from my genealogical novel, Tainted Tree. That book more or less “wrote itself”, to use an author’s cliché. When I started Lost Innocents, I only had an idea for a starting point, and didn’t really have a destination. I thought of it as a cliff face, in which, each time I went back to it, I had to chip out another foothold and climb up from it. That was the second reason why it took me so long. The first was that, initially, I couldn’t think of any story at all. ‘But that’s in the past now. The work has all been done, and for better or for worse, my crime novel is ready to face an audience. ‘Lost Innocents is published by Goldenford Publishers Ltd.’ Website: www.goldenford.co.uk

WE’LL HELP YOU SELL YOUR BOOK! Don’t miss your exclusive chance to feature on our website,

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PLUS When you’re sending in submissions to appear on those pages, feel free to send us any additional content you have available. Whether it’s an interview video, book trailer, podcast, audio extract or anything else, we’ll give you as much exposure as we can through our digital edition and website. As ever, send your details to [email protected] www.writers-online.co.uk

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BIG NOVEL WIN ‘A thrilling day for a thriller writer!’, writes subscriber David Laws. ‘I’ve just had a huge confidence boost with the announcement that my third novel, The Maze Kids, has won the 2019 Yeovil Literary Prize for novels. ‘The story, about a young teacher’s attempt to rescue 27 orphans from Nazi Germany in the midst of war, has yet to find a publisher, but as a result of the competition I have high hopes for it. ‘I was honoured to visit the Yeovil Literary Festival in November to attend a gathering of winners (other categories included short stories and poetry) and to give a reading from the manuscript. ‘The novel prize, which comes with a handsome cheque, won praise from the judge, author Vaseem Khan, who said: “I loved the concept. The idea of a band of dispossessed children hiding out in Nazi Germany, in danger of discovery and of being shot, imprisoned or sent to the concentration camps, and the daring rescue attempt to save them. ‘“This is a book that works on many levels: as a thriller, an old-fashioned adventure yarn, a wartime escape story, a historical account, and a romance... it grabbed me by the throat from its opening pages and drew me in.” ‘The Maze Kids follows two previous thriller novels – Munich, The Man Who Said No! (Mr Chamberlain, Munich and all that) and Exit Day (Brexit, spies and conspiracy) which were self-published this year at last under the Troubador imprint. ‘Writing, as everyone knows, is a lonely business afflicted by doubt and frustration in the struggle to become published. This to me is a landmark event cancelling out all the reversals of the past and a great encouragement for the future. I’m now working full blast on novel No 4 about a suffragette aviator.’

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DYSTOPIAN REIMAGININGS ‘The dramatic North East countryside provides the inspiration for my third novel, Awakening,’ writes subscriber Chris Ord. ‘I accepted voluntary redundancy from Gateshead Council in August 2015. Having left a job of fifteen years in education policy, I wrote my debut, Becoming. ‘Following its success, I caught the writing bug and set about writing the follow-up, Awakening. However, things didn’t quite unfold as I intended. ‘My plan was Becoming would be a series. But after writing about half of Awakening I wasn’t happy with the story so I decided to set it to one side and work on something else.’ ‘This different focus led to the publication of my second novel, supernatural thriller The Storm. But it wasn’t long before the story of Gaia and her adventure began to dominate my thoughts once more. ‘Writing a sequel can be daunting. Awakening has definitely been my most difficult book to write so far. At the same time, it is also my most rewarding, and as with everything in life, the greater the struggle, the more you appreciate the achievement.’ ‘I’ve had a lot of fun with this book. There are the usual twists and turns, and as ever I like to keep my readers guessing until the final page. There are also some familiar local places, reimagined as dark, dystopian settings. I’m excited about this book, and hope readers will love it too.’ ‘I’m working on ideas for the third book in the Becoming series entitled Reckoning. ‘I loved climbing back inside the heads of the characters and immersing myself in their world again. They’re all still floating around in there and the next book is developing already.’ Website: http://chrisord.wixsite.com/chrisord

On the activity trail ‘I wrote Step Away from the Sofa as part of my ongoing mission to divorce people from their sofas,’ writes subscriber Ellie Kennedy. ‘I wanted to show ladies (I can only write from a female point of view!) that there is a whole world of doing and being out there. ‘Each chapter covers one activity, some of which I’ve experienced myself and some that are beckoning to me from my growing bucket list. Swimming with whale sharks currently tops the list. ‘I’ve written about bungee jumping, combing the Egyptian Desert looking for preDynastic rock art and facing down Anne Robinson on The Weakest Link. ‘After learning how Scrivener, the book writing software, worked I formatted my book for Kindle and self-published on Amazon. ‘Shortly after publication I decided to follow my own advice again and I upped sticks, sold everything and with my seventeen-year-old rescue cat Poppy and the help of an ageing Renault Megane I towed a caravan nicknamed “The Catavan” around the UK. I met some amazing people along the way and acquired several caravanning skills such as wiring up solar panels, using a remote to park the ‘van and driving around roundabouts without endangering unsuspecting road users. ‘I currently have a few notebooks filled with my jottings from the journey and I hope to publish The Big Girls’ Guide to Caravanning very soon, possibly followed by The Big Girls’ Guide on What to do with a Great White Shark! However these ideas are currently competing with the urge to write a crime novel as an open prison close to me has just opened a cafe on site for the public to use. It’s got plugs for laptops and free wifi and just begs for crime novelists to come in and write.’

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SWWJ, STORIES AND SUCCESSES ‘I am a long-time subscriber,’ writes Sylvia Kent. ‘Bought my first copy in 1993. I’ve loved Writing Magazine since your earliest days, particularly when I won your Freelance Writer of the Year title in 1997 and a few years later, the Community Cup writing about my Brentwood Writers’ Circle. We are one of the oldest writing groups in Britain with membership hovering around sixty members during our almost eighty years. ‘Along my path of writing freelance articles on a multitude of different topics for more than seventy-odd magazine titles, I eventually plumped for Essex history, writing weekly newspaper columns for Newsquest; then longer features for Archant glossies while still working for Hansard in both Parliamentary Chambers parttime. Eventually I was offered a book contract by The History Press and produced Voices of Brentwood. ‘As vice president and archivist to the Society of Women Writers and Journalists (and now a Fellow), plus vice president of Brentwood Writers’ Circle, I’ve just seen my twelfth title Brentwood in 50 Buildings

published, this time, by Amberley Publishing, so in twenty years or so of writing books, I’ve come full circle. ‘I love research, but the publisher’s brief including selecting, photographing and finding the “back stories” to each structure was challenging. I had to fit the work into my current writing schedule which includes monthly radio writing programmes via BBC Essex and Phoenix 98fm, plus weekly online feature for the local press. Blogs are intriguing and I’ve written one since 2005/6 with around eight posts per month – all about writing and linked topics, and although this absorbs much time, my page views are climbing – currently 345,000 worldwide. ‘Now, I’m on the marketing trail and have been invited to carry out book signings in local bookshops, Christmas events, even our local brewery (I used to write about winemaking), so an even busier time ahead. Must learn to pace myself. ‘Creating short stories has always interested me but paid freelance work took precedence, but now I’m studying your listings of forthcoming competitions covering all genres. Recently, I’ve heard that one of my stories has come first in the SWWJ John Walter Salver Competition. Delighted!’

ipt r c s u n a m r u o y s e o D ? e y e t r e p x e n a d e e n has a critiquing service that will work with you to get your book in the best possible shape. “The feedback from my tutor was excellent. It was expertly considered, thorough and honest. She has given me lots of ideas on how I can improve my writing technique, the plot and the story itself. It has helped me to reflect on the characters more, analysing their motivations and behaviour. Most of all it has given me the confidence to pursue writing my romance novel as now I can clearly see its potential.” Dawn R, Liverpool

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P O E T RY WO R K S H O P

AT 7 am I watch your car pull away with barely a sound, gliding into traffic, a huge, white swan , no ripples in its wake. You don’t look back— no final glimpse, no wave farewell. You leave me, standing, rain soaked, on this dirty pavement, in this dirty town at 7 am. I heave my rucksack, roll its burden across shoulders too tired to care and raw pain stabs. You’ve gone – reversing into your old life with easy confi dence, while I, in battered, toe-scuffed boots, inch my way forward, alone.

e c a l p & Time

Alison Chisholm explores the way a poem can capture a particular moment in time

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ome poems create their impact by doing nothing more than examining a moment in time. They look at it through the senses and resonances that give colour to life, and fix it for their readers as much as for their writer. The perfect example of this is Adlestrop by Edward Thomas. A train stopped – and the day and the station were immortalised when the moment was fixed geographically and by season, described in images of sight, sound and, by implication, smell. The same technique animates At 7 am, by Marian Cleworth of St Helens, Merseyside. The title fixes the time, text pinpoints the location, and the narrator’s situation is communicated via images of sight, sound and touch. The scene is urban instead of rural, and the poem relies on slant rather than full rhyme, but there is a definite echo between the two pieces. Marian has delighted in poetry all her life, and tells how, when she was only seven, ‘my teacher used to read us poems every afternoon. I was spellbound. The rhythm and flow of words and sounds in each poem excited me – I used to long to hear more. I soon began to ask my parents for poetry books!’ That early love of poetry never abated, and, like so many of us, she started writing her own poetry as a teenager and has never stopped. Her preferred form takes metre and rhyme, but

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she appreciates the value of listening to the poem and the way it wants to be written. On this occasion, free verse was the obvious medium. The poet explains: ‘I chose free verse to give the poem more weight and greater impact. It meant that I could vary line length and repeat certain phrases to emphasise the emotion. I wanted the reader to feel the weight of that rucksack and the stab of the pain... but to know that even with everything stashed against you, you can still move forward.’ The best free verse has two features: careful lineation and plenty of slant rhymes. When there is no set line length, the line should break naturally at the end of a phrase, rather than with an awkward severing at an illogical point. Here, phrasing and line breaks work beautifully together. It’s also desirable to end each line with a strong, specific word, not a ‘worker-bee’ word such as the or in. Again, that practice has been followed, with words like swan, farewell, pavement and rucksack placed at the line’s end, its strongest point, taking advantage of the extra hint of emphasis the positioning affords them. Slant rhyme weaves its way through the text. In the centre is the repetition of dirty while the title, an integral part of any poem, is repeated half way through. The alliteration in the opening lines of watch/with/white/wake/wave makes use of the sustained semi-vowel sound of the w, while the consonance of

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P O E T RY WO R K S H O P

Poetry in practice final/farewell, wake/back and wave/leave tightens the mesh of the poem’s sounds. Assonance in wake/wave/pavement, rolled/ shoulders/old and into/in/inch creates another strand of slant rhyme. Each of these examples on its own would slip by unnoticed, as a mere coincidence of pronunciation, while the combination demonstrates that the sound links are intentional, and gives the reading a more cohesive feel. The message of the poem has a subtle underlining in the fact that it is told through the use of you and I, while the word we never occurs. From its start, this poem describes a moment of rejection, and the drab scenario highlights the point. The initial idea to write the poem came in a very ordinary way, proving that we don’t have to be galvanised by the Muse in order to be creative. It’s just a case of keeping the mind open to every possibility, employing the magic phrase ‘What if…?’ in any circumstance. Marian tells just how it happened: ‘Having been given a lift early one morning into the city centre to catch a train, I was dropped off in a convenient but less than salubrious street round the back of the station. It was a place which made me feel very much alone... and vulnerable, which in turn triggered memories of loss, of parting with friends, of journeying alone. How awful it would be to be abandoned in that street by someone who didn’t care. I dug deep into the well of emotion. Then came the idea.’ The poet goes on to say that the first rough draft had presented itself by the time she boarded her train, although it took rather longer for the poem to be completed. The important thing is to record the idea in note form – or more usefully, in draft form. When the poem’s time is ripe, it’s much easier to go back to a contemporaneous draft, however sketchy, than to try to recall an event and the feelings associated with it, and construct the piece from scratch. This poem was first tried out at the local writers’ club Marian Cleworth had joined in the early 1990s, and she is grateful for the initial support, confidence and guidance she received from its more experienced members. Not only is it helpful to get feedback on an emerging poem, but the reading aloud in public indicates areas where anything doesn’t flow well or sound right. Gauging the impact of your work on others can show where further revision is required. Having the opportunity to develop and hone this particular poem with the background of a supportive group helped the poet to win first prize in a club competition with At 7 am, something she was too modest to mention in her initial comments. Her final words are sheer gold for any poet, so they stand as a message to us all. ‘The profound joy of being a writer is owning that special file you keep tucked away at the back of your mind – the one which stores all those experiences in life, good and bad, which may one day come in useful for writing. Sometimes you hardly know it is there, but, closely connected to the deep emotion of your heart and to the pull of your memory, it gives you the power to overlay experience with ideas. That’s what happened with this poem.’ www.writers-online.co.uk

Plan a new poem round the months of the year with Doris Corti

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t doesn’t matter what month it is or what the weather is like – a poet can write about any of that. As an example, take the first six months of the year, January to June, then write a line for each one of these. Think of an image you can use for each one as in the following: January sun is a nudge on your back February is a slow, cold walk March is a crisp choir singing April can be sunlight and tears May a brightness of buds June soft sun and breezes

Having thought of six images for the months, there are several options about what might happen next. You may decide to work on just one of these images. For instance, you might choose to use the January image just as it is here, or you might write your own image for that month What about leaving the word January out, and simply start your poem with the image for the sun: Sun is a nudge on your back. Take the ideas singly, or what about using all the images in one poem? If this idea doesn’t appeal, write after plucking a few words from one of the lines as in a crisp choir singing... These are from my image about the month of March. A crisp choir singing could start a poem about listening to birdsong, or you would possibly write another poem using the words from my June image: Soft sun and breezes... You could write a poem putting all these months together and extend it so that the whole year is covered. This might make a suitable birthday present for a friend or maybe a fellow poet? If none of this is appealing, what about writing about a memory relating to one of these months? It might be when you were on holiday and it was a hot month or, completely opposite, it could be about the time in a cold month when the trains or buses let you down. Or perhaps the car wouldn’t start and you arrived late for work. A poem written on these lines could be tragic or perhaps humorous? Many poets have written about the months and described some aspects of them in imagery. Take a look through any poetry anthology and you will see many.

Exercises • Use a rhyme pattern and write about a violent storm in summer. • In a series of unrhymed couplets write about a night in February. DECEMBER APRIL 2018 2020

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Grasmere from the Rydal Road 1786 by Francis Towne, photo by Birmingham Museums Trust on Unsplash

t a e r g T he c i t n a Rom There is much, much more to William Wordsworth than daffodils, says Alison Chisholm as she launches WM’s poetry competition in his honour

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illiam Wordsworth was born in Cockermouth, on the north west fringe of the Lake District, on 7 April, 1770, so to mark his 250th anniversary the next Writing Magazine poetry competition will honour him. He is known for his autobiographical tour de force The Prelude, for numerous odes, sonnets and lyrical pieces, but especially for a single poem concerning a walk taken with his sister one spring, I wandered lonely as a Cloud. This is regarded as the most famous poem in the English language, and the version we know today is rooted in Dorothy Wordsworth’s journal entry of 15 April 1802, drafted in 1804, revised and amended, and including input from the poet’s wife, Mary Hutchinson. There’s a lot more to Wordsworth than daffodils. His childhood adventures, the loss of his mother when he was seven and his father a few years later, his trips abroad and the birth of his daughter in France, his relationship with his siblings and fellow poets, his reactions to the railway, marriage and family, his eventual acceptance of the laureateship… all of these, and a kaleidoscope of experiences during a long life, provide material for stunning poems. The competition is for poems that look at any aspect of Wordsworth’s life and career, or at any of his writing. You do not have to be fixed in his 1770-1850 lifespan. The way history has placed the poet, the industry that’s grown around him and the joy or horror of

‘doing Wordsworth’ for school exams extend the contest’s range still further. This gives enormous breadth, and challenges writers to draw on the vastness of their imagination in order to offer fresh slants on well-documented topics, or new comments on the poems. Think of all the other people preparing their entries at the same time. What will make yours stand out from the crowd, insisting its message to the adjudicator? Unless a specific topic is burning in your mind and demands to be written, it would be a good idea to steep yourself in the source material, re-reading Wordsworth or learning new facts about him, until ideas for your entry start to formulate. Whatever clings to your imagination has the potential to trigger a new piece of writing, and sometimes you can be lucky enough to find inspiration for two, three, four or a dozen new poems. It’s worth pursuing every avenue offered. Attempting a few different ideas will help you to focus on the one that intrigues you the most, as well as giving you the opportunity to develop the others in the future. Your poem can be in any form. You may choose one of Wordsworth’s own favourites, anything from the blank verse of The Prelude to Petrarchan sonnets using his own variants in the sestet. You may prefer to work in free verse or a more recently developed form. As long as the pattern and content of the piece fit well together, there is no limit to the range of options. During the actual writing, give yourself entirely to the poem as it emerges. Switch www.writers-online.co.uk

off the phone, ignore the doorbell, resist any distractions. If you can manage to get the complete first draft down in a single session of writing, a unity of voice is inevitable. The poem will have a cohesion that is remarkably difficult to achieve if it’s written in fits and starts with conversations and interruptions in between. Newly written poems benefit from a resting period, so if time allows try to set your fresh piece aside for a while before you complete your revisions and then submit. If time is tight, even a single day to let it settle between one check and the next is useful. It’s surprising how a fresh reading the morning after the poem was created can reveal tiny flaws that you then have a chance to correct, or opportunities to tweak a word or phrase and make it more compelling. One of the joys of adjudicating a poetry competition is that you never have any idea of what the winning poem will be like, or the angle it will take. You can simply be sure that it will be good, to earn its top place over all the other entries submitted. It will have been devised with imagination, developed with flair and revised meticulously. It is likely to be rich in imagery and compelling in vocabulary choices. It will probably have an interesting title, use language grammatically, and be punctuated with accuracy. Without a doubt, it will grip you and remain with you for the next day, the next year, maybe your whole lifetime. If you can write that poem, send it in with confidence. Good luck. APRIL 2020

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Getting festive The WM poets really captured a sense of seasonal magic in their Christmas Poetry competition entries, says judge Alison Chisholm

WINNER: GILL HAWKINS

The Magic of... I am the shine on red berries, the smart left by spiked holly leaves. The stickiness clinging to fingers from sap of a pine scented tree. I am the crumple of paper, the flourish when ribbons are tied; the elegant touch a bow gives and shape of a gift that’s disguised. I am the sparkle on tinsel, the two coloured candy cane tist. The tremble inside when you steal a long promised mistletoe kiss. I am a shimmer on streamers, the chasing pulsating of lights. The aura surrounding a star and wonder that fills up this night. I am the wide-eyed excitement; the heartbeat of anticipation, the one final sleep until Santa, space in a stocking that’s waiting. I am a warm spiced aroma, the flicker that’s firelight glow. The quiver of eyelash that catches a stellate shaped crystal of snow. I am encompassing silence, the breath that gives voice to a choir. The second before midnight chimes tumble through belfry and spire.

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art of the pleasure of judging a competition is the thrill of anticipation when the parcel arrives. How many entries will there be? (Never possible to know.) Will they all be clamouring to be the winner, or will they be a lacklustre set? The good news is that nothing that arrived for the Christmas poetry competition could be described as lacklustre. Maybe that’s because everyone has opinions and memories regarding the festival, as well as tales of the perfect and the worst Christmas, parties and disasters, rows and laughter, still-frozen turkeys and overboiled sprouts. Christmas is also a time when emotions are highly charged. Every joy is multiplied, but every pain is more severe. It’s difficult to be jolly when your heart is breaking, and there were poems of sheer anguish among the entries. It’s a special accomplishment to write a poem and enter it in a competition when you are in a state of suffering. It’s worth remembering that doing so has a double benefit. It honours the situation you are grieving, and provides you with the healing effect of creativity, a special therapy. There were plenty of quirky entries, such as the Christmas tree-shaped calligramme, the excesses of the French chef, the voice of the stable, and the meeting and conversation between Jesus Christ and Santa Claus. There were poems about cards and presents, food and drink, decorations and entertainments, Advent and aftermath, sparse times and plentiful, past and present Christmases. There were free verse poems, rhymed couplets, sonnets, a rubai, a villanelle,

I am intangible feelings, the intricate spell that is weaved; the world’s best ever kept secret, all the magic that is Christmas eve.

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poems depending on refrains, and prose poems. In short, the Writing Magazine poets followed the advice offered to extend their imagination and their skills in every dimension. The use of language in a competition poem is all-important. A few pieces were eliminated for problems with punctuation – an excess or a lack of it – for wrenched syntax, where the need to rhyme contorted the word order into unnatural patterns, or for predictable rhyming, with boys and toys taking the honours for the most frequently used rhyme. When poets avoided these language faux pas, their writing sang, and quantities of the poems that weren’t prizewinners were eminently deserving of public reading or publication in magazines or books. That is certainly true of all the shortlisted poems, and it was difficult to make a final choice. The first prize goes to Gill Hawkins of Wimborne, Dorset for The Magic Of... a list poem written in the persona of the magic of Christmas Eve. The poem is written in quatrains, using the first person and present tense to bring immediacy into the writing. Each stanza begins with I am and goes on to describe itself in terms of the crumple of paper, a warm spiced aroma, encompassing silence and so on. An impressive aspect of this poem is its vocabulary. Words have not only been chosen with precision, but also where internal elements of slant rhyme reinforce the poetic quality.

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Look at the alliteration of smart/spiked and left/leaves in the second line, and the consonance of sparkle/tinsel at the start of the third stanza. There’s assonance in the chasing/pulsating of the fourth stanza, and unaccented rhyme of stocking/waiting in the fifth. These are just a few examples – there are plenty more. The piece relies on rhythm to keep it spinning along, with an occasional touch of syncopation to add variety. The basic full rhyme is relieved, too, by close slant rhymes; so we see both full rhymes such as glow and slow, choir and spire and the near rhymes of weaved and eve, twist and kiss. One of the joys of poetry is that it can occasionally break the rules – and do it so effectively that the departure from expectation enhances rather than detracts from the writing. In no fewer than five stanzas in The Magic Of... the second couplet does not form a grammatical sentence with a combination of subject and main verb. Often, this would result in the elimination of the poem. Here, however, the device works well. This is due in no small part to the repeated stanza openings. Although a full stop divides stanzas in two, the application of the I am to both parts is so obvious that the poet can make the break with tradition. It’s a daring step to take in a competition poem, but in this instance the gamble pays off. The whole poem builds up to the climax of the final stanza. In the list of elements, the title is almost forgotten while the richness of wording provides a deluge of images to engage the reader. At the end, the final couplet sums up everything that has gone before, and the open-ended title is completed to round off a sumptuous, satisfying read. The second prize is awarded to Gillian Dunstan of Sidmouth, Devon for a poem that focuses on a single, specific aspect of Christmas and

examines it minutely. All is explained in the title, Making Mince Pies, but this poem is not merely about baking. It uses elements of a recipe, nostalgia, imagery and anticipation to turn the act of baking into an act of love. This is a beautifully balanced free verse poem, in which each stanza takes a different angle to keep the focused poem alive with variety. The first stanza, full of the sibilance of the plurals, creates the recipe in non-cookery-book language. The second reminds the reader of past times, while the third brings the poem up to date. The fourth has a dream-like quality and carries the reader out of the kitchen and into the night, while the last has all the intimacy of a love poem. This poem, too, has a first-person narrator, but it moves in tense from present into recalled past, back into present and then to the short-term future. The transitions are smooth and natural, and add a conversational feel to the piece. At its centre, the poem pivots on a single example of line-end full rhyme, while the network of slant rhymes on either side of it has to be spoken aloud to appreciate the richness of the wording. Try saying phrases like the small maw / of a metal mincer, buttery pastry and all ready to fill glass jars to savour the taste of the words. This poem has a feelgood quality that insinuates a warm glow into the mind of the reader. Its final comment, reflecting on the small ceremony / we’ve repeated down the years / and filled with love opens up opportunities for readers to mull over their own little ceremonies, their own perfect moments; and while the tie-in with Christmas is delicious, the wider picture of these small rituals adds a more universal quality. Writing a poem for Christmas is one ritual that’s certainly worth cultivating. Have you started on your Christmas 2020 poem yet?

RUNNER UP: GILLIAN DUNSTAN

Making Mince pie I weigh black beads of currants, beige sultanas, walnuts, and sticky cherries. Next I add spices, then tumble all together with fiery brandy. Once this was fed into the small maw of a metal mincer. I’d turn the handle, grind out luscious strings and stir them into a stiff mix; that was hard work and slow. Today, in seconds, a processor makes mincemeat of it, all ready to fill glass jars. I store them, glowing, and opulent, knowing that I must wait for time to work its magic, melding the flavours and maturing them by Christmas. Then I’ll make buttery pastry enriched with orange zest. I’ll cut out stars to let the dark and glossy mincemeat shine through icing-sugared crusts – reminding me of fallen snow at midnight. That evening, we’ll light candles. Sitting around a glittering Christmas tree, we’ll eat the pies and drink mulled wine in a small ceremony we’ve repeated down the years and filled with love.

Also shortlisted in WM’s Christmas Poetry Competition were: Dennis Bryant, North Baddesley, Southampton; Anna Caddy, Taunton, Somerset; Heather Cook, Woking, Surrey; Alan Coombe, West Norwood, London; Fay Dickinson, Corby, Northamptonshire; Samuel Dunn, Ballycarry, Co Antrim; Pamela Trudie Hodge, Plymouth, Devon; Anne Lawson, Bolton, Greater Manchester; Lucy Nankivell, Ferndown, Dorset; Joyce Reed, Marple, Stockport; Viv Seaman, Southend-on-Sea, Essex; Jane Trenholm, Newbury, Berkshire.

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N I S ’ T A E? H W AM AN Helen M Walters looks at a short story by Charles Dickens as a starting point to exploring the importance of names in fiction his month we’re going to look at how names of characters can be significant in short stories. The story I have chosen, by Charles Dickens, is an intriguing little tale and, as always, you will gain most from this master class if you read it for yourself: https://writ.rs/dickensbirths. Dickens is well known for his use of meaningful, and often striking, names in his novels. Who wouldn’t tremble in the presence of a schoolmaster called Wackford Squeers? Who could doubt that a character called Gradgrind would turn out to be hard and emotionless? And there is a good reason why Ebenezer Scrooge and Uriah Heep have passed into common usage as shorthand for people who are miserly and manipulative respectively. In the short story Births. Mrs Meek, of a Son we get one of the important names immediately in the title and opening lines of the story. The name ‘Meek’ has connotations of submissiveness, liability to go along with the wishes of others, quiet, gentle and easily imposed on. As the story goes on the meek nature of

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Mr Meek is the direct cause of other characters being able to get away with doing what they like and ultimately causing harm. Let’s contrast the name ‘Meek’ with some of the other character names in the story. The two antagonists in the story are Mr Meek’s mother in law, Mrs Bigby, and his wife’s nurse Mrs Prodgit. Although these names aren’t directly meaningful in the way that Meek is, they do suggest certain things. Bigby suggests something that is solid and large, outclassing the meeks of the world. Prodgit, possibly suggests one who prods; someone who interferes and pushes themselves in where they are not wanted. Also note the baby’s name. Augustus and George are strong and uncompromising names in contrast to Meek. Augustus means ‘great’ and George means ‘farmer’, but also has associations with kings and, of course, St George. Mr Meek is open about his nature, admitting to being quiet, tremulous and small. Mrs Bigby is by contrast described as terrifying, unyielding and able to storm a town www.writers-online.co.uk

singlehanded. Meanwhile, Mrs Prodgit is first seen helping herself to the sherry and ushering Mr Meek out of his own dining room. After this inauspicious start, Mrs Prodgit’s presence in the house makes Mr Meek feel more and more unwanted and shunned. Finally Mr Meek feels it necessary to speak up on behalf of his baby son. Notice how he points out that he is not angry. He is mild (a close synonym for meek) but also miserable. Notice that he says he wants to avoid giving rise to bad feeling and therefore restricts himself to plaintive words. The cause of his misery is not only his own treatment, but the way that Mrs Bigby and Mrs Prodgit are conspiring to treat baby Augustus. The excessive swaddling of the child, the administering of castor oil, the sharp frills that irritate his skin, all seem outrageous and unnecessary to Mr Meek. Finally the worm has turned and he is speaking his mind, but the outcome of the story is sad, and a grim reminder of the times in which Dickens was writing. Perhaps it might have been avoided if Mr Meek had

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been less meek from the start. As it is, his imploring on behalf of his child turns out to be almost certainly too little too late. The story acts as a reminder to readers that it isn’t always good to be accommodating to other people. Being meek and mild might make you liked in the short term, but sometimes you have to be prepared to speak out to avoid disaster.

The name game How much time do you spend coming up with names for your characters? How important is hitting on exactly the right name? You may not want to use names with meanings in quite such a direct way as Dickens does, but you can still make sure you are using names effectively in your fiction. One thing to consider is how all the names in your story sound. In general it’s a good idea to avoid having more than one name starting with the same letter. So try not to have John, Jenny and Jason in the same story. Equally names that rhyme are usually best avoided. I once wrote a first draft of a story in which my characters were called Jill, Phil and Bill. Oh, and if you’re setting your story in a swimming pool, don’t call your main character Paul. I only spotted that one when I read the story aloud to myself. How names sound can also impact on how readers will envisage your character. Try this exercise. Think about names that are similar and from the same root, but have slightly different feels to them. Picture a Julie, a Julia and a Juliet. What subtle differences are there in what you feel a character with those names might be like. What about Mary, Marie and Maria? How would a Harry differ from a Henry? What about people with the same name, but different diminutives? How does the picture conjured up by Pat differ from that suggested by Trish? Or Lizzy from Beth? Maybe you want to take into consideration the meaning of the name you want to use. If you wanted to call your character Bella, meaning beautiful, what effect might that have on your story? Would it influence other people in how they react to that character? Or perhaps you want to call a character Sophie, meaning

wisdom. How will her name impact what happens to her? What might happen to a character called Victor, meaning conqueror? Obviously some name meanings are more apparent on the surface than others, so it’s up to you how subtle, or otherwise, you want to be. Do you find you’re often at a loss for names or that you find yourself using the same ones over and over again? If you want to spread your wings there are some great places to look for a range of names. I quite often use Twitter and just scroll through my timeline until I find something I like the sound of. You can also flick through magazines, newspapers and books for names, or even the telephone directory! One source that lots of writers use is a baby name guide. There are loads of different ones available and you should be able to find one in a bookshop or library easily enough. There are also online baby name sites which allow you to search by things like meaning and popularity. Some of the online sites will also help you narrow names down by geographical/language origin which will be useful if you want to set your story in a country other than your own, or have characters from a particular ethnic background. You can also find sites which arrange names by the years in which they were popular which can be helpful if you are writing historical fiction or if you are writing about a character who was born some time ago. Obviously names go in and out of fashion, but it’s worth making sure you don’t pick a name that’s going to feel so out of place that it throws your reader out of the story. You may not feel the need to give surnames to your short story characters. But if you do, and the meaning is important to you, there are also plenty of both online and book based resources which explain surnames. If you are giving your character a full name it’s worth checking that name doesn’t also belong to a high profile real person. That way you can avoid calling your romantic heroine after, for example, a serial killer. Sometimes it’s nice to give your character an unusual name. I would only advise doing that if you’re doing

it for a good reason though, or it may just be a distraction for the reader. I wrote a story once with a female character who was called Presley because her parents were big Elvis fans. I had another character reflect on how special it made her seem because that name was just hers. Some stories have unnamed characters, and this can work if you are doing it for a reason. You might want to deliberately make a character enigmatic, or there might be a reason why no one knows their name. Generally speaking though, readers will tend to relate better to a character if they know their name. One type of story where it can be hard to naturally convey the main character’s name is one told by a first-person narrator. Most of us don’t refer to ourselves by name. You can have another character address them by name, but sometimes it is tricky to do that in a way that doesn’t seem staged. You may also want to not disclose your character’s name in some types of twist story, especially gender twists, where the name may give too much away. In these circumstances you’ll need to weigh up the pros and cons before deciding on your approach. Do bear in mind that if your stories are published in magazines, the editor may change your character names, so don’t be too precious about them. Why would they do that? Well, most likely is that they have another story in the magazine which uses the same name and they want to avoid a clash. I also once had an editor change my characters’ names from traditionally English names to Indian-sounding names. I assume this was in order to make the magazine more inclusive, which is a good sign and hopefully an encouragement for more diverse stories to be submitted. Why not experiment with names in your writing? As we’ve seen, they can really add an extra dimension to your stories.

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Being different Author Joseph Elliott talks to Amy Sparkes about the importance of representing children with additional needs in books What is The Good Hawk book about?

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t is estimated that over 286,000 children in the UK (age 0-17) have a learning disability1, and over 1.3 million children have special educational needs2 (14.9% of children) . In addition, 10% of children and young people aged 5-16 have a clinically diagnosable mental health condition3. And each of these children has a story to tell. The good news is that the publishing industry is becoming more proactive about diversity in children’s books, creating opportunities and trying to readdress the balance. It’s absolutely vital that all children have the opportunity to see themselves reflected in stories and books, as they grow up. Debut author Joseph Elliott is passionate about creating characters who are different, and his new book reflects this.

REFERENCES

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‘The Good Hawk is the first book in an epic new fantasy trilogy, Shadow Skye, set in an alternate version of Scotland. It’s about a clan from the Isle of Skye who get enslaved by invaders from across the seas and the two teenagers who must cross the mysterious, plague-ridden mainland to rescue them. It’s aimed at readers aged 12+ and I’m hoping it will fill the gap there sometimes seems to be between middle grade and young adult novels. 12 to 14 is such an integral age to keep children reading, particularly boys. It’s exactly the kind of book I enjoyed reading at that age (and still love reading now).’

What’s the story behind the story? ‘I’m an actor, and during my “resting” periods I used to work as a teaching assistant in a special needs school. One day, I broke my foot playing football (it’s fair to say my playing style is maximum enthusiasm with minimal skill…), so I couldn’t do either job for quite a few months. I’d always had the ambition to write a novel and – with my leg in plaster and unable to do much else – I decided to give it a go. ‘The story started with the image of a girl stood on a wall, looking out to sea. I knew she was in Scotland – a country I have always loved for its dramatic landscapes and atmospheric weather – and, inspired by some of the children I was working with at the time, I also knew that she had Down’s syndrome. The story unfolded as I tried to work out who this girl was, www.writers-online.co.uk

and why she was there. ‘The book took me about two and a half years to write as I juggled it with my other jobs. Once it was finished, I sent it off to a handful of agents and was extremely fortunate to be picked up by the phenomenal Claire Wilson at RCW (Rogers, Coleridge & White). A few months later – after several suggestions from Claire and tweaks by me – Claire submitted it to publishers. I was on holiday at the time so had to have all these important conference calls with publishing people from around the world whilst chilling on the beach. The whole experience was very surreal. I had an instant connection with Walker Books, who were excited to publish the book simultaneously in the UK and the US. It’s since been picked up by international publishers as well, and is going to be translated into both Spanish and Italian. I’m still pinching myself that it’s all real’

Who are your main characters and why are they different? ‘Agatha is a fifteen-year-old girl with Down’s syndrome, living in a world where her condition is unnamed. She is often ridiculed or belittled by other members of her clan, but she is brave, fierce and loyal, and proves that the ways in which she thinks differently are often her greatest strengths. She is also incredibly loving, which is one of the reasons I enjoy writing her so much; she’s like a friend who is always able to cheer me up with her unique humour and her big-hearted smile. ‘Jaime is thoughtful and

WRITING FOR CHILDREN

TOP TIPS FOR CREATING CHARACTERS WITH DISTINCT VOICES • Make bold choices. You can always adjust them at a later date if you feel they’re not quite working. • Be creative. Try making up words or speech patterns that are unique to your character. • Be precise and consistent. Consider creating a dictionary or style sheet to help you. • Don’t be afraid to use simplified vocabulary. Most people don’t use complex vocabulary all the time, so be brave and allow your voice to suit your character and their situation. If you do use simplified vocabulary, find other ways to keep it from becoming repetitive eg by adding humour or exploring an original point of view.

thinking makes her a joy to write, and I often find myself smiling at the unpredictable things she comes out with. Jaime’s voice was harder to get right. In many ways, he is similar to me when I was fourteen, at a time when I was also struggling with my identity. Consequently, I had to tap into feelings that I had kept bottled up for many years. I hope that, as a result, there is a great deal of truth in him, which readers will be able to relate to.’

Why do you think it’s important to write about characters with additional needs? Representation is crucial within all forms of media, particularly for children. If they don’t see themselves in books or on TV, it can easily make them feel ostracised or less worthy of being portrayed. The more books people read featuring characters with additional needs, the more informed and accepting our society will be as a whole.’

The Good Hawk is out now, published by Walker Books.

compassionate, but also full of anxiety and self-doubt. He sees himself as weak and afraid, in a clan that tolerates neither of those traits. Whilst Agatha is often viewed by others as “different”, Jaime’s difference is in his perception of himself; he doesn’t feel like he belongs, and it is these inner demons which he needs to overcome. With issues of mental health on the rise within children and young adults, I wanted to create a character that teenagers could empathise with, as the transition into adulthood can be an extremely difficult and lonely experience. One of the aspects I love most about Jaime is witnessing him discover how strong and capable he can be.’

How did you create and develop the characters? How did you “find” their voices? ‘I spent many years working with children with additional needs, and it struck me that I’d never read a book featuring a character with Down’s syndrome. I’d certainly not heard of any mainstream fantasy novels featuring a protagonist with Down’s syndrome. When Agatha first popped into my head, I knew the story wasn’t going to be about her condition, it was just a part of who she was. I wanted the children I was teaching to see aspects of themselves in a kick-ass heroine, and be inspired by that. ‘Agatha’s voice was quite easy to find, undoubtedly influenced by the children I was working with at the time. Her alternative way of

RESOURCES • We Need Diverse Books: https://diversebooks. org/ • Learning disabilities: www.mentalhealth. org.uk/learningdisabilities/ • Children and young people’s mental health: www.mentalhealth. org.uk/tags/childrenand-young-people • Down’s syndrome: www.downssyndrome.org.uk/

Established in 1994, we are a literary consultancy service providing advice and training to children’s writers. We ofer: • Manuscript appraisals • Consultancy services • Courses and workshops We work alongside children’s publisher Wacky Bee Books. Shakespeare House, 168 Lavender Hill, London SW11 5TG T

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FICTION FOCUS

Spring clea ning Is your manuscript at the stage where it needs tidying up? Give it a good spit and polish with advice from Margaret James

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t’s not only our houses that could usually do with a good clean and polish in spring. As the days are getting longer, and as we’re all doing our best to shake off our winter lethargy – okay, as I personally am doing my best to shake off my own winter lethargy – I find it’s a good time to think about spring cleaning my writing, too. All those cobwebs of redundant adjectives and adverbs, all that dust of repetition, all those carefullycrafted episodes that don’t actually advance my story line – at some point in the process I know I shall need to be ruthless and to sweep them out of my literary house. It can be somewhat depressing to realise I’ve written a first draft that I’ve checked 62

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for redundant adjectives and so on, but which still doesn’t feel quite right, although it’s not obvious why. So, when I’m trying to identify what doesn’t seem to work in a piece of writing, I refer to my list of points to check. The first item is always to look at my writing style and ask myself if it’s appropriate to its subject matter. Does my thriller race towards the finishing line? Or does it drag its heels? Does my historical novel feature vocabulary that’s right for the time and place? Or is it mildly or even wildly anachronistic? As for my plot – is it satisfying and believable, is it logical, is there any emotional development, and – most importantly – is there something to find out? What doesn’t need to be there? What doesn’t tell the reader anything he/she needs to know, and/or doesn’t advance the action in any way? Any subplots – are they actually needed? Do they enhance the reader’s www.writers-online.co.uk

understanding of my central story? Or are they distracting and/or apparently part of a separate novel? I’ve occasionally had to sweep a subplot right out of a first draft and file it away, perhaps to become the plot of a novel of its own. Now I check up on my characters: are they flawed, sometimes likeable, sometimes dislikeable: a mix of nice and nasty? Also, are they ordinary (and therefore recognisable and sympathetic) people in extraordinary situations? They shouldn’t be superhuman – too good, too gorgeous, too hideous, or too bad! What about their names – are these right or wrong? Do too many begin with the same letter? Do my characters have contexts – friends, families, jobs? Or do they exist in isolation? My dialogue will need to be appropriate to these characters, it must push the action forward, and there will need to be enough speech tags (such as said Sally,

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asked Steve, continued Tom) for the reader to know who is talking. Also, my dialogue mustn’t be too much like speech in real life, which is often repetitious, hesitant or clogged up with irrelevancies. Since many novels, including my own, are simultaneously issued in audio formats as well as in print, the dialogue mustn’t be stilted and difficult to read aloud. Now for my narrative viewpoints – are there too many, too few, and am I guilty of head-hopping in individual scenes, or even in individual sentences? Do I always choose the right viewpoint – first, second, third, deep third, or some other kind unknown to reader until I invented it (which I haven’t yet). It’s always a challenge to start a story, so is my own opening interesting, intriguing, mystifying, worrying or/alarming? Do I introduce or at least suggest the challenge(s) my central character(s) will face? Or do I spend my opening pages waffling about nothing very much? Fast-fowarding towards my ending – is it satisfying or unsatisfying? Did it answer the questions I asked at the outset? Or did it tail off? Do I need to tie up any loose ends? I have written several series of novels, but I always need to bear in mind that every individual story must be complete in itself. What about all those vital clues that are certainly in my head – are they also on the page? It’s so easy to assume I have written something down, but I find it’s always wise to check. Most stories have themes, so does my new novel have one? Jealousy, revenge, redemption: can I identify any? Or, if I can’t, does it matter? As for showing as opposed to

telling – have I fallen into the trap of using too much authorial overview? Or do my characters reveal themselves in action and dialogue? I’m quite a visual writer, and I always set my stories in specific places, so are my settings important (or irrelevant – let’s hope not), and are they well-realised? Do I use too much or too little description? Do I describe the settings myself, or do I let the reader see them through eyes of my characters? Do I use the other four senses to take the reader there? The last item on my list is to check my spelling, punctuation and grammar. Yes, a good story can always be edited, and everyone is allowed the occasional solecism or typo. But, as writers, we all need to know how to handle these basic tools of our trade: to keep them sharp and free from rust. It can be a wrench to let go of actual possessions that have outlived their usefulness, but which are still dear to us. But it can also be also very satisfying to have a good sortout, to take all that stuff we don’t need any more to the dump or the local charity shop, and to make some space for improvements. This is as much the case with writing as it is with life.

NOW Try this Hardly any piece of writing, either published or unpublished, is likely to be perfect. So, before you get going on spring cleaning your own work, maybe take a critical look at someone else’s writing, and only then reflect on your own?

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I wish I’d known… with Morton S Gray

‘I

t took me a long time to take my own writing positively and seriously because that little critical voice in my head kept telling me that publishing wasn’t a world open to me, and that no one could possibly want to read a novel I had written. ‘Yet the stories were pouring out of me into my notebooks and on to my computer. They seemed to be well-received in the writing class I attended for many years. With the encouragement of my writing tutor, the novelist and poet Sue Johnson (author of Fable’s Fortune), I began to enter competitions and started to get shortlisted for short story and first chapter of a novel competitions. I joined the Romantic Novelists’ Association’s New Writer’s Scheme, which gives a priceless critique of one of your novels for each year you are a member, and I kept writing. ‘By the time I saw Choc Lit Publishing’s Search for a Star competition for a completed, unpublished romance novel, I had several to choose from sitting on my study shelf, so I sent off my entry. I couldn’t believe it when I made the shortlist, alongside a friend, Lynn Forth (and she’s now published too – Love in La La Land). ‘Beyond all my expectations, I won the Choc Lit publishing contract! My debut novel came out in 2017 as The Girl on the Beach. Since then I’ve had another two books published by Choc Lit: The Truth Lies Buried and Christmas at Borteen Bay. I don’t think anything can compare to holding a paperback of your own novel. ‘My message to anyone reading this and aspiring to be a published author is to believe in yourself and your work, to take time to learn the craft of writing, to send out your work despite your doubts, and to enter those competitions, because then you could become a commercially-published author too.’ APRIL 2017 2020 AUGUST 2018

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On a grand scale Epic fantasy requires a particular kind of input from the writer. Get skilled up to write a longer book by following advice from Alex Davis

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e’ve explored numerous aspects of fantasy and science-fiction here over the years, and one thing we know is that – on average – books in these genres tend to be longer than those in other forms. There are numerous reasons for this – you could argue these genres require the most significant worldbuilding, which takes time and word count to do effectively. You could also argue that these genres rely to some extent on an epic scale of storytelling and sweeping story arcs featuring multiple characters. There’s very likely an element of reader demand, with fantasy fans mostly seeking out extensive stories rather than shorter novels, leading to authors and publishers seeking to meet those expectations. There’s probably some truth to all of the above, but the fact remains that while many novels outside of ‘the fantastic’ in its broadest sense stick to around 80,000 to 100,000 words, fantasy and SF novels can push to 120k, 150k, 200k and beyond. This presents a challenge to many writers – even the lower end of the word count scale for a novel can be daunting, so pushing way past that can be even more off-putting. With that in mind, here are a few tips for aspiring writers in the field to help develop those truly epic novels and deliver those mighty word counts well.

The three Ps: planning, planning, planning Planning is important for any novel, and personally I wouldn’t even embark on so much as a novella without a solid plan behind me. This is a statement that probably goes double for a novel of above-average length – the larger story arcs and more complicated character journeys can be very easy to lose track of, so some sort of ‘roadmap’ to guide you along the way is pivotal. 64

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How you want to do this is of course up to you, but I can’t imagine many fantasy novels were ever written ‘on the fly’ or just improvising. These larger stories are often intricate and involved, and if you read closely in SF or fantasy you’ll probably be able to see just how much planning the author has done. There is a second element to this in that many fantasy and science-fiction authors embark on series rather than individual books. Once again, this is a very prominent trend in the field, and you might want to give some consideration as to the ‘long game’ and where you want the trilogy, quadrilogy or twentybook magnum opus to wind up. I’m writing this not long after watching Star Wars: The Rise of Skywalker, and sadly it’s a great example of a trilogy being criticised for a perceived lack of longterm planning, which has left filmgoers very much divided. Of course the world of film is different to the world of books, but it’s a pertinent example of a trilogy arguably not setting up its conclusion properly throughout by virtue of having no clear finale in mind.

And the fourth P: pacing I intimated above that worldbuilding is something that can add to the length of a fantasy or SF novel, but that raises an important follow-up point – this should not be something that you sacrifice the pace of the story for. Having a longer book does not mean that you have things happening more slowly – put simply, for a truly epic book you actually benefit from more things happening. As such, it’s crucial that you don’t get bogged down in pages and pages of backstory, exposition, description and scene-setting for your story and the plot sits absolutely first and foremost. A great setting is nothing without a fantastic plotline to go along with it!

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FA N TA S T I C R E A L M S

With that said, it’s also crucial that the pace does not go along too fast, and that readers find themselves left breathless by the rattling speed of your story. It’s important to strike a balance – if you want something to go down in history as truly epic, it’s crucial that events within it feel as though they have meaning and have real impact on the characters and/or the world of the story. Cramming in too many events can be every bit as unsatisfying as having events be too sparse – anyone who’s ever watched Jupiter Ascending will know exactly what I mean. The events have to have meaning for the characters and these thoughts and emotions should be explored too.

Make it a party Most more substantial novels would have a larger cast of characters – there’s a certain logic to that, giving you more individuals to carry the extra ‘weight’ of story involved. This is well worth thinking about for any epic novel, and something that you should be looking to factor in from the very start. Ideally you would have a host of characters, probably at least three, each with their own plotline and story arc to go through in your novel. If you do insist on having a lone central protagonist, you will at least need a few other side-characters around them who will still go on a journey of some kind. The other option you could go for would be to go for a classic ‘hero and nemesis’ structure, with a ‘bad guy’ and a ‘good guy’ in a constant back-and-forth battle for supremacy and victory. But a large zooming in on one or two characters is going to make your task substantially harder – most epic novels are better served by a wide and varied array of characters.

will tend to be improved for excising words rather than adding them, so try not to get into this habit – and indeed be wary of it as something you might slip into without intending to.

Set a deadline The thing with a big project – in any realm of life and work – is that it can easily spiral out of control, growing unwieldy and taking two or three times the length of time expected. That’s why a deadline for any novel is crucial, and I would argue this goes even more for a longer novel, because it could even more simply lose momentum or come off the rails than a shorter project. Try not to view the deadline as a pressure, but instead a motivation – a challenge that you have set yourself and a goal to strive towards.

But be realistic With that said, it’s important to set yourself a feasible deadline – having the sense of falling behind or missing targets is never going to help your creative process or your enthusiasm. The sense of being on track is pivotal, so what I would suggest doing first of all is setting yourself a sensible daily or weekly word target. Of course everyone’s lifestyle and circumstances are different, so what is viable will vary immensely from person to person. But the idea of targets is certainly a valuable one, and it’s often surprising just how quickly you can get something written if you break it down into manageable chunks. For example, at 500 words a day, you would still have 150,000 words in ten months – or if you wanted to take the whole year on you would be surpassing 180,000 words. And there is nothing too scary about the idea of writing 500 words, right?

Break it down One of the prime psychological obstacles of a longer book is quite simply a feeling that the mountain you are trying to climb is too big. Writing a novel of any length is no mean feat, but if you double the word count you are angling for then things can feel a lot more difficult! As such, one simple ‘mind trick’ to play on yourself is to divide the story up into numerous parts. Of course any story would tend to have chapters, and these can serve as handy waymarkers to show that you are making progress with your book. But the addition of parts provides a further way for you to note the ground you are making towards your grand target, and help to ensure that your motivation for the project doesn’t drop off. If you divide your story into four parts, you’ll be able to acknowledge and feel a sense of achievement in hitting the quarter, half and three-quarters mark on the way to finishing your book.

Don’t waste words One thing that could be a temptation with a larger project would be to try and bulk out the word count, be it consciously or unconsciously. You might feel that in-depth and detailed description is a way to get through some of your word count, but if it’s not justified for the story then it’s not going to help make it a more enjoyable or satisfying read. You might even keep slipping in an extra descriptor, or an extra pause in speech to grab another word here or there. In many regards this is the downside of thinking about word count, and honestly in these cases these additionals rarely help things along. Ultimately books

Conclusions The writing process changes immensely as you go from the short end of things to the long end – a short story can be launched into with minimal planning, with quick completion and a more rapid-fire editing process. Arguably it is where prose writing can be at its most creative. I would encourage anyone looking to write a novel to think generally in far more practical terms – yes, the creative element remains strong, but it’s much more in expression of ideas than it is in pure ideas. Novel writing concerns itself much more with the long-term. If you count on the ‘muse’ to carry you through that, it’s going to be a very long way home – if the book gets finished at all in those circumstances. Put simply, the ‘muse’ comes and goes. Planning your book, your time and your writing process will all be important, and that takes even more precedence where that book is longer than the average. It certainly can be done, but it will be a series of small victories that will ultimately lead you to that major victory in getting that longer novel completed. Finally, you should bear in mind that not every novel can be epic – you might think that your plotline is going to eat up a huge word count, but that doesn’t always come to fruition. I’ve found many a writing project weigh in at under what I expected, and usually when that is the case it’s because the story works better at that length. If you land that bit short of the epic, it’s going to be very hard to expand convincingly to fill in those ‘missing words’, and is liable best left to be whatever length it naturally came to a close. Never try to be epic for the sake of being epic.

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r o f t s o L words

s advises Jane Wenham Jone r whose a recently retired write up creative flow has dried to give herself the time she needs to adjust to a big life change

When I had a job, I used to write all the time but now I am retired, I haven’t put a word on paper or screen for weeks. I only think about writing. Short stories are what I enjoy writing, even though I’ve not had any successes as yet. But now that the short story market has shrunk, it feels like a waste of time as there’s nothing to aim for. A novel feels too daunting. When I was working all week, I used to spend many hours in the evenings and at the weekend at my laptop, trying to squeeze out as many words as possible but now my days are empty, I watch mindless television, potter around the house doing unimportant tasks and suddenly it’s bedtime and nothing has been achieved. I don’t know what’s wrong with me. Should I take up knitting and forget the whole writing lark? BARBARA WOOD Sutton Coldfield

urprisingly, I think knitting might be a very good idea, Barbara. Or embroidery or macramé or bonsai-growing. Anything to clear your mind, and give you something new to focus on. For it sounds to me, as if you are going through a period of adjustment and you may simply need to take the pressure off yourself. Retirement – with all those endless free hours stretching in front of you – sounds wonderful, but as you are finding, it can take some getting used to. You are accustomed to routine and structure and your writing taking place on particular days in a certain way – at the weekends, with an urgency – because time is short. Now you have all the time in the world, that’s bound to be disconcerting. The word ‘empty’ jumped out at me. You seem to be experiencing quite a void. For that reason, it’s important not to let the non-writing become a source of stress. Because this will be self-defeating. It is okay not to achieve something every single day. After years of working hard, why

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shouldn’t you watch TV and relax before you assess what you want to do with this next stage of your life? Also try not to berate yourself. Your response to the change in your lifestyle is not unusual. I remember receiving a letter from someone who’d taken six months off work to write a novel and was panicking because four weeks in she’d barely started. I sympathised! I was a lot more focused and prolific when I was juggling a toddler and a small business than I am now, when in theory I have all day, every day, to write. I think it’s known as Parkinson’s law – that ‘work expands so as to fill the time available for its completion’. In other words, if you have one short story to write in a month, it will take a month. If you only have your lunch-hour, you’ll knock out a first draft in that. When circumstances change, one has to find new rhythms. So be easy on yourself. Get used to this more leisurely life. Knit by all means, take walks, see your friends, dig the garden. And remember that mindless TV is good for finding plots, pottering is an

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If you have a question you would like Jane to consider, email jane@ janewenham-jones. com

important part of the creative process – I could faff for Britain – and that if you don’t go out and see a bit of life, you’ll have nothing to write about when you do want to. Which could be another aspect to this. What might be really helpful on all levels, is to start a diary. Buy a nice journal and make a pact with yourself to write something in it every day. Even if it’s only ‘Got up, ate cornflakes, didn’t feel like writing…’ I would wager that you will soon find the one sentence becomes a paragraph that turns into a small essay. Write about who you see, what you do, whether you liked the film you watched, how you feel… You may discover you are missing your sense of purpose, or the banter with your work colleagues, and that is leading to your negative view of the writing you once loved. For if you think about it logically, the short story market has not shrunk any more dramatically in the last few weeks, than it had in the last couple of years. It is your feelings that have changed. It is true that some short-story slots have gone – from the women’s magazines, for example – but there are still plenty of opportunities out there. If you do like submitting stories to magazines, take a look at Patsy Collins’ excellent womag writing blog https://womagwriter.blogspot.com/ for the latest news on who’s taking what. Or enter some competitions. Look at the competition supplement with this very issue, or Writers' News in other months– you will find writing contests galore. In the meantime, perhaps you could try something different to kick-start the imagination – poetry or flash fiction maybe? Again, look on the web for outlets. And is there a local writing group you could join? Hearing others talk about their own work may well rekindle your enthusiasm. If you have writing mates, get them round for lunch or coffee. Or catch up on your email correspondence with like-minded pals. Anything that will get you back in the groove, as it were. What can work well is to re-visit your past work. Dig out the very first story you ever wrote. What would you do differently now? Are you still proud of it or are you thinking of all the ways in which it could be improved? You may even feel moved to write another draft. Study published writers too. Get a book of short stories by successful authors and just enjoy the form all over again, reminding yourself what you admire about it. Read some great novels. Daunting can be invigorating. Never say never. The very fact that you are thinking about writing demonstrates that it is still an important part of you. Allow yourself these weeks off and when the time is right, you will not be able to resist picking up that pen. I think you will be writing again quite soon. Good luck.

Under the covers

Diamond shoes New author Gillian Harvey can’t believe her luck... now that she’s got Book Two Blues to contend with Did I mention that I have signed up for a two-book deal? Lucky me, right? The only problem is that now I’m tasked with delivering the next novel in two months’ time. No problem for a seasoned (jaded) writer like myself, surely? After all, I’ve churned out seven unsuccessful chunks of literature previously – what’s so different now? The problem is – and don’t laugh – writing when you absolutely know someone important is going to read it is mind-blowing. Yes, I know. Poor me and my too-tight diamond shoes. I know I’d have killed for this opportunity a year ago – and I’m still ridiculously grateful that I’ve got this far. But it’s hard to write something authentic with the spectre of your publisher looming over you. Will she like it? Was my other novel a one-hit wonder? Will she understand what I mean by that joke, that metaphor? Am I writing with her in mind, rather than thinking about a wider audience? Of course before, when I was writing with hope rather than as part of an actual deal, it wasn’t much fun at times either. Not least because I had to ride constant waves of self-doubt. I’d sometimes abandon a manuscript for months, and spent much of my time worried about whether there was any point. But bearing in mind I was writing for an audience of three – or possibly four – friends and family members, at least I knew that when finally finished my manuscript it would be well received. I was unselfconscious, and this meant that when I managed to motivate myself to write, my words flowed freely. Another difficulty I’ve encountered this time is the fact that after several edits I remember my previous novel in intimate detail. Before, once I’d started something new, I could forget about what I’d written in the past. This time, when editing No 2, I found a few recurring themes and jokes I’d been unaware of when writing. The most disturbing repeat so far? Both novels featured a man wearing a skin-tight onesie. Who knew that was lurking in my subconscious? Of course there are many, many plus points to my situation. Not least that I actually sit down each day and write, no matter what. My previous method of writing in fits and starts meant my manuscripts often had cavernous plot holes – and minor characters would change their names, hair colour or job halfway through the text. This time when I edit, there will be far less to do; the plots and subplots should hopefully tie up nicely. See? It’s great. I love my diamond shoes, and for the most part they only chafe a little at times. But I’ve had to come to terms with the fact that – even with a book deal – a writer’s life is riddled with angst. • Everything is Fine by Gillian Harvey is due for publication by Orion Fiction on 28 May. www.writers-online.co.uk

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You can bank on it Simon Whaley looks at the pros and cons of having a business bank account for your writing

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e all remember our first time. It was 1989, I was eighteen, and I couldn’t believe what I was holding in my hands. (It was a postal order for £3.50, in case you were wondering.) That was the payment for my first published piece – a word search puzzle. Little did I know then how that would be the first of many, many more payments. But even then, I knew it would be sensible to keep this income separate from my personal income. What I needed was a separate bank account for my writing business.

Business legalities If you establish a limited company or a partnership in the UK, then you are creating a new legal identity. By law, any such business must have a separate bank account in that same name. However, as writers that’s way beyond the realms of most of us. Limited companies may be the way some writers go, but that’s for highly successful creatives like JK Rowling. The rest of us are sole traders, which means we operate our writing business in our own name. Therefore, there is no law that compels us to open a separate bank account in our own name. However, it’s not as simple as that. HMRC’s A General Guide to Keeping Records For Your Tax Return says, ‘If you do not have a separate business bank account, you need to keep records of which transactions were personal and which were business. Unless your business is small or has few transactions, it would usually be helpful to maintain a separate bank account or accounts for the business.’ Mixing personal with business payments in a single bank account could mean we don’t pay the right tax. And if it results in an HMRC investigation, 68

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that could result in being fined for poor record keeping. Matt Dickinson, spokesperson for the Federation of Small Businesses agrees. ‘Generally speaking, it’s a good idea to open a business account as soon as possible to keep finances orderly and clear.’ It’s also important to remember the Government’s Making Tax Digital (MTD) policy, which aims to streamline HMRC’s tax collection service. Originally, the Government planned introducing this for income tax in 2020. This would have affected writers. However, in March 2019, the then Chancellor Philip Hammond announced that the government would delay the introduction of MTD until after 2020. So, although Making Tax Digital is not looming on the immediate horizon, having a separate bank account for our writing business will make the transition easier when it does eventually happen. Two years ago, in the February 2018 issue of Writing Magazine when I last looked at Making Tax Digital, consultant Barry Kernon at accountants HW Fisher and Company said, ‘I think for many people it would be a good idea to organise their affairs so that self-employed income and expenses go through one bank account.’ Therefore, having a separate bank account for our writing income and expenses is definitely a sensible decision to take.

Business bank accounts So, the next question is, do we need to have a business bank account, or can we simply open a second personal bank account? A survey commissioned by accounting software company Intuit Quickbooks in 2016, revealed that 75% of sole trader businesses use a personal bank account for their business transactions. www.writers-online.co.uk

That’s despite the fact that this often goes against the terms and conditions of personal accounts. Barclays Bank’s terms and conditions state that a personal current account is, ‘for your personal use and not for money relating to any business you run. We can close an account (or stop providing a service) if we find out you are using it for nonpersonal use, or are not eligible for it.’ The Royal Bank of Scotland’s personal current account terms clearly state, ‘Your account must not be used for business purposes.’ Similarly, Lloyds Bank’s terms and conditions state that, ‘you must not open or use a personal account to hold money for… the purpose of a business, club, charity or other organisation.’ Running your writing business through a personal current account is risky. If your bank spots this they have the right to close the account for breaching the terms and conditions.

Free banking, or fee banking? As personal customers, we’re used to free banking. Business bank accounts are different. The High Street banks charge monthly administration fees as well as individual transaction fees for the number of credits and debits passing through a business account, or the number of electronic transfers. Even if you don’t bank any royalty cheques, or incur any writing expenses, the account will still incur the monthly fee. Monthly account fees are not insignificant, and can start from £6, whilst individual transaction fees can range from under 50p for an electronic transaction, to £1.50 for every cheque paid into your account. These charges can quickly mount. If you were to bank two cheques for your writing sales totalling £200 in one month, you could end up paying £9 in charges: a £6 monthly fee and an additional £3 in transaction charges.

T H E BU S I N E S S O F W R I T I N G

That’s 4.5% of that £200 income. Naturally, these fees put off a lot of writers, which is why many sole traders risk using a personal current account and hope not to get caught! Banks understand that small start-up businesses do not have a lot of money coming in, so many offer free banking for the first few months. This freebanking period ranges from 12 months to up to 30 months, depending upon the bank you approach. In theory, you could extend the freebanking period by switching banks as each free-banking period comes to an end, but account switchers tend to get shorter free-banking periods (such as 6 months), than the 12 to 30 months that new businesses get. The problem for many writers is that our income fluctuates on a monthly and an annual basis. It’s difficult to predict how much we’ll need to pay in charges. And some charges could wipe out the actual income. Amazon will make small payments to self-published writers, especially those enrolled in their Kindle Unlimited programme. It’s not uncommon for Amazon to pay out amounts of less than 10p. If your business bank account charges 50p per credit, that small income could lead to a bigger expense!

Challenger banks But all is not lost. The High Street banks are being pressured by new kids on the block, known as Challenger Banks. These are attracting large numbers of businesses, in particular sole traders, like us writers. Challenger banks were created after the banking crisis, and are designed to shake up the British banking system. Many are internet-only, which means they don’t have the huge costs of the branch network that traditional banks have to endure. As a result, many of them can offer free business banking facilities, only

charging when the number of credits and debits exceed a certain number, or the account balances exceeds several tens of thousands of pounds. Some sole traders using these accounts pay little or no fees at all. So if you’ve held off from opening a business bank account because of the costs involved, a challenger bank might be the solution you’ve been looking for. Services like Revolut, Starling Bank, Mettle, and Tide all offer business bank accounts for free. Other day-to-day transactions like bank transfers and card payments are also free, up to certain limits. Many of these internet-only banks also offer extra useful benefits, such as being able to allocate money to various virtual pots. This means whenever you receive a payment you can automatically allocate a percentage of it to your tax pot. That way, you know you’ll always have money set aside to meet your tax bill. A word of caution, though. Not all of these business accounts are run by banks. Banks are regulated by the Prudential Regulation Authority, and each bank licence safeguards customers to the tune of £85,000 under the Financial Services Compensation Scheme (FSCS). If the bank were to collapse, customer bank accounts are protected up to the £85,000 limit. However, some of these accounts, like those provided by Tide and Coconut, are not bank accounts but electronic money services. This means they’re not protected by the FSCS.

investing our members’ money in laying the foundations needed to launch our business current account early in 2020. We have developed a new, dedicated mobile business banking app which allows eligible customers to open a business current account within minutes. We continue to test and refine the experience to maximise usability and to deliver a best-in-class customer experience.’ And the building society also hopes to make it easier for its business bank account customers to accept card and contactless payments directly from customers. That could be useful to writers who regularly attend book fairs or books signings and have to take their own stock and process payments. So don’t get caught by your bank for using a personal account for your writing business, if the terms and conditions forbids this. Respect your writing business and open up a business bank account for it. It might not cost you as much as you think. Needing to open a business bank account is part of the coming-of-age process for your writing business.

BUSINESS DIRECTORY: Branch Directory • Revolut: www.revolut.com Basic freelancer account is fee-free, with limited free transactions. • Starling Bank: www.starlingbank.com No monthly fees, free electronic payments, domestic transfers and ATM withdrawals.

High Street challenger If you’d rather bank with a bricks and mortar financial institution, then there’s another solution on the horizon. The Nationwide Building Society is planning to launch a business bank account free of monthly fees for selfemployed people in the near future. As Nationwide communications officer Anabel Goncalves explains, ‘We are already www.writers-online.co.uk

• Mettle: https://mettle.co.uk No monthly fees or transaction charges for sole trader accounts with less than £50,000. E-money licence, not a banking licence. • Tide: www.tide.co No monthly or annual fees. Free card payments. Free transfers between Tide accounts. Electronic transfers 20p, ATM withdrawals £1, cash deposits at Post Office £1. E-money licence, not a banking licence.

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RESEARCH TIPS RESEARCH TIPS

Crime and punishment Writing a crime novel? Tarja Moles gives you the clues and leads you need to research the criminal underworld and the forces of the law.

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esearching crime can be tricky. Observation and participant observation would be revealing, but they’re not, for obvious reasons, recommended methods. Therefore, you’ll need other ways to find your leads. There are different types of sources that crime writers can take advantage of. Using a combination of these – and not merely relying on Google – is likely to prove most beneficial. Here are some pointers for where to start:

Independent websites cover a wide range of topics: Police Oracle (www.policeoracle.com) provides news and other information to the UK policing community; Explore Forensics (www.exploreforensics.co.uk) covers forensic science, crime scene investigation and pathology; Crime & Clues (http://crimeandclues.com) focuses on criminal investigation, court room testimony and forensics; and Murderpedia (http://murderpedia.org) is an encyclopaedia of murderers around the world. You can find more websites by doing online searches.

Library material Libraries have a lot to offer for crime writers. If you’re new to the subject, learn the terminology first. Dictionaries covering legal matters and criminology will help you. In addition to reference works, you can find useful material in numerous different sections within the library. Depending on what you’re researching, you could explore, for instance, the criminology, psychology, neuroscience, sociology, law, international relations, human rights and/or war sections. If you want to read biographical or autobiographical accounts, have a look at the library’s true crime books. The public seems to have a strange fascination with criminals, whether it’s Jack the Ripper or the ‘diamond wheezers’ of the Hatton Garden heist – and public libraries tend to be well stocked with such books.

Online resources The internet is a great place to quickly find snippets of information. There’s a multitude of sites covering different aspect of crime and punishment. Some sites are hosted by public bodies while others are maintained by individuals, groups of like-minded people and other organisations. Examples of the former include the National Crime Agency (https://nationalcrimeagency.gov.uk), the UK legislation website (https://nationalcrimeagency.gov.uk), and the Government’s Crime, Justice and Law page (www. gov.uk/browse/justice) which functions as a hub for official information about courts, sentencing, prisons, probation, youth offending and other details relating to crime and justice. There are also websites that provide official crime research results and statistics, such as those by GOV.UK (https://writ. rs/crimeresearch) and the Criminal Records Bureau (https:// writ.rs/crimrecbur). 70

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Historical crime and punishment Numerous books have been written about crime and punishment during different historical periods. You can see examples in the National Archives’ bookshop at http:// bookshop.nationalarchives.gov.uk/. These include titles such as Bodysnatchers by Suzie Lennox and The History of the Newgate Prison by Caroline Jowett. If you find a potentially interesting book, you can check if it’s available in your local library. If it’s not there, you can ask the librarian to organise an inter-library loan for you. There are some excellent historical web portals that provide and/or direct you to further information. For example, the Victorian Web’s crime page (www.victorianweb.org/history/ crime) covers different types of crime, punishment and the police. It also gives you further reading suggestions. Exploring archival material is a great way to deepen your research. The National Archives (www.nationalarchives.gov. uk) holds, among other things, court records, army courts martial records, prison registers and documents containing information on criminals as well as convicts sent to Australia. Its website (https://writ.rs/natarcresearchguides) has 39 guides to help you research its crime-related records. You can locate more archives around the country as well as online. For instance, you can find the 1674-1913 proceedings of the Old Bailey, London’s Central Criminal Court, at www.oldbaileyonline.org. Regional and local archives have details on crime and punishment in their respective areas. They also have old newspapers which you can read to find out more about past crimes and the way they have been reported in the media. Alternatively, you can access old newspapers via the British Newspaper Archive (www.britishnewspaperarchive.co.uk).

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and is also willing to answer writers’ questions. However, make sure you first read his submission guidelines carefully. Networking with other crime writers, for instance through the Crime Writers’ Association (www.thecwa.co.uk), can be useful for receiving advice and locating unexplored sources. Have fun discovering new leads!

Specialist museums can give you a more concrete feel about crime and punishment in the past. The Galleries of Justice Museum in Nottingham (www.galleriesofjustice.org.uk) and Littledean Jail in Gloucestershire (www.littledeanjail.com) are such examples. To find more prison museums around the world, see https://writ.rs/prisonmuseums.

Resources for crime fiction writers

BOOKS FOR CRIME WRITERS

Resources specifically aimed at crime fiction writers are on the increase. There are now helpful books that cover, for instance, forensics, police procedure and detective work (see the box-out for suggestions). There are also websites that contain useful material. One interesting site is that maintained by Brian Price (www. crimewriterscience.co.uk), a UK-based chartered chemist and biologist. He gives details of various scientific principles relating, for example, to poisons, knockouts and explosives. He can also be contacted via email if you have any specific queries. DP Lyle hosts a US-based site for crime writers at http:// writersforensicsblog.wordpress.com. He focuses on forensics

• Kate Bendelow: The Real CSI: A Forensic Handbook for Crime Writers (2017) • Michael O’Byrne: The Crime Writer’s Guide to Police Practice and Procedure (2nd revised edition, 2015) • Brian Price: Crime Writing: How to Write the Science (2019) • Stephen Wade and Stuart Gibbon: Being a Detective: An A-Z Readers’ and Writers’ Guide to Detective Work (2019) and A Straightforward Guide to the Crime Writers Casebook: A Reference Guide to Police Procedure Now and Then (2017)

BEHIND THE TAPE

If you have a query for Lisa, please send it by email to enquiries @ lisacutts.co.uk

Expert advice to get the details right in your crime fiction, from serving police officer Lisa Cutts

Q

When someone is killed in a road accident the police call at the person’s address to inform the next of kin. I’m presuming they found identification on the body. Now, usually, would two police officers call, or could it be one? And can it be male or female constables or must it be a higher rank? I believe they would ask the next of kin to call at the police station asap to confirm the identity of personal belongings prior to a visit to the mortuary to identify the body.  I ask this partly because knowing how tight the police budget is, wasted manpower is wasted money. Normally the police officers would need to enter the home rather than break the news on the doorstep, I believe. Reg Hidson

A

You’re correct that officers are likely to identify the person through ID found on the person or if the driver is the deceased, running the registration through PNC and any other databases with local information on the vehicle. Ideally, the death message would be passed to the family by a Family Liaison Officer, one from Traffic Collision. The chances of a FLO being on duty and available may mean they are assigned the family at a slightly later time, after the message has already been delivered. It would be whoever is available and is very likely to be a police constable rather than a sergeant. It wouldn’t be anyone of a higher rank. Again, ideally, it would be two officers if a double-crewed car was available to attend the address.

It would always be better to break the terrible news in the home as you’ve mentioned, rather than on the doorstep. Even those who are very anti police understand the severity of the situation and usually allow officers inside. Rather than take the next of kin to the station, it would be better to gain as much information as possible first. Fatal accidents usually mean the roads are closed for hours and nothing would be moved from the scene (other than those injured or deceased) for some time. Traffic Collision take videos and photos, measurements and carry out house-to-house enquiries, witness statements, CCTV, dashcam downloads and wouldn’t release anything from the scene in the initial moments.

Q

Could a character get away with murder if it was covered up? If the police only had the victim’s family’s say so to go on and some innocent texts between her and the victim, could she get away with it? Gemma Callaghan

A

In short, yes, she could get away with covering it up. However, depending on the circumstances, the police may not be happy to leave it there and may delve a little further. At least, I hope they would. The post mortem, CCTV, interviewing family members and friends and downloading of electronic devices always gives the police a great deal to go on. There may well be something that gives her away if the officers involved are suspicious in any way, meaning they dig a lot deeper.

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Editorial calendar

Strong forward planning will greatly improve your chances with freelance submissions. Here are some themes to consider for the coming months.

10 years ago July 2010 • Christopher Nolan’s film Inception premieres on 8 July. • Boyband One Direction form during the X Factor on 23 July.

20 years ago

July 2000

• Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire (book 4 in JK Rowling’s series) was published on 8 July. • Coldplay released debut album Parachutes on 10 July. • Tiger Woods wins the British Open Men’s Golf Championship on 23 July and at 24 becomes the youngest person to win all four major golf tournaments.

30 years ago July 1990 • Actor Margot Robbie was born on 2 July.

50 years ago July 1970 • Black Tot Day on 29 July 1970 was the last day that sailors in the Royal Navy were issued with a daily tot of rum. • Singer Beck was born on 8 July.

40 years ago July 1980 • Alexandra Palace burnt down for the second time in its history on 10 July 1980. The first time was in 1873. • Satirical disaster movie Airplane! premiered worldwide on 2 July. • New Zealand PM Jacinda Ardern was born on 26 July.

60 years ago July 1960 • To Kill a Mockingbird by Harper Lee was first published on 11 July.

• Actor John Simm and Take That singer Jason Orange were born on 10 July. • Filmmaker Christopher Nolan was born on 30 July. • First Minister of Scotland Nicola Sturgeon was born on 19 July. • Game of Thrones actor Nikolaj Coster-Waldau was born on 2 July.

• Etch-a-Sketch drawing toys went on sale on July 12. • Private Eye editor Ian Hislop was born on 13 July. • Sirimavo Bandaranaike became the first non-hereditary female head of government in modern history. She was elected Prime Minister of Sri Lanka on 21 July. • Filmmaker Richard Linklater was born on 30 July.

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90 years ago

70 years ago July 1950

July 1930

• Singer Huey Lewis was born on 5 July.

• Sherlock Holmes creator Arthur Conan Doyle died on 7 July.

• Virgin entrepreneur Richard Branson was born on 18 July. • R’n’b singer Gwen Guthrie was born on 9 July. She died in 1999. • Fashion designer Bruce Oldfield was born on 14 July

• Pulp character The Shadow first appeared on 31 July as the narrator of a US radio programme Detective Story Hour. Smith & Street created The Shadow Magazine in 1931. • The first ever FIFA World Cup began in Uruguay on 13 July. Uruguay beat Argentina in the final on 30 July.

75 years ago July 1945 • The BBC launched the BBC Light Programme radio station for music and light entertainment on 29 July. In 1967 it was rebranded as BBC 2. • The Labour Party had a landslide victory in the general election on 5 July, with PM Clement Attlee replacing Conservative leader Winston Churchill.

• American literary critic Harold Bloom was born on 11 July. He died in October 2019. • French-Algerian post-structuralist and postmodernist philosopher Jacques Derrida was born. • Pink Panther actor Bert Kwouk was born on 18 July. • LibDem politician Shirley Williams was born on 27 July

• Blondie singer Debbie Harry was born on 1 July. • Tennis champion Virginia Wade was born on 10 July.

100 years ago

• Actor Helen Mirren was born on 26 July

July 1920

80 years ago July 1940

• The first World Scout Jamboree began at Kensington Olympia on 30 July. • Actor Yul Brynner was born in Russia.

• The Battle of Britain began on 10 July. • Warners Bros cartoon character Bugs Bunny made his debut in A Wild Hare on 27 July.

Looking ahead

• Soul singer Fontella Bass was born on 3 July. • Beatles drummer Ringo Starr was born on 7 July

In 2025 it will be 50 years since comic writer PG Wodehouse died. What is his literary legacy? Who is writing comic novels now?

• Actor Patrick Stewart was born on 13 July • Comedian Tim Brooke Taylor was born • Modern dance innovator Pina Bausch was born on 27 July

Pic, all creative commons: Derrida, Arturo Espinosa Seguir; Shirley Williams, University of Essex; Patrick Stewart, Gage Skidmore; Tim Brooke Taylor, Ed g2s; Pina Bausch, Leafar; BBC2, Feeling My Age; Helen Mirren, See Li; Huey Lewis, Jauerbeck; Richard Branson, Chatham House; Bruce Oldfield, Open Media Ltd; Etch a Sketch, Etcha; Ian Hislop, ian_fromblighty; Richard Linklater, LBJ Foundation; Diorama aboard HMS Belfast, Kjetil Bjornsrud; Beck, Ralph_PH; John Simm, rodwey2004; Jason Orange, vagueonthehow; Christopher Nolan, Georges Biard; Nicola Sturgeon, Scottish Government; Nikolaj Coster-Waldau, Gage Skidmore; Alexandra Palace, E Gammie; Jacinda Ardern, Governor General of New Zealand; Margot Robbie, Eva Rinaldi; One Direction, Fiona McKinlay.

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N E W AU T H O R P R O F I L E

AMY MCLELLAN Adrian Magson learns a new word from the debut psychological thriller writer don’t think I’ve ever profiled anyone who had an idea for a book from a word I’d never heard of… but Amy McLellan has corrected that omission with her debut Remember Me, which will be published by Orion in paperback in April. The word is prosopagnosia, known as face blindness, which is an inability to recognise faces. According to Amy’s research on the subject, it’s not as rare as it might sound. As Amy, a freelance journalist and copy editor explains, ‘Francesca Pathak [now editorial director] at Orion knew someone with face blindness and it got the cogs whirring about how this would work in a murder story. I did lots of reading and research about face blindness and brain injuries. Although it sounds very rare, up to one in fifty people may have the condition to some degree, often without knowing it. It’s amazing how many people have contacted me to say they either have the condition or know someone who has it – for some people, it’s almost a “ta dah” moment of making sense of difficulties they’ve faced in their lives.’ Sarah, the central character in Amy’s book, witnesses a violent murder but she suffers from the condition and can’t identify the killer. Framed for the murder, it’s up to Sarah to find the real killer in a world where she can’t trust anyone. But how do you catch a killer when you can’t recognise a face? ‘The book was written very quickly over the summer of 2018,’ says Amy, from Shropshire. ‘It felt very intense living inside Sarah’s head, to the point where I felt like I was developing face blindness myself. I have a job and three children, and my husband (fellow author, scriptwriter and

I LISTEN TAP HERE To hear an extract from Remember Me

AMY’S TOP TIPS

• Make time to write and never give up. • Go to book festivals and author events. • Fake it ‘til you make it. You have to be prepared to talk about yourself and your work publicly and positively. • Be open to advice from people you trust. Don’t be precious about your manuscript: good advice can lift your work to another level.

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co-founder of Capital Crime, Adam Hamdy) works very long hours. I’ve written everywhere – at football matches, ice rinks, soft play, on the beach, in car parks and cafes – and spent a lot of late nights in front of the laptop.’ Her love of writing came very early. ‘I’ve always loved books and writing. As a child, the headmaster called me “the girl who writes stories” and it’s always been something I felt compelled to do. As an adult, the jobs I’ve held have always been writing-based as I love playing with words and finding the right tone of voice for different audiences. But being an actual author felt like a dream that was out of reach. I wrote lots of poems as a child and short stories as I got older, and there are a number of unpublished novels sitting in my office and notebooks full of ideas for stories.’ As with most writers, Amy admits to having had many rejection letters. But they always contained enough encouragement to keep her going. ‘Never give up, and make time to write. Get a notebook and write whenever and wherever you can, even if it’s just 200 words a day – that’s 73,000 words in a year.’ She’s also a strong advocate of getting involved in the writing community. ‘I’ve learned so much from author events in local independent bookshops and festivals like Capital Crime, including tips on plotting, pace and structure from best-selling authors, plus support and encouragement from others. I found the idea of self-promotion and talking about myself excruciating, but that’s part of a writer’s life. And it does get better with practice, honest.’ Amy’s next book is yet to be announced.

INSPIRATION AT YOUR FINGERTIPS EVERY DAY

FROM THE PUBLISHERS OF

WRITERS’ NEWS

Your essential monthly round-up of competitions, paying markets, opportunities to get into print and publishing industry news.

Writers put your noses to the Grindstone Tina Jackson

Grindstone Literary have four creative writing competitions running this spring. • Win £1,000 in the 2020 International Novel Prize for unpublished novels. Enter up to 3,000 words of the opening of an unpublished finished or part-finished novel in any genre aimed at readers from YA upwards. Also send a synopsis no longer than 300 words. The Grand Prize winner gets £1,000 and the runner-up, £500. There are also four £50 shortlist prizes. The entry fee is £16. The closing date is 28 March. • Win a £500 first prize for flash fiction up to 500 words in Grindstone’s Flash Fiction Prize. Enter original, unpublished short fiction, in any genre. The first prize is £500, and the second prize, £200. There are also four shortlist prizes of £50. The entry fee is £6. The closing date is 28 March. • To enter the International Short Story Prize, send original, unpublished short stories in any genre up to 3,000 words. The first prize is £500 and the second, £200. Four shortlisted writers

Destination dynamic drama

Nothing to lose with Yeovil

The Red Planet Prize 2020 is inviting entries. The winner of the biannual competition for emerging drama scriptwriters will get a script commission. The focus of this year’s award, which is from independent production company Red Planet Pictures and ITV, is on finding original voices to bring into the mainstream. This year’s contest invites scripts for four-part contemporary thrillers (crime, psychological, conspiracy, relationship, political) and returning procedural series (crime, medical, legal). Emerging scriptwriters from the UK and Ireland are invited to submit an existing original full-length spec script for TV, radio, film or theatre, a one- to two-page pitch for an original TV series or returning serial, and a brief CV mentioning writing credits if applicable. Up to ten shortlisted writers will be invited to a one-day pitching masterclass and then will have three weeks to write up their pitch and series outline. The runner up will get development opportunities with ITV and the winner will get a script commission. The submission window opens on 27 March and closes on 3 April. Website: www.redplanetpictures.co.uk/the-red-planet-prize

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will each get £50. The entry fee is £8. The closing date is 28 April. • First prize is £500 for an unpublished poem in the Grindstone International 2020 Poetry Prize. To enter, send original, unpublished poems up to 40 lines. There is a first prize of £500 and a second prize of £200. Four shortlisted poems will each win £50. The entry fee is £8 per poem. The closing date is 28 May. Website: www.grindstoneliterary.com/competitions

Enter The Yeovil Literary Prize 2020 in four categories: novel, short story, poetry, writing without restrictions. Since its launch in 2002, the annual international Yeovil Literary Prize has established itself as a major event on the writers’ competition calendar. • The novel category is for the synopsis and opening chapters of an unpublished novel. The prizes are £1,000, £250 and £100. The winner will also have the opportunity to pitch their book to literary agents. This year’s judge is Paul Blezard. The entry fee per novel is £12. • The short story category is for original, unpublished short fiction up to 2,000 words. There are prizes of £500, £200 and £100. This year’s judge is Susan Sandon. The entry fee per short story is £7. • The poetry category is for original, unpublished poems up to 40 lines. The prizes are £500, £200 and £100. This year’s judge is Caroline Gilfillan. The entry fees are £7 for one poem, £10 for two and £12 for three. • The writing without restrictions category is wide open. Entries may be anything you have written that doesn’t fit into the other categories. There are prizes of £200, £100 and £50. This year’s judge is Jessica Axe. The entry fee is £5. There is also a special £100 Western Gazette Best Local Writer Award for a shortlisted entry by a writer living in the Western Gazette distribution area. The closing date is 31 May. Website: www.yeovilprize.co.uk

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WRITERS’ NEWS

UK MAGAZINE MARKET Fly high with FlyPast Tina Jackson

FlyPast magazine explores aviation history, vintage aircraft NEW Battle of Britain Aircraft Series Hurricane restoration, the latest news on museum activity and airshow reports. ‘You’ll see plenty of wartime legends such as the Defending the Lowlands Supermarine Spitfire and P-51 Mustang, but we also focus on classic civil machines and airliners,’ said editor Chris Clifford. ‘Superlative air-to-air photography is guaranteed.’ Topics are wide and varied. ‘Our focus sometimes You’ll never centres on a classic aircraft in detail, but other articles believe... L describe famous aviators or aircraft designers, recordGLOBA breaking pilots, “aces”, prototypes and pivotal air battles,’ VOYAGER epic The Silver Spitfire’s said Chris. ‘A FlyPast team member or contributor ht round-the-world flig may also get to fly in a classic aircraft and impart the Boeing 707 experience to the readers – and delve into the machine’s history. And our popular Women in Aviation series continues to highlight famous and lesser-known female flyers, civilian and military.’ A typical reader of FlyPast would be someone who regularly visits airshows and museums. ‘The readers vary in age and aviation tastes; the “average” purchaser is in their forties or fifties (but the age span runs from teens to people into their eighties and nineties). Most will be died-in-the wool enthusiasts, but we also have many former and current service personnel reading FlyPast – and some have made the leap into writing for us.’ As editor, Chris always bears in mind that FlyPast aims to be the first port of call for anyone wanting the latest news in the heritage aviation world. ‘We are proud of the fact that many restorers/aircraft owners come to FlyPast first to seek coverage for their latest project. With histories, we strive to write and source features that make readers get out of their comfort zone and want to learn about something new – whether it’s about an aircraft type, pilot or squadron.’ Chris and his team have recently relaunched FlyPast. ‘Part of our mission is to report in depth on professional and grass-roots restorations in every edition, getting the engineering and operator perspectives. I do like to have some form of air combat history each month, and as many Cold War aircrew are still with us, it’s great to have their personal accounts too. A fascinating feature recently explored the role of the Portuguese Air Force during its operations in Africa in the 1960s-70s, so there’s plenty of variety.’ Keeping knowledgeable readers entertained and accurately informed is paramount. ‘Above all, it needs to be an interesting read – not some dry account cribbed word for word from a squadron Operational Record Book, or overly technical that it baffles the readers,’ said Chris. ‘We usually take a reverent tone with veterans and known aircrew members, but some stories demand that we highlight someone’s full character. Pilots, such as “Dambuster” Guy Gibson, had flaws or could be hard taskmasters, but that’s all grist to the storytelling mill. Quality imagery is vital too; we need high-resolution photos (scans of originals) or decent archive shots. We do have our own large photo collection though, so can often fill in the gaps. We don’t accept photos ripped from the internet. Above all, potential freelances need to bear in mind the need for accuracy. ‘There are some very knowledgeable readers out there, especially ex-service people, and they are certainly not shy of telling us if something’s incorrect. Any author should contact me first to pitch an idea and be keen enough to write in accordance with our house style guide. Reliability, and keeping to a deadline, are also vital.’ Chris is happy to hear from prospective freelances. ‘Do your homework. As I mentioned, accuracy is key but then again, so are the journalistic basics. And do try to unearth stories that are seldom told, which always heightens reader interest.’ Send a brief stating the proposed story and its components, and sources of imagery. Payment is £60 per 1,000 words, £20 for a colour photo and £10 for black and white. Details: email: [email protected]; website: https://flypast.keypublishing.com/ The Heart Of Aviation Heritage

w w w. Ke y. A e r o

Dutch Fokker D.XXIs vs the Luftwaffe

–

...what you'd see at Dhahran Airport 1969-71

MARCH 2020 £4.90

World-beating jetliner

Can $11.25 Aus $13.25 UK £4.90

FLYPAST CLASSICS

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Write till times are done Silver Apples Magazine is a lively American magazine which bridges literary and genre work with themes and a quirky attitude to what makes good writing. Currently accepting subs for issue thirteen with the theme of ‘Very Superstitious’, the editorial team want genre fiction and poetry, particularly SF, ‘crime, horror, westerns, trashy romance… you name it, we want it!’ The team always publish ‘stories and art across all genres and mediums.’ The team always accept submissions in all genres, including children’s and graphic novels. Submit two short stories or creative non-fiction pieces, or a one-act play, up to 3,000 words. For poetry submit three poems. Submit doc or docx attachments with a short bio (max 50 words). Response ‘might take us a few weeks’. There is only a token payment for first publication righrs. Details: Silver Apples Magazine, email: [email protected] or [email protected]; website: https:// silver-apples.squarespace.com

Big win for unsung hero Jack Fairweather’s The Volunteer wins Costa Book of the Year. The £30,000 prize was awarded for a biography of Polish resistance hero Witold Pilecki. In The Volunteer, former war reporter and Washington Post correspondent Jack uncovered the story of one of WW2’s greatest unsung heroes. Witold Pilecki was an underground resistance operative who volunteered to be imprisoned in Auschwitz, where his activities included sabotaging facilities, murdering Nazi officers, gathering evidence of the mass murder of Jews and getting information to the Allied forces. Sian Williams, chair of the final judges, said: ‘The judges were unanimous in choosing The Volunteer by Jack Fairweather. It’s an incredible story; pacy like a thriller, it reads like fiction and yet it’s not, it is fact. It is a story none of us have read before – this is an extraordinary and important book that people need to read.’ Jack was awarded the £30,000 Costa Book of the Year Award at ceremony that took place one day after the 75th anniversary of the liberation of Auschwitz. APRIL 2020

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WRITERS’ NEWS

FLASHES Win $50 for a short spec fic story between 500 and 5,000 words in Pressfuls Horror and Fantasy Short Story Competition. Entry is free and the closing date is 31 March. Website: https:// writ.rs/pressfuls The Sun newspaper has taken on fifteen trainees after launching a programme in November to improve its diversity and find journalists ‘from all walks of life.’ Five of the new trainees have no journalism experience. Six are from a BAME background. Nine are women. The National Archives’ exhibition With Love: Letters of Love Loss and Longing, which launched on Valentine’s Day and runs until 5 July, includes letters and documents relating to love, including Edward Vlll’s abdication document, the will of Anne Lister, leaving her estate to her partner Ann Walker, and a letter from Dudley, Earl of Leicester, to Elizabeth l where he writes ‘I humbly kiss your foot.’ Never grow up. I don’t mean don’t become an adult with responsibility and the weight of the world on your shoulders. I simply mean if you’re writing or directing give yourself enough time to play. Play the fool. Goad. Shock. Laugh.Trip over something that isn’t there.Try something. And never be afraid to fail.That failure is useful too. It’s just another building block. Ricky Gervais

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GLOBAL LITERARY MARKET Paying more than pennies

UK FICTION MARKET A new chapter for HarperColllins

Jenny Roche

Based in California, the quarterly Threepenny Review accepts submissions of poetry, articles, stories and memoir online or by post and pays $400 per story or article and $200 per poem or Table Talk item. Critical articles may be about books, films, theatre performances, art exhibitions etc and there is a formatting guide on the website. The articles should be in the form of an essay which is ‘broader than the specific event it covers and of interest to people who cannot see the event,’ which does leave the field open to essays on international events. For an idea of articles and other published content selective pieces can be read online. Word limits are 1,200-2,500 words for critical articles, 4,000 words for stories and memoir, 1,000 words for Table Talk pieces and 100 lines for poetry. All submissions must be doc files and while poetry may be single or double spaced, everything else should be double spaced. Simultaneous submissions and work that has been published elsewhere is not wanted. Submit one article, story or memoir only, and group a maximum of five poems into a single document. Include your name and contact details on both your work and the submission form. It is requested you do not submit any further pieces until you have gained a response, which may take two days to two months. If submitting by post include a SAE for a reply and post to: The Editors, The Threepenny Review, PO Box 9131, CA 94709, USA For full details and online submission form see the website: www.threepennyreview.com/submissions.html

Jenny Roche

One More Chapter launched in 2019 as a new digital-first division of HarperCollins that combines HC’s digital imprints Harper Impulse, Killer reads and Avon under one banner. One More Chapter’s mission is to publish the best commercial fiction and be able to respond quickly to trends in the market. Submissions of original, unpublished commercial fiction are welcomed by the team, which has Kimberley Young as publisher and Charlotte Ledger as editorial director. Details: email: onemorechapter@ harpercollins.co.uk; website: www. harpercollins.co.uk

Poets get ready to emerge Win €1,000 for the best poem written for children in the The Caterpillar Poetry Prize 2020. The international poetry competition from Irish story and poem magazine for children The Caterpillar is for a single unpublished poem for children aged 7-11. This year’s competition will be judged by Roger McGough. The winner will receive €1,000 and be published in the summer edition of The Caterpillar. Poems may be of any length and on any subject. The entry fee is €14 per poem. The closing date is 31 March. Website: www.thecaterpillarmagazine.com

Stories to make a meal of After Dinner Conversation is a fascinating concept. The editorial team provide a short story, with accompanying audio and video podcast discussions, with the aim of stimulating ‘deeper discussions with friends and family’. They like work across genres. Each story must be ‘an accessible example of an abstract ethical or philosophical idea and is accompanied by suggested discussion questions.’ Read the guidelines carefully as this team want a specific type of writing and they give three examples to read at the website. They want thoughtful, well-written, stories. Fantasy, biography, western, horror, erotica are all welcome, as long as the story fits their requirements. They do accept children’s stories but read their example first. The team accept writing of any genre, and from any perspective, but it should be interesting as a short story, with ‘a deeper point for a longer discussion’. Lengths required are: children’s stories, under 1,500 words, YA, under 3,500 words, and adult stories, 1,500-10,000 but note that shorter stories – 5,000 words and under – are preferred. Reprints and simultaneous submissions are www.writers-online.co.uk

accepted but ‘no more than three submissions per six months’. Submit well edited work in a standard publishing format, saved as a PDF file, by email: info@ afterdinnerconversation.com Responses have a ‘two-month backlog’. Payment is 1¢ per word (max $50). Website: www.afterdinnerconversation.com

WRITERS’ NEWS

Diversity paramount

UK HORROR MARKET

Plays written in either English or Italian on topics ‘affecting the LGBTQ+ community and the promotion of diversity in love, society, politics and culture’ are invited for the Carlo Annoni Award. There is a prize of €1,000 for the winner in each language category and also special mentions for: • a play on the theme of asylum seekers who leave their country because they are victims of sexual orientation persecution. • a maximum ten-minute play or video on the topic of diversity in schools, clubs, conferences, events and meetings, social media platforms or online. • a LGBTQ+ themed comic play on relationship life. Plays which have been previously staged are eligible and there are no limitations on length or on cast numbers. All entries will be assessed by Award organisers who will be looking for creative content, play form, pertinence with the topic and the play’s social impact. The organisers would like to create a virtual library of plays received. You should say clearly on your application whether you would like your play to be included or not. Submit your work before the deadline of 30 April with your name, email address and a telephone number for any further communication. Email to: [email protected]; website: http:// premiocarloannoni.eu/guidelines/?lang=en

Go dark Gary Dalkin

For 30 years Tartarus Press have produced beautiful editions of classic supernatural tales and work by many of the finest contemporary writers of dark fiction. Run by writers and editors RB Russell and Rosalie Parker, Tartarus has won five World Fantasy Awards, finding mainstream success with the publication of Andrew Michael Hurley’s The Loney, which went on to win the Costa First Novel award. Now Tartarus is marking its anniversary with a volume of contemporary literary strange tales, for which Rosalie Parker is accepting submissions until 10 April. You should send one original, previously unpublished story between 2,000-6,000 words. It must be on the literary strange/horror/supernatural spectrum. Payment will be by a share in profits. Tartarus is also open, without a deadline, for submission of short story collections and novels between 75,000 and 120,000 words. Submissions should be strange, literary supernatural fiction. No high fantasy, violent horror or young adult. Avoid the more cliched trappings of horror fiction. Payment is by negotiation. Do not send a complete manuscript, but rather the first three chapters / three stories, and a synopsis when first getting in contact. All submissions should be sent to rosalieparker@btinternet. com as a doc or rtf attachment. However, if this is not possible please post your submission to Tartarus Press, Details: Coverley House, Carlton, Leyburn, North Yorkshire DL8 4AY; website: www.tartaruspress.com

A call to action

Quiet man, impressive prize The 2020 QuietManDave Prize is a new award in honour of the muchloved Manchester writer and critic Dave Murray. It has first prizes of £1,000 for short-form fiction and non-fiction. Writer, blogger and theatre critic Dave Murray, who died last year aged 53, came to writing later in life and was a lover of flash fiction and non-fiction. The new prize in his memory is being run by Manchester Writing School in association with Manchester School of Theatre. The QuietManDave Prize is for flash fiction and non-fiction up to 500 words. Entries must be original and unpublished, and may be in any form and style. The first prize in each category is £1,000. There are runner-up prizes in each category of £200 and £50. The judges are Kate Feld, Tania Hershman and Shane Kinghorn. The entry fee is £5 per piece of writing. Sponsored entries are available for writers who would struggle to pay the entry fees. The closing date is 17 April. Website: www2.mmu.ac.uk/qmdprize/

Stelliform Press is a new Canadian small indie for novellas, novels, short story collections and creative non-fiction ‘which address our world’s most pressing problems: climate change, ecological destruction, and the effect of these issues on how we relate to each other and to the other beings that live with us in the world’. Practising what they preach, the press has an environmentallyconscious publishing plan, limiting use of paper, which is all recycled, using vegetable inks not polluting metallic ones, using print on demand technology, use of conferencing technology and no air travel for longdistance events. They also participate in the Tree Neutral or Tree Canada Programme to offset their carbon emissions. Works must ‘address environmental issues from many different perspectives and are, foremost, emotional and relational or interconnected narratives which can help us to find the strength and inspiration we need to confront the uncertain future’. Submit genre fiction, science fiction, fantasy, and horror, but ‘literary fiction with some genre crossover’ will also be considered. Lengths are 17,500-39,999 words for novellas, 70,000-100,000 for novels. Short story collection subs, 40,000-60,000 words, open later this year. Send the first 15-20 pages, a short covering letter, explaining the story in under 250 words, its length and genre, a brief statement about the main conflict, and how the story fits the Stelliform vision. Response time is ‘reasonable’. Payment is a Can2¢ per word advance, plus royalties, for first world English electronic and print rights. The contract includes clauses for rights reversion should the author and/or publisher wish to terminate their relationship. Details: Stelliform Press, email subs to: submissions@stelliform. press; website: www.stelliform.press

www.writers-online.co.uk

APRIL 2020

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FLASHES Bitesize Stories runs a monthly flash fiction contest for stories no longer than 999 words, and a drabble contest for stories of exactly 100 words. Entry is free and the outright winner gets £30. Website: www. bitesizestories.co.uk Struggling online retailer The Book People has collapsed owing £2.1 million to creditors. It went into administration in December. Writers Sarah Ladipo Manyika, Will Eaves and Chris Power will join Dr Frances Wilson on the judging panel for this year’s £10,000 Goldsmiths Prize, which celebrates mould-breaking novels. Sarah was shortlisted in 2016 and Will in 2014 and 2018. In 2019, eligibility was extended to international citizens resident in the UK or Ireland. The winner was Lucy Ellman’s Ducks, Newburyport. Submissions, by publishers, close on 27 March. ‘Writers of the quality of Kafka and Gogol do not run away from reality. They have too much integrity, both as artists and human beings, to indulge in escapist flights. Especially sensitive, they are especially vulnerable, and they escape nothing… The artistic value of their work endures because it is also a part of reality. It is conscious, uncompromising, personal, true. It is life.’ Anna Kavan

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GLOBAL LITERARY MARKET Southword bound PDR Lindsay-Salmon

Southword Journal is an Irish print literary journal published by the Munster Literature Centre. The editorial team are proud of the journal’s reputation and welcome international submissions to publish along side their Irish writers. Do read the journal – there is plenty online – to see what they publish. Submissions are open now to fiction submissions; poetry subs open in December. Submit fiction, no more than

5,000 words, or up to six poems, as doc, docx, rtf or txt files. No reprints, multiple or simultaneous subs. Response time is ‘before the end of June’. Payment is €40 per poem and €250 per short story published in our new print editions. Payments to contributors outside Ireland can only be made through Paypal. All contributors also receive a complimentary copy. Website: www.munsterlit.ie/ Southword%20Journal.html

Welsh poetry and a new award The International Welsh Poetry Competition 2020 is open for entries. Running alongside the competition are the inaugural Poetry Book Awards. The judge for the 14th International Welsh Poetry Competition is Sally Spedding. There is a first prize of £500 and second and third prizes of £250 and £100. The winners and seventeen runners-up will be published online and in an anthology. The entry fee is £6 for one poem and different rates for entries of more than one poem. The closing date is 31 May. Website: www.welshpoetry.co.uk • The Poetry Books Awards is a new annual award

for the best poetry books produced by indie writers and self-published authors, or independent and small presses. Both print books and ebooks may be entered. Books may have been published in any year, but must still be in print. The prizes are £200, £100 and £50. Entry is £25. The closing date is 30 June. Website: www.poetrybookawards.co.uk

Go for the big win The Bridport Prize 2020 is inviting international entries The categories are: • Poetry: the prizes are £5,000, £1,000, £500 and 10 x £100. Enter original, unpublished poems up to 42 lines. The entry fee is £10. • Short story: the prizes are £5,000, £1,000, £500 and 10 x £100. Enter original, unpublished short stories for adult readers up to 5,000 words. The entry fee is £12. • Flash fiction: the prizes are £1,000, £500, £250 and 3 x £100. Enter original, unpublished flash fiction up to 250 words. The entry fee is £9. • Peggy Chapman Andrews First Novel Award: the prizes are £1,500 plus a year’s mentoring from The Literary Consultancy and a detailed judge’s critique, £750 plus a full manuscript critique and TLC Industry Day, 3 x £150 plus a 50-page manuscript appraisal and Industry Day. Enter between 5,000 and 8,000 words from the opening of an unpublished manuscript plus a 300-word synopsis. Writers entering must not be represented by a literary agent. The entry fee is £20. • Young Writer Award: a new award for 2020 with a prize of £500 for the highest-placed writer aged 16-25 in any category. • Dorset Award: £100 for the highest-placed writer from Dorset in any category. Winners will be published in an anthology. The closing date is 31 May. Website: www.bridportprize.org.uk

www.writers-online.co.uk

Sharpen your pencils The BPA First Novel Award 2020 is inviting entries. The Bluepencil Agency’s competition for unpublished novelists has a first prize of £1,000 The competition is for unpublished and unrepresented novelists in any genre. The winner gets £1,000 and an introduction to a literary agent. The runner-up prize is a manuscript review and agent introduction, and the third prize is agent introduction. The judges are literary agents Caroline Wood and Carrie Plitt of Felicity Bryant Associates and author Anna Hope. To enter, send the opening chapters up to 5,000 words and a 300-word synopsis of an original, unpublished novel manuscript. Shortlisted writers will be asked to submit 20,000 words. The entry fee is £20 per novel. The closing date is 31 May. Website: https://bluepencilagency.com/

G OW I NRG ITE TO R SM ’N AERW KS ET

ONLINE ARTICLE MARKET Food for houghtCo Gary Dalkin

Established in 1997, ThoughtCo contains over 40,000 articles produced by hundreds of writers, and has over 13 million visitors a month. It is ranked as one of the top ten information sites in the US by comScore. The editorial team, headed by VP and general manager Molly Fergus, associate editor Olivia Valdes and content manager Hildara Araya, are always interested to hear from experienced online freelance writers who can write in-depth well-researched content that leaves readers feeling educated, empowered, and understood. Showing the range of the site, recent articles have included strategies for controlling a drought, a history of flash fiction from Baudelaire to Lydia Davis, a ten-step guide to conflict resolution, an introduction to medical anthropology, and a biography of Russian abstract art pioneer Kazimir Malevich. All these pieces are aimed at the intelligent general reader and range between about 800 and 1,500 words. ThoughtCo publishes articles about Science, Math, Social Sciences, Computer Science, Animals & Nature, History & Culture, Visual Arts, Literature, English, Geography, Philosophy. The site also has a section devoted to learning languages, English as a Second Language, Spanish, French, German, Italian, Japanese, Mandarin and Russian. The Issues section covers Geo-Politics from a US perspective, as well as Women’s Issues, Civil Liberties, Terrorism and more. ThoughCo pays professional US rates by negotiation. As a first step toward writing for the site email [email protected] to introduce yourself and tell the editors about your professional expertise. Don’t pitch a specific article, just explain why you are really knowledgeable about a particularly topic, however obscure. You can see the editorial guidelines, including bios of all the main staff, at www.thoughtco. com/about-us

Stimulate the memory Hippocampus is an online press for books, and associated magazine, both aiming to entertain, educate and engage with quality creative non-fiction. They want work which is ‘quirky… edgy… witty… gritty… smart,’ from diverse voices. They like to ‘root for the underdog, and we appreciate resilience’. Hybrid forms and unique structures which will work online are welcomed. Science, nature, and travel pieces are also welcome if they have a personal element. The magazine enthusiastically welcomes unsolicited, previously unpublished, creative non-fiction, no more than 4,000 words. Memoir excerpts are okay if they are self-contained. Flash non-fiction is welcome, up to 800 words. Submit through the website: www.hippocampusmagazine.com Books can be memoirs, essay collections, personal narratives, or anything that may not yet have found a home because it doesn’t conform to ‘traditional’ standards of topic, format, voice, or style, craft of writing books, and non-fiction for young readers. Book submissions open on 1 August. Submissions are open for two anthologies in the Way Things Were series, reflecting on ‘the good ol’ days (or not)’. Road needs stories about true road trips, from around the globe. Corner needs stories that are set in or revolve around a corner bar/dive bar (or small pub or tavern). Submissions for both should be no more than 5,000 words, submitted by 15 June. Response time is ‘four months’. Payment is $40 for the magazine. $50 for the anthologies. Website: https://books.hippocampusmagazine.com www.writers-online.co.uk

Looking back Your ‘unused’ files may contain work that fits a modern market, suggests Patrick Forsyth I enjoy mixing and comparing notes with other writers and spend regular time so doing. For example, I delight in being one of comparatively few men members of the SWWJ (Society of Women Writers & Journalists), especially when, as recently, I came second in one of their short story competitions. When I thought back to how I had decided on my entry it made me think. I have written a good many short stories, many of which are buried unused in my computer, so I went back to my archive to see if any such met the brief (a story with a twist at the end). Sometimes doing this is unsatisfying – what on earth made me write that? – but it can also be pleasing. I found a forgotten story I had written a couple of years ago, that I liked and which I thought would appeal to the judge. It needed a little editing, partly to adjust the length to make it fit the competition, but also, as ever, because I thought I could improve its flow and description. And it worked (well not producing a win, but close) and a cheque followed. Many writers find this reassessment process useful. Amongst your unused material there may be much that is saleable. Not necessarily as it is, but with some degree of adaptation or editing. Of course, much writing must begin with a blank sheet of paper, but sometimes it can be useful to look back and you may find a significant percentage of mothballed work is saleable. Just because something did not find a home immediately does not mean the idea was rubbish; it may be gold. Look back, adapt and you can create new, usable material, and improve productivity too. APRIL 2020

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WRITERS’ NEWS

FLASHES Sharon Reid, editor of Yours fortnightly, needs treasured photos and the memories of them, 200-250 words, for Year Book 2021. Published memories earn a £10 high street voucher. Details: Yours Magazine, Media House, Peterborough Business Park, Peterborough PE2 6AA; email: yours@ bauermedia.co.uk; website: www. yours.co.uk A website has been setup as a portal for events and commemorations celebrating the life and work of writer and artist Alasdair Gray, who died on 29 December, 2019. The ‘cultural trailblazer’ and Lanark author requested no memorial service of any kind. Glasgow Libraries are hosting a book of condolence and an exhibition of his work is at Glasgow Print Studio until 29 March. Website: http:// thealasdair grayarchive.org I feel more and more that comics are capable of dealing even with the most difficult of subjects – an ability that has to do, I think, with their relative lack of words. Unlike a novel, they can make full use of silence. Pain may be seen in a glance on the faces of their characters; foreboding may be found in the sky and the trees. Rachel Cooke, The Guardian, reviewing Tian Veasna’s Year of the Rabbit

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GLOBAL LITERARY MARKET Head for Southampton PDR Lindsay-Salmon

The Southampton Review is a US literary journal with a fine reputation, publishing ‘fiction, non-fiction, plays, screenplays, poetry, literary cartoons, photography and art’. Its doors are open to writers worldwide whose work is compelling. For fiction submit short stories and novel excerpts, no more than 7,500 words, and flash fiction is welcome. For poetry submit up to five poems, any style. For nonfiction submit memoirs, personal essays, and craft lectures no more than 7,500 words. For plays and screenplays submit no more than twenty pages set out to industry standards. Fine art, photography, illustration, cartoon are always wanted. Submit through the website, www. thesouthamptonreview.com If their monthly quota of 1,000 free submissions has been reached expect to pay a submission fee of $3. Submissions are open 1 Feb-1 April and 15 Aug-15 Oct. Response time is ‘reasonable to slow’. Payment is

$100+ for prose, $75 per poem, $200 for art portfolios and $100 per page for illustrations plus one copy. Online contributors receive a one-year subscription, for the usual first rights.

Ware it’s at There is a prize pot totalling £1,050 on offer in the Ware Poets Open Poetry Competition in addition to a prize of £150 for the winner of the Ware Sonnet Prize. You have until 30 April to submit original unpublished poetry of a maximum fifty lines on any subject. Submissions should not have been placed in any other competition, or be under consideration or accepted elsewhere. Submit poems, max fifty lines, on separate pages without any other form of author identification.

Include that information on your entry form or a separate sheet. If entering for the Ware Sonnet Prize include an ‘S’ in the top right hand corner of your work. The entry fee is £4, £12 for four, £3 each subsequent, in the same submission (cheques to Ware Poets Competition). Include an additional amount of £4 if you would like a copy of Ware Competition Anthology 2020 with the eventual winning and shortlisted poems. Include SAE(s) marked ‘Receipt’ and/or ‘Results’ if you would like to

Be seen at your best The Aesthetica Creative Writing Award is open for entries. The competition, now in its fourtenth year, supports the work of emerging and established writers of prose and poetry. There is a £1,000 prize in both categories. The winners and a further sixty highly commended writers are published in the Aesthetica Creative Writing Anthology. The poetry winner receives a year’s membership of The Poetry Society and the prose winner gets a consultation with Redhammer Management. Winners also receive a selection of titles from Vintage and Bloodaxe Books and a year’s subscription to Granta. Enter poetry up to forty lines and prose fiction up to 2,000 words. The entry fee is £12 per poem and £18 per short story. The closing date is 31 August. Website: www.aestheticamagazine.com/creativewriting-award/

www.writers-online.co.uk

be notified of these. Details: The Competition Secretary, Ware Poets Competition, 21 Trinity Road, Ware SO12 7DB; website: www.poetrypf.co.uk/ comps/ware20.pdf

Gateway for magical realism The Gateway Review: a Journal of Magical Realism is a literary journal publishing ‘the best contemporary magical realism, surrealism, and new fabulism writing’, including poetry and nonfiction about writing the genre. Submissions are open, 15 Jan-15 March, then 15 Aug15 Oct, for ‘work which will blend the magical and the real in some way to lead to some truth about the human condition, all while being attentive to the possibilities of the English language.’ Submit stories, 1,000-4,000 words, non-rhyming poems, up to forty lines, non-fiction, under 1,000 words, on the craft or importance of magic realism, or reviews. Response time is one month. Payment is one copy, plus an ‘Editor’s Choice’ award of $15 for first North American serial rights. Website: https://gatewayreview.wordpress.com

WRITERS’ NEWS

UK QUEER MARKET

Enter the Corpus

Here and queer Tina Jackson

Cipher Press is a new independent publisher of queer fiction and nonfiction. ‘We know this is a broad scope, and in a way that’s intentional,’ said co-publisher Jenn Thompson. ‘We want to publish the many different stories that make up the queer community, whether they take the form of short stories, sci-fi, crime fiction, essays, experimental writing, memoirs, or anything in between. Our one stipulation is that our books fit somewhere within the literary bracket. We’re not looking to publish poetry, YA, or children’s literature at this time.’ The first Cipher Press title will appear in the summer. ‘We wanted to start a queer press for a long time, mostly as a response to the lack of dedicated queer publishing in the UK,’ said Jenn. ‘We started seriously thinking about it in 2019, and now will publish our first book in August 2020. It feels like the right time; independent publishing is thriving, and readers generally seem more open to books by diverse and underrepresented authors.’ Jenn points to the lack of queer owned and queer run publishing houses in the UK as another driving factor behind the launch of Cipher Press. ‘In the 1980s and 90s there were quite a few but they don’t exist anymore,’ she said. ‘Now seems like a great time to launch something new, something updated that reflects the way our community has evolved and changed. There is a huge push for diversity coming from the big publishing houses at the moment, but small presses have always championed minority voices. The world of independent publishing is a huge inspiration to us, and we’re excited to be publishing alongside so many incredible indie presses.’ The Cipher Press team have worked in publishing, editorial, and design for years. ‘We feel like we just about have the experience to launch Cipher Press. I’m sure it will be a steep learning curve, but we’re ready for it.’ Initially Cipher Press will be publishing three or four books a year. ‘But we hope to grow this number as Cipher Press evolves,’ said Jenn. ‘We hope the press helps to encourage a new queer literary scene in the UK, and that we can work alongside other incredible publishers, literary mags, and organisations to boost the voices of our authors and to publish more great books. We’re really excited by all the support and enthusiasm we’ve had so far, and our hope is that Cipher Press will not only find amazing new authors but keen new readers. We have a lot of plans and projects on the go and are absolutely thrilled to be bringing Cipher into the world.’ A submission window is open until the end of March. ‘We say on our website that we’re, “looking for stories that transcend genres and explore the many dimensions of queer identity.” We’re aware that queer stories aren’t always straightforward, and so we’re open to any high-quality writing by queer authors that reflects some aspect of the queer experience. The LGBTQI+ community is hugely diverse, and we expect our catalogue to be the same. We’re especially keen to publish work from BAME/POC, working class, trans and gender non-conforming authors.’ Cipher Press is looking for writers with fresh slants and original ways of telling their stories. ‘A good book for us is honest, weird, smart, original, and unique. We like old stories told in new ways and characters we can relate to. You can win us over with a perfect sentence; we’re very focused on the writing as well as the plot. Ultimately, a good book can be of any genre as long as it affects us in some way.’ Jenn is happy for writers to rip up the rule book. ‘Our advice would be to be bold and take risks. To try and tell the story you want to tell as honestly as possible. To drift away from the mainstream and from literary conventions. And to just write whatever you want, whether that be erotica, a western, or an experimental essay. Or a mixture of all three.’   Submit by sending the first three chapters of a novel, or the first twenty pages if the work is nonfiction, along with a brief synopsis and bio. Cipher Press will publish in print and ebook, and pay and advance and royalties. Details: email: [email protected]; website: www.cipherpress.co.uk www.writers-online.co.uk

Submissions are open for two anthologies from Corpus Press, pubishers of horror and weird fiction, ‘modern pulp that emphasises plot over gore’. Needing submissions are: • Two-Page Terrors, deadline 31 March, for either serious or comedic/bizarre horror, 400-550 words. • In Darkness, Delight: Fear the Future (Vol 3), is for ‘truly terrifying stories that deal with futuristic themes, set in the near future or far’, whether earth-based or extraterrestrial. Post-apocalyptic stories will not be accepted and the editors are ‘more interested in “fiction” than “science”’ and ‘this is a horror anthology first and foremost, not a science fiction anthology’. Submit stories, 2,500-4,000 words, by 15 November. Submissions are currently closed to novella, collections and Kindle Shorts submissions. Payment for Two-Page Terrors is $5 for world rights. Payment for In Darkness, Delight is 3¢ per word up to $150 plus two free copies. Website: www.corpuspress.com

Poetry from wise women Believing older women ‘have a lot to say, and they say it with style’ the independent Grey Hen Press Poetry Competition is for women over the age of sixty years and there are prizes of £100, £50 and £25 for first, second and third winners. If you reach your sixtieth year by the end of June 2020 you are eligible for the competition. Poems should be a maximum forty lines, be previously unpublished and not have been accepted for future publication. Your name and contact details should appear on the entry form only and this is available from the website or by post with an SAE. The closing date for submissions is 30 April and entry fees are £3 per poem or £10 for four poems with cheques being made payable to ‘Grey Hen Press’. The results will be posted on the website by 30 June. As email entries will not be accepted post your work with an SAE marked ‘Results’ if this is required. As no entries will be returned, keep a copy. Details: Grey Hen Press, PO Box 269, Kendal, Cumbria LA9 9FE; website: www.greyhenpress.com

Exciting voices for Brick Lane The 2020 Brick Lane Bookshop Short Story Prize is looking for new, original and diverse voices in UK fiction. The winner will get £1,000. There are second and third prizes of £250 and £100. The winning and longlisted stories will be published in the Brick Lane Bookshop Short Story Prize Anthology. The judges are Dialogue Books publisher Sharmaine Lovegrove, literary agent Harriet Moore and Chris Power, author of the short story collection Mothers. Enter original, unpublished short stories for adult readers between 1,000 and 5,000 words. The entry fee is £10 per story. The closing date is 15 May. Website: www.bricklanebookshop.org/ APRIL 2020

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WRITERS’ NEWS

FLASHES Farnham Flash Fiction Competition has a first prize of £75 and a runnerup prize of £25. The best entry featuring Farnham will win a special £25 prize. The competition will be judged by author Joanna Barnard. The entry fee is £5 per story. The closing date is 23 June. Website: https://writ.rs/ farnhamflashfic The Plot Against America, Philip Roth’s 2004 alternative history novel, has been adapted by David Simon (The Wire) into a six-part HBO mini-series. It follows a workingclass Jewish family in New Jersey as aviator and xenophobic populist Charles Lindbergh becomes president and turns the US toward fascism. Starring Zoe Kazan, Winona Ryder and John Turturro, it premieres on 16 March in the US, and comes to Sky Atlantic in autumn. ‘This is an industry full of people who are unashamed enthusiasts for books and reading in every form. To step into this world after so many years outside it, and find so many kindred spirits, is intoxicating.’ Private Eye writer and QI researcher Andrew Hunter Murray on publishing his debut novel, The Last Day

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GLOBAL SPECFIC MARKET

Have a healthy approach Jenny Roche

A bimonthly lifestyle magazine ‘promoting physical health, mental agility and spiritual balance from a practical Christian point of view’ Vibrant Life is looking for articles that have an informal style, are interesting, easy to read and avoid medical jargon. ‘We especially like features on the latest breakthroughs in medicine, health, nutrition and exercise and interviews with leading personalities on health topics.’ Articles are welcome promoting a happy, healthy outlook and pieces are preferred with a positive, holistic approach to the topic and show the benefits to readers. Particular areas of interest are articles on health, exercise, nutrition, self help, family, spiritual balance, challenges and triumphs, environmental stewardships, informational articles, interviews and profiles. Feature articles should be a maximum 1,000 words and if informational should include at least one sidebar. Short articles of 450-650 words are always in demand. Any information used must be reliable and be correctly documented if scientific in nature. For all submissions a doc file is preferred. There is no need to pitch ideas here so submit your

completed article with your contact details and the rights you are offering. Payments rates for first world serial rights and reprint rights are $100-$300 and three complimentary copies of your published article. Previously published articles will be considered for a lower fee. Submit completed articles to: heather.quintana@ pacificpress.com Website: www.vibrantlife.com

GLOBAL LITERARY MARKET

Black Mountain days Gary Dalkin

Based in Asheville, North Carolina, The Black Mountain Press is a small non-profit independent literary publisher now in its 26th year. The focus is on collections of poetry, memoirs, literary novels and collections of short stories. The editors seek the highest quality literary fiction, creative non-fiction and poetry, works with a distinct voice and vision. No children’s or young adult literature, plays or self-help books. The editors say ‘We do not publish romance, science fiction, thrillers, detective fiction, horror stories, westerns, unless written in a unique, literary, never seen before, style.’ Submissions must be either by post to The Black Mountain Press, PO 9907, Asheville, NC 28815, USA, or via the Submittable here: https:// thehalcyone.submittable.com/submit/107991/submissions-to-the-blackmountain-press. Note, there is an $8 fee for online submission, but this is less than the cost of posting a manuscript to the USA. There is no charge for postal submissions. All submissions must be at least 64 pages. Response time is around six months. If you have not had a reply by then contact the Black Mountain Press, email: [email protected] The press is part of the Flood Fine Art Center, and also publishes a quarterly literary magazine, The Halcyone. Find out more on the website: www. thehalcyone.com

www.writers-online.co.uk

Bathtime rota The Bath Short Story Award 2020 is inviting entries. Win a first prize of £1,000 in the international competition for unpublished short fiction Now in its seventh year, the Bath Short Story Award is for original, unpublished short fiction up to 2,200 words on any theme or subject. This year’s shortlist judge is agent Kate Johnson from Mackenzie Wolf Literary Agency. There is a first prize of £1,200, a second prize of £300 and a third prize of £100. There is also a £100 Acorn Award for the best entry by an unpublished writer and a runner-up prize of £50 in book tokens from Mr B’s Emporium of Books in Bath. The entry fee is £8 per story. The closing date is 20 April 2020. Website: www. bathshortstoryaward.org

WRITERS’ NEWS

INTRODUCTIONS Writing Magazine presents a selection of pet publications currently accepting contributions. We strongly recommend that you read back issues, familiarise yourself with their guidelines before submitting and check websites for submission details.

UK ONLY

£1,250-worth

OF GIVEAWAYS ● Cat beds ● Dental OVER care kits 75 PRIZES ● Cat blankets ● Food and treats ● Books ● Cat care bundles UK ONLY

BRITAIN’S BEST-SELLING LLING

CAT MAGAZINE ZINE

CAREERS WITH CATS Being an RSPCA instructor

I’m seeing the world, one cat at a time

The cat cafe tour

NOT TO WORRY MAKE YOUR CAT LESS STRESSED

Visiting the country’s cat cafes

Interview with:

The Cat Man of Aleppo R11

March 2020 £4.50 03

9 771353 260175

BREED FOCUS: THE RARE AND DELIGHTFUL EGYPTIAN MAU

1 YC Cover Mar20 CS MH.indd 1

31/01/2020 14:37

The Bark (featured in WM Nov 19) has ceased print production from the March 2020 issue and is now a digital-only brand aimed at modern dog owners and enthusiasts. Feature content is based round a dog-owning lifestyle and the bonds between dogs and humans, ie not specific breed advice. Topics covered in thebark.com include food, health, training, activities and dog-related news. Editor in chief Claudia Kawczynska is currently accepting submissions of online content tailored for The Bark’s intelligent and culture-savvy readership. Details: email: [email protected]; website: https://thebark.com/

Parrots magazine, edited by John Catchpole, covers everything of interest to Psittacine breeding tips people owning and caring for Lovely lories Their fascinating colours pet parrots and and behaviour The value of light parakeets. Feature Favoured desertion content includes The power of GSE Spike the expert advice Caique on parrot health The Grey-breasted Parakeet and care as well as accounts of life with parrots, personalities in the parrot world and parrot-related clubs, shows and activities. John is happy to accept pitches from writers with specialist knowledge. Contact him with ideas through the website. Payment varies. Website: www.parrotmag.com THE WORLD’S LEADING MAGA ZINE ON PARROTS AND PARAKEETS

Issue 266

March 2020

www.parrotmag.com

Planning the year ahead

Vitamin D & calcium

My bird’s gone off me!

Its effectiveness against pathogens

Some more of his story

03>

How nest boxes came to the rescue

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Your Cat, edited by Michael Hallam, is the UK’s bestselling cat The travelling cat sitter: magazine, packed with practical information How cats New series! change about cat care, health people’s lives and wellbeing plus inspiring tales of cats and their relationships with their owners. Michael is happy to accept contributions of True Cat Tales – real life stories about people’s cats (500 words, usually paid at £40); short fictional stories about cats (500-1000 words, usual rate £80-£100) and feature ideas from experienced journalists or cat professionals which should be pitched as ideas in the first instance. He also accepts submissions for My First Cat (recounting the story of your first cat) and Golden Oldie (telling us about your cat who is over twelve years old) and these contributions are voluntary. Details: email: [email protected]; website: www.yourcat.co.uk FREE collector’s badge!

magazine

Parrots on Facebook – www.facebook.com/ParrotsMagazine

Pets Magazine is a free digital pets and lifestyle magazine edited by Marie CarterRobb with a growing monthly readership of 24,000. The magazine features new and luxury products, pampering for people and their pets, pet friendly reviews, activities for pets and owners as well as pets in the news, advice columns, health and wellbeing tips, pet owning celebrities, other news and informative articles of interest to pet owners. Marie accepts contributions on a voluntary basis from freelancers and is happy to consider all submissions, particularly those with accompanying good high resolution images. Details: [email protected]; website: www.petsmag.co.uk

Reptiles is an international, bimonthly magazine that covers all aspects of owning and caring for reptiles and amphibians. The content is aimed at beginners as well as experienced herp owners, and features on the herp care make up the bulk of the content. Breeding, experiencing herps in the wild, herp healthcare and herp conservation are also popular topics. Pitches for feature articles in these areas are welcomed, with detailed guidelines available for writers. Payment for a 2,000-5,000 word article with photos is $300. Details: email: reptileseditorial@gmail. com; website: www.reptilesmagazine.com Animal Wellness is the US’s number one natural health magazine for pets, with an aim to provide helpful educational advice to pet owners to help animals lead happy, healthy lives. Coverage includes animal wellbeing as well as physical healthcare. Pitches and completed article submissions with the focus on holistic health care for pet animals are welcomed. The usual length is 500 to 1,500 words and all healthcare facts and statistics should be accurate and come from accredited sources. Payment is for all rights. Submit ideas or completed articles through the website. Website: https:// animalwellnessmagazine.com/

The mystery of travel The Globe Soup Spring 2020 Travel Writing Competition is a new non-fiction contest with a mystery theme. The theme will be revealed when writers enter the competition. The winner will receive £1,000 and Globe Soup will print their entry. Enter original, unpublished non-fiction

travel writing in any form, including personal essay, destination piece and opinion piece. Entries must be no longer than 1,000 words. The entry fee is £5 per piece up to 1 March, and then £8. The closing date is 1 April. Website: www.globesoup.net

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FLASHES Woman’s Weekly women’s magazine lifestyle director Geoffrey Palmer invites reader input. His remit includes recipes, craft makes, puzzles and books. Details: 161 Marsh Wall, London E14 9AP; tel: 020 3148 500; email: WomansWeekly PostBag@ ti-media.com; website: www. womansweekly. com YouWriteOn, the manuscript development community led by Bloomsbury and Orion, which offered critiques from publishers themselves for the highest rated stories, has closed. The website, www. youwriteon.com, remains online as an archive. Kitty Flanagan has won the inaugural $5,000 Booktopia Favourite Australian Book award, for her book 488 Rules for Life. The award, which replaces Booktopia’s annual Australia’s Favourite Author poll, was determined by an online public vote. Kitty beat Rachael Johns’ Just One Wish and the young adult edition of Heather Morris’s The Tattooist of Auschwitz. She sold 99,500 copies between October and December 2019. ‘I frequently don’t finish books. I used to feel obliged, but now I think life is too short. If they haven’t grabbed me by page 100 they are off the pile. I feel it’s mean to name them, though.’ Jojo Moyes

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GLOBAL HISTORY MARKET

Take a trip back in time Jenny Roche

Based in North America and published six times a year, History Magazine aims to publish articles that are more interesting than academic. ‘We prefer that our articles be wrapped around a particular phenomenon, achievement or occasion… we like it when an item or custom that’s now part of our lives is taken and the story of how it came to be is told.’ Articles should not be first person narratives and should generally be focused on an era between the fall of the Roman Empire and the end of the 1950s. Check out the website for examples of articles used. At the moment the magazine is only accepting queries so rather than submitting a completed piece email a brief descriptive proposal of your idea along with a proposed word count of a preferred 2,000 words. There is also a preference for the inclusion of suggested section headings and a list of reading recommendations. A research sources list is not required but it is suggested you keep hold of such a list in case it is later requested. You may include as many images as you think necessary so long as these are copyright free or you have written permission from the copyright holder to use them. Payment rates for first world and electronic rights is 8¢ per word and $7 for any image which is used. Writers from America and Canada are paid in their own currency and writers from other countries may be paid in their currency by negotiation. Send your query with ‘History Magazine Query’ in the subject line to: edward@ moorshead.com Website: www.history-magazine.com/anotes.html

CHRONIC CONDITIONS

The Barbellion Prize is a literary new prize dedicated to work that furthers ill and disabled voices in writing will be awarded in 2021 The awarded work may be in any genre: fiction, memoir, biography, poetry, critical non-fiction. It may be traditionally or self-published. It is named in honour of the diarist WNP Barbellion, who wrote about living with multiple sclerosis before his death in 1919, and will be awarded for an author’s presentation of life with a long-term chronic illness or disability. Authors who are not ill may enter works that articulate life with illness but authors who suffer from illness or disability will take priority in the expression of their experience and selection for the prize. The prize money is £600. Entered works should be published this year. The closing date is 31 October. Website: www.thebarbellionprize.com

Nature poets take flight The Rialto Nature and Place Poetry Competition 2020 is open for entries. There is a £1,000 first prize in the contest for poems that deal with any aspect of nature. Poetry journal The Rialto works with the RSPB, Birdlife International and the Cambridge Conservation Initiative to present its prize for poems that explore nature. There is a first prize of £1,000, a second prize of £500 and a third prize of £250. There is an additional prize of a personal tour of East Anglia with celebrated nature writer Mark Cocker. The judge is Pascale Petit. Enter original, unpublished poems up to 40 lines. The entry fee for the first poem is £7, and £4 for subsequent poems. Up to six poems may be entered in one batch. The closing date is 1 May 2020. Website: www.therialto.co.uk

POEMS IN PRINT The Rialto Open Pamphlet Competition 2020 is inviting entries. Enter 18-24 pages of original poetry. Individual poems may have been published in magazines and anthologies but not in a pamphlet or collection. The winner’s poetry pamphlet will be published by The Rialto and they will be given a launch event and www.writers-online.co.uk

up to £200 in travel expenses. The winner and three runners up will have a poem published in The Rialto, and the shortlisted poets will have a poem published online. The competition judge is poet Will Harris. Entry is £24 per pamphlet. The closing date is 15 May. Website: www.therialto.co.uk

WRITERS’ NEWS

GLOBAL LITERARY MARKET Make your words sing PDR Lindsay-Salmon

Clare Songbirds publishes work by poets and writers as limited edition fine art volumes. They publish chapbook manuscripts and art quality poetry broadsides in ‘an accessible way to promote the art of words in order to resonate with, and impact on, readers not yet familiar with the siren song of poets and writers’. Manuscripts are considered on a rolling basis throughout the year from 1 January to 1 November. Some previously published poems, stories, essays, excerpts may be included in the manuscript, but provide those details in the body of your email. Submissions are open for non-fiction and short fiction chapbooks of no more than 40 pages; full-length poetry collections may be submitted after 1 July. Submit by email, as an attached doc, docx or pdf file. A cover letter is not required but chat about a writer’s literary process and goals, and how they heard of the press, are welcomed. Response time is 8-12 weeks. Payment and rights are discussed with the contract. Details: Clare Songbirds Publishing House, email: [email protected]; website: www. claresongbirdspub.com

Dearly anticipated Margaret Atwood’s first poetry collection in 13 years, Dearly, will be published in November. Her first collection, Double Persephone, came out in 1961. The new volume will explore ‘absences and endings, ageing and retrospection’. Speaking for publisher Chatto & Windus, editor Becky Hardie said, ‘Every poem in Dearly rings with all Margaret Atwood’s characteristic curiosity and energy ... It is a pure delight which stretches heart and mind.’ The book will address environmental themes, and also feature, ‘werewolves, sirens, aliens and dreams.’ Margaret, who recently shared the Booker prize with Bernardine Evaristo for her sequel to The Handmaid’s Tale, will narrate the audio book version herself.

FOR RAZOR SHARP NOIR CRIME Switchblade has an editor who loves ‘punk noir.’ he calls his magazine ‘a cutting edge magazine of noir, featuring no-limit outlaw fiction.’ He doesn’t want ‘police procedurals, or cosy murder mysteries.’ He wants ‘a twisting crime culture story that’s 100 proof, and far too prurient and politically-incorrect for the herbal tea crowd at Ellery Queen.’ Please do check out the website and read what’s there. Study the guidelines, the editor is open to new submissions in April. Submit dark and twisty tales through the website: www.switchblademag.com;

Comic line up The next BBC Script Room submission window will be for comedy scripts, and will open on 23 March. Writers identified through the open submission window will be invited to take part in the Comedy Room, which is a sixmonth development programme that includes monthly meetings, targeted training and workshops, as well as networking opportunities. The BBC is looking for distinctive new voices in comedy writing. To submit, send a comedy script of at least thirty pages for TV, film, radio, stage or online. The submission window will open on 23 March, and close on 20 April. Website: https://writ.rs/ comedyscriptroom

www.writers-online.co.uk

Novel Ideas Surprise yourself A bit of bravery goes a long way, says Lynne Hackles I’ve a little book in which I write down quotes that appeal to me. Most of them are about writing. All of them are positive. They are there to remind me to never give up, to stay cheerful and to believe you’re never too old to have a new dream. I read through them often and close the book feeling good. When I see something that inspires me, be it a few words, a poem or a long quote, I add it to my book. Recently I added a new one to the collection. It was from the late Denholm Elliot, an actor who was rarely off television and also appeared in many films. He said, ‘Surprise yourself every day with your own courage.’ I could have done with that quote when I started out and worried far too much about sending out any work. Then, one day, someone said, ‘The editor wouldn’t know you from Adam.’ Yes, we’ve all heard that one but on that day it meant a lot to me. I imagined the editor opening my work and reading it. They’d look at the name and it would mean nothing to them. They didn’t have a picture of me. They didn’t know me. They couldn’t point at me in the street and say, ‘She’ll never write as long as there’s a hole in her head.’ It was a light bulb moment. My stories could be sent out to markets and, in spite of having my name on them, they’d be anonymous to the editor. My work went out. Acceptances came in. I surprised myself with my own courage and became a writer. You can do the same. Why not start your own book of positive quotes. You could begin with, ‘Surprise yourself every day with your own courage.’ Then you act on it. NOVEMBER MARCH 2019 2019

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FLASHES Rosie Nixon is editor in chief of weekly Hello! magazine, but editorial queries should be addressed to Holly NesbittLarking, tel: 0207 667 8721; email: holly. nesbitt-larking@ hellomagazine. com Details: HELLO! magazine, Wellington House, 69-71 Upper Ground, London SE1 9PQ. After stints as WH Smith High Street head of children’s books, adult fiction and non-fiction, Lucy Swinburn is now the chain’s overall head of books. She replaces Pete Selby, who has left to ‘pursue other opportunities’. The US Andrew Carnegie Medal for Excellence in Fiction, 2020, has gone to Lost Children Archive by Valeria Luiselli. The Andrew Carnegie Medal for Excellence in Nonfiction was won by Midnight in Chernobyl by Adam Higginbotham. ‘All of my books, at their heart, are about loneliness. About feeling outside of the normal human experience, of feeling disconnected, dissociated... I’m not interested in displaying brains and education or class. I’m interested in the underneath of everything, the inside of everything.’ Eimear McBride

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UK NON-FICTION MARKET Hero born of Legend Tina Jackson

Hero Press is a new imprint from Legend Press that will publish non-fiction books to inspire, provoke conversation and spark ideas. ‘We are invested in discovering new voices within general non-fiction, well-being, gift, popular science and culture,’ said Legend’s product and development manager Liza Paderes. ‘We are open to any kind of nonfiction content, as long as it’s inspiring or motivational – anything from business, science, psychological, cultural, biographies or mind, body and spirit/well-being. Hero evolved from the Legend Business imprint. ‘Under that we have published a variety of books with educational, corporate and non-fiction trade appeal,’ said Liza. ‘The seeds of development began quite organically early last year, when we had the opportunity to publish some special-interest titles, such as Conquer the Web (Legend Business) and The Hockneys (Legend Press). With the acquirement of University of Buckingham Press (UBP) in spring 2019, we felt that our business titles would have a better fit under that imprint, giving us some the freedom to create a brand new non-fiction imprint to suit both our trade business titles and our new inspirational acquisitions.’ Hero is looking to publish 7-8 titles in 2020, with the plan to publish 10-12 each year for the first three years. ‘We are focused on building a reputable list and establishing Hero as a publisher who produces essential reading for stimulating and motivating change. It would also be great to have a prize-winning title in the future, such as the Baillie Gifford Prize.’ Hero Press is currently open for submission. ‘I’m looking for titles which are inspirational and entertaining

Grow your own collection

regardless of subject matter,’ said Liza. ‘It can be business, cultural, or psychological but it has to have an essence or spark that will propel the reader to be inspired and to motivate conversations with friends, family and colleagues. A good book will takes the reader on a compelling journey. It has to be written well and have a purpose to it. To tell a story, to advice, to inform, or provide a compelling argument or debate.’ Good non-fiction need to be written with a reader in mind, says Liza. ‘What’s your motivation for writing a book? What is the main aim of the book to the reader? Asking these questions should help you to identify who your reader is. All of your content should then be created and curated with that reader in mind, which will help the publisher to market and sell your book. Also remember that writing non-fiction is like fiction: you are telling a story that needs to have a beginning, a middle, and an end.’ To submit, email a detailed synopsis and the first three chapters with an introductory statement containing information about why you think Hero Press is the right publisher for you, details of any previous publications and competition successes and the names of at least two comparable titles published in the last five years that are similar in style, subject matter and/or readership. Hero Press will publish in various formats. Contracts are individually negotiated. Details: email: [email protected]; website: www. legendpress.co.uk

Test the climate

erbacce-press is inviting entries for the erbacce prize for poetry 2020. The winner will be awarded a publishing contract for a collection with erbaccepress. Two runners up will be considered for publication of a collection or chapbook. Four other entrants will be featured poets in issues of the quarterly in-house journal erbacce. To enter, send five pages of poetry. Some poems may have been previously published but some must be unpublished. Entry is free. The closing date is 8 May. Website: http://erbacce-press. webeden.co.uk/

The Everything Change Climate Fiction Contest 2020 from the Imagination and Climate Futures Initiative at Arizona State University is inviting entries of eco-fiction for its third competition. There is a first prize of $1,000 and nine runners-up prizes of $100. Winners will be published in a digital anthology. The lead judge is Claire Vaye Watkins, author of Gold Fame Citrus. Enter original, unpublished short fiction in any genre up to 5,000 words. Entry is free. The closing date is 15 April. Website: https://climateimagination. asu.edu/clificontest/

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Get in with the outsiders The theme for the Momaya Short Story Competition 2020 is ‘Outsiders’. The international competition invites original, unpublished stories up to 3,000 words. Stories may have been previously published as long as the writer holds copyright. The prizes are $150, $75 and $35. Winners and seven honourable mentions will be published in the Momaya Short Story Review 2020. The entry fee is $14. The closing date is 30 April. Website: https:// momayapress.com/

WRITERS’ NEWS

INTERNATIONAL ZINE SCENE US website McSweeney’s Internet Tendency provides ‘Daily humor almost every day’. Read the content at the website and the extensive guidelines, which are both informative and an excellent example of the kind of humour and writing that they are looking for. Submit in the body of an email to the address for each section. Sections include humorous lists, ‘Reviews of New Food’ and ‘Open Letters to People or Entities Who Are Unlikely to Respond’. Timely submissions are welcome for topical news responses. Keep work to a maximum 1,200 words but note that shorter pieces are more readily accepted. Average response time is ‘7.39 days’. There is payment for all accepted work, for first rights. Website: www.mcsweeneys.net The Squeaky Times is Australia’s satirical and humorous ‘Not The Real News’ website. Read the content and guidelines at the website, then submit ‘satirical nonsense’ in the form of fake news articles, 25-300 words. The team want humour but not ‘gore, erotica, political extremism, racism, homophobia, etc’. Submit a doc or rtf file or paste into the email body. Response time is ‘around three weeks’. Payment is $2.50. Details: The Squeaky Times, email: [email protected]; website: https://thesqueakytimes.com

The Forge Literary Magazine is ‘open to all genres and voices, and stories with any background, race, ethnicity, gender, sexual and personal identity from all over the world’. Each submission is read anonymously by a rotating cast of editors

with ‘wide-ranging and eclectic tastes’. Submit fiction and nonfiction, not over 5,000 words and preferably under 3,000. Flash and micro prose are particularly welcome. Submit through the website, where there is a submission fee after the first of each month. Response time is ‘currently four to eight months.’ Payment is $60 per piece regardless of length, ‘for exclusive worldwide English language rights for a period of three months.’ Website: https://forgelitmag.com

Eternal Haunted Summer is an ezine of poetry and short fiction about the heroes and divine entities of the world’s many pagan traditions. Everything published must have a pagan focus or otherwise interest its pagan readership. Issues are themed. Submissions open 1 May-1 June for the summer, ‘Holy Days’ issue, for explorations of holy days, sacred festivals, and important dates, from Beltane to Walpurgisnacht, Dia de Muertos to Diwali, in fiction, poems or essays. Pagan and spiritual topics are welcome, but not ‘Atlantis, Mu, UFOs, aliens, or subterranean civilisations’ There is no length limit, but under 5,000 words is preferred. The team are interested in essays which ‘address the nature of the deities, the mythologies of the various pantheons, folklore, ritual, etc’, and stories and poems in any form or genre, ‘provided the deities and heroes are treated respectfully’. Submit one story, up to three reviews, or up to three poems, per submission period, as an attached rtf, txt or doc file, by email: [email protected] Response time is ‘reasonable’. Payment is $5 per piece for first electronic publishing rights Website: https://eternalhauntedsummer.com Malefaction is a new Edinburghbased magazine of ‘genre fiction with a criminal twist’. Any genre is acceptable, but all submssions must feature a crime or be related to crime in some way, eg stories set in a courtroom, or featuring a forensic www.writers-online.co.uk

by PDR Lindsay-Salmon

scientist protagonist, or about a victim. The team want writers who can ‘explore the huge potential of crime fiction through genre blending’, although pure crime stories are accepted too. Each issue has a theme, which can be interpreted broadly. Give them ‘characters whose identities and/or cultural/ ethnic backgrounds have historically been marginalised, erased from, or misrepresented within crime and genre fiction’ and break the trope rules. Submit one or two short stories, no more than 2,000 words or one to three flash fiction pieces under 750 words. Poetry, no more than five poems, may be in any style. Submit a doc or docx by email: [email protected] Response time is ‘reasonable’. Payment is £20/€22 per short story, £15/€17 per flash fiction; and £10/€11 per poem for the usual rights. Website: www.malefactionmag.com

3:AM Magazine is a US online journal of radical literature and philosophy. The editorial team know exactly what they want: there are clear and specific guidelines at the website. It publishes literary criticism, fiction, poetry and ‘interviews with writers, philosophers and intellectuals’. Fiction and poetry will re-open in April if they manage to clear the backlog. Non-fiction subs are open now. Submit pitches and queries to the relevant editor or [email protected] Website: www.3ammagazine.com Whales of Arcadia is a fledgling literary magazine with an editorial team which ‘appreciates literature, classicism, and art’. It needs submissions which the writer ‘really cared about writing’. Submit no more than five poems, maximum ten pages, up to 6,000 words of prose (one short story or three flash pieces); no genre work for non-fiction avoid academic style Submit all work in a single doc or pdf file through the website, https://whalesofarcaida. art.blog (sic) Response time is 2 to 4 months. Payment and rights are decided on acceptance. APRIL 2020

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FLASHES A new Australian literary award offers an Aus$15,000 prize for unpublished fiction or creative non-fiction, up to 5,000 words, on the theme of ‘Australian life’, by writers resident in Australia. The winner of the Furphy Literary Award will also receive a university residency opportunity and chance to get published. There is no entry fee and the closing date is 30 April. Website: www. furphystory.com.au A Gallup poll revealed that last year the average American visited a library more often than they went to cinemas, concerts, museums or sports events. Not only that, but as Gallup noted, ‘Despite the proliferation of digital-based activities over the past two decades – including digital books, podcasts, streaming entertainment services and advanced gaming – libraries have endured as a place Americans visit nearly monthly on average.’ ‘Years of always chasing your quarry and looking for a glimpse – for one of those very special moments when you suddenly see the full man. It can be a story detail or a snippet you find in the archive.’ Journalist and author Jack Fairweather on the five years that went into writing the Costa Book of the Year-winning The Volunteer.

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GLOBAL BIZARRO MARKET

You bring your good thing Gary Dalkin Founded in 1999 in Portland, Oregon, Eraserhead Press is an independent publisher of bizarro fiction, by which they mean the weird, the surreal and the unclassifiable. In two decades they have published over 400 books by around 150 authors, including Piers Anthony, Carlton Mellick III, Brian Keene, Molly Tanzer, JF Gonzalez and Laura Lee Bahr. From 1 April to 30 June, Eraserhead has an open window for submissions, and head editor Rose O’Keefe will be looking for original novellas and novels, 20,000-100,000 words. She says, ‘We want surprising, unique, well-crafted weird stories with compelling plots, eccentric characters, and never-before-seen concepts. We want a balance of both plot and character – we love weird characters with weird problems in weird places. We are looking for exciting concepts that make people say “I have to read that!” and well-developed characters they can fall in love with along the way.’ She adds, ‘We’re most drawn to darkly absurd tales that are addictive to read and contain a strong emotional core. We love fiction that is both heart-rending and fun. While it may or may not be funny, we are interested in more than just a joke. If you can make us both laugh and cry or creep us out and draw us in, we will love your book.’ Submit quality, original (in every sense) boundary-pushing weird fiction; no simultaneous submissions, story collections, non-fiction, poetry or comics/graphic novels, reprints or experimental formatting. Eraserhead Press pay a 50% net royalty on both print and digital on worldwide print and ebook English-language rights. All other rights remain with the author. Submit by email as a doc, docx or rtf attachment. In the body include an author bio and a 3-5 sentence summary of your book written like a back cover description. Also attach a onepage synopsis of your novel or novella. All submissions will receive a response by 31 July. Details: Eraserhead Press, PO Box 10065, Portland, OR 97296, USA; follow the full guidelines at https:// eraserheadpress.com/submissions/

GLOBAL LITERARY MARKET

Aim for the crown Gary Dalkin Persea Books is a New York-based publisher of literary fiction and creative non-fiction. Co-founder and editorial director Karen Braziller and poetry editor Gabriel Fried are pleased to receive enquiries from unagented authors. They will consider literary fiction including short story collections, creative non-fiction, memoirs, biography, literary criticism, and books on contemporary issues – feminism, LGBTQI+, multicultural, etc. They will also consider literary young adult fiction. Most of all Persea is looking for the ‘fresh voice, a clear point of view, the well-written work that will endure.’ They will publish debut books and stay with an author through further works. Persea Books have published several hundred titles to date, notably works by Anzia Yezierska, Christine de Pizan, Pulitzer Prize-winner Oscar Hijuelos, Carl Friedman, Paul Celan, Nazim Hikmet, Thylias Moss, and Laura Riding. Queries should include a cover letter, author background and publication history, a synopsis of the proposed work, and a sample chapter. Do not send a complete manuscript. Simultaneous submissions are acceptable, but state that this is the case when submitting, and notify right away if your book is accepted elsewhere. All submissions should be sent by email to [email protected] or by post to Persea Books 90 Broad Street, Suite 2100, New York, NY 10004. Allow at least five months for a response to a mail submission. Email submissions will only receive a response if the editors are interested in your proposal. Full submission guidelines and contact details at on the website: www. perseabooks.com/contact

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WRITERS’ NEWS

GLOBAL TRAVEL MARKET

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Nomads want emotional and sensory travel stories Aiming to ‘uncover the best, the funniest, the freshest, the most gut wrenching or just the most beautiful stories’ World Nomads is looking for travel writers, photographers and film makers around the world to contribute their ‘personal, authentic stories about life changing journeys and experiences’. Love, fear, discovery, connection and transformation are the emotional experiences to aim for in addition to the sensory experiences of journeys. To help with submitting articles suitable for this magazine the website guidelines have a list of questions to ask of your story together with examples of published stories. There are also lists for photographers and filmmakers to ask of their stories. To help further, the website has ‘storytelling tips from the pros’. In the first instance pitch your idea for an article making sure the theme, content and tone fit with the magazine. Include a title of a maximum forty characters and a synopsis of no more than 250 words explaining the story subject, format, category, what makes it emotionally compelling and why you are the right person to tell it. Also say a little about yourself and your professional experience. There is an example of a good pitch on the website. Payment rates on publication of written stories of 600-800 words is 50¢ per word. See website for photo essay and video story payments. Website: www.worldnomads.co.uk

Fine words in four categories The 2020 Segora creative writing competitions are open for entry in four categories. • Poetry competition for original, unpublished poems up to 50 lines. The prizes are £300, £100 and £50. The entry fee is £5 for one, £7.50 for two, £10 for three, £12.50 for four, £15 for five and £17.50 for six. • Short story competition for original, unpublished short stories between 1,500 and 3,000 words. The prizes are £300, £100 and £50. The entry fees are £8 for one, £14 for two and £20 for three. • Vignette competition for vignettes of 300 words. There is a prize of £100. The entry fees are £5 for one, £7.50 for two, £10 for three, £12.50 for four, £15 for five and £17.50 for six. • One act play competition for original, unpublished and unproduced/ performed playscripts up to 35 minutes. The prizes are £150 and £50. The closing date is 15 June. Website: www.poetryproseandplays.com

Long smoke, quick flash The SmokeLong Quarterly Award for Flash Fiction is open for entries and has a first prize of $2,000. The winner will also be nominated for The Best Small Fictions, the Pushcart Prize and be published in The Smokelong Quarterly in June. The second prize is $200 and the third, $100. The runners up and finalists will be published in The Smokelong Quarterly and finalists will get $50. Enter original, unpublished short fiction up to 1,000 words. Stories written in a non-English language accompanied by an English translation may be entered. The entry fee is $13.50 up to April 26 and $15.50 after that, and is for up to two stories in the same submission. The closing date is 24 May. Website: www.smokelong.com

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How are you feeling? Patrick Forsyth suggests going beyond facts to bring your travel writing to life ukhothai is a World Heritage site, the ruins of an ancient city, which now takes the form of the remnants of stone buildings spread across an area of parkland. The wooden buildings that predominated are long gone. All this is outside a modern town set an hour’s flight north of Bangkok. I think it attracts a good many tourists, but they must spread out, certainly when I visited I found few people around to spoil the tranquillity. The place is very atmospheric. While visiting I climbed to Wat Saphan Hin (meaning ‘temple of the stone bridge’). It is approached up a long steep stretch of uneven steps. The first part is actually a ramp, a path built up with rocks and stones with an increasing drop on either side. Half way up irregular steps take over, but a sure foot is still needed to mount it safely. The path progresses, pretty much in a straight line until the ruined Wat is reached 300 metres above the starting point; it is a hot climb. In this kind of place there is a lot for a writer to describe. A carved stone Buddha figure more than twelve metres high, named Phra Attharat, stands looking across the ruins of the small temple. There is little there but the outline of a building surrounded by trees. Whatever there is can be described factually: the rocky path up, the Buddha figure (draped with yellow silk), the view over the park and so on. But in such a place I am reminded that there is another way to approach this – or indeed any other place you visit. That is how it makes you feel. One paragraph I wrote about this was: It had seemed quiet in the area below. Up high the quiet took on a whole new dimension. I sat alone for a while on a stone wall looking out over the area spread out far below: its various largely terracotta buildings, statues and ruins widelyspaced amidst the tree scattered parkland displayed minimal signs of other visitors. Everything seemed a long way off. The extreme serenity and quiet beauty of the place around me took over. I could have stayed there, content in the silence, for a very long time. The reflective mood brought on by such an atmospheric place was just one aspect of how I felt, which included more mundane thoughts: for example I was getting very hot sitting in the sun after a tiring climb. In reviewing descriptions that you write it is useful to think separately about the factual description, what you can actually see around you, and the feelings that you experience prompted by your surroundings. You can decide which aspects you should give priority to and check that together they provide an impression that fits your intentions.

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WRITERS’ NEWS

FLASHES Autosport, subtitled Britain’s best motorsport magazine weekly, is edited by Kevin Turner. Details: Autosport, Sport Media UK Ltd, 1 Eton Street, Richmond TW9 1AG; 020 3405 8100; email: autosport@ autosport.com; website: www. autosport.com Children’s publishers Puffin are to publish a new middle-grade book from Charlie Higson, billed as ‘Adrian Mole for a new generation’. Worst. Holiday. Ever. is ‘a warm and funny story about facing fears, dealing with worries, and how it’s okay to be anxious, scared, and sometimes a little bit brave’, out in May. Chocolat author Joanne Harris has been appointed Chair of the Society of Authors’ board. She succeeds David Donachi for a two-year term as Chair of the SoA Management Committee, which sets the society’s strategy and policies. Website: www. societyofauthors. org.uk ‘I’ve always enjoyed the idea of total mundanity, and the struggles and the happinesses of ordinary life, and then contrasting it with something a bit strange; the possibility of magic in the everyday.’ Naomi Ishiguro, whose debut short story collection is out now

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GLOBAL LITERARY MARKET Look on the bright side with Book*hug PDR Lindsay-Salmon

Book*hug Press call themselves ‘a radically optimistic Canadian independent literary press’. They publish innovative and contemporary books of literary fiction, nonfiction, literature in translation and poetry. They want ‘work that meaningfully contributes to and reflects culture and society; books that challenge and push at the boundaries of cultural expectations.’ Check out the publishing list at the website, read the detailed guidelines and what the editors want. Submit a disposable manuscript by post. Include ‘an introductory letter’ describing the work and which two other Book*hug titles the work is closest to, or which authors the work is similar to. Response time is ‘approximately six months’. Rights and royalties are discussed with the contract. Details: Book*hug Press, 260 Ryding Avenue, Toronto, Ontario M6N 1H5 Canada; email: jay@ bookhugpress.ca; website: https://bookhugpress.ca

Be part of the poetry canon Live poetry organisation Live Canon has three competitions inviting entries. • The 2020 Live Canon Pamphlet Collection is for pamphlets between 18 and 35 poems. Four winning pamphlets will be selected for publication by Live Canon Poetry Press. The entry fee is £12 per pamphlet. The closing date is 31 March. • The 2020 International Poetry Competition has a first prize of £1,000 for a single poem. There is also a £100 prize for the best entry written by a poet living, working or studying in the London Borough of Greenwich. Winners and longlisted poets will be published in an anthology. Enter poems of any length. The entry fees are £6.50 for one poem, £12 for two, £16 for three, £20 for four and £35 for ten. The closing date is 12 May. • The 2020 Live Canon Collection Competition is for full collections of 35+ poems. There are categories for first collection and second and subsequent collections. Three books will be selected for publication with Live Canon. The entry fee is £12 per manuscript. The closing date is 25 May. Website: www.livecanon. co.uk

Find your voice for Frome The 2020 Frome Festival Short Story Competition is open for entries. The international competition is for original, unpublished short stories between 1,000 and 2,200 words. There is a first prize of £400, a second prize of £200 and a third prize of £100, with additional local prizes for writers living within a 25-mile radius of Frome Library. This year’s judge is Bel Mooney. The entry fee is £8 per story. The closing date is 31 May. Website: www.fromeshortstorycompetition.co.uk/

Encouraging emerging writers The Belfast Book Festival is inviting entries for the Mairtín Crawford Awards for Poetry and Short Story. The Awards are aimed at emerging writers who have not yet published a full collection of poetry or short stories, or a novel. There is a £500 in each category and prize winners will be invited to read at the Belfast Book Festival . Enter 3-5 poems or short stories up to 2,500 words. There is a £6 fee per entry. The closing date is 29 April. Website: www.belfastbookfestival.com/mairtin-crawford

Find new words for Wasafiri The Queen Mary Wasafiri New Writing Prize 2020 is open for entry. There are three categories, each with a £1,000 prize: fiction, poetry and life writing. Winners will be published in print and online, and will be offered the Chapter and Verse or Free Reads mentoring. Shortlisted writers will be published online and may be offered Free Reads mentoring. The judges are Simon Prosser (fiction), Aida Edemariam (life writing) and Raymond Antrobus (poetry). The chair of judges in Kadija Sesay. Writers entering the competition must not have published a book-length work in the category they are entering. Self-published writers may enter. Enter original, unpublished work up to 3,000 words, or up to three poems. The entry fee is £10 for a single entry in one category and £16 for a double entry. The closing date is 1 June. Website: www.wasafiri.org/new-writing-prize/ www.writers-online.co.uk

WRITERS’ NEWS

UK MAGAZINE MARKET Finding new ways of being a Lady Tina Jackson

The Lady, the UK’s longest running weekly magazine for women, is reinventing itself for a wide-ranging modern readership. ‘I think what we’re trying to do is reach a slightly younger audience than people assume – people assume it’s for 60-somethings,’ said editor Maxine Firth. ‘I’m 47, and trying to aim for my demographic and above, fifty-somethings. And not assuming it’s all people with children. Our readers are individuals. Liz Hodgkinson, who writes for us, really fits our demographic. She’s 72, has children, grandchildren, but she still works, and needs to. She’s fit and healthy, is always doing things, not sitting at home.’ Maxine is passionate that her readers aren’t pigeonholed or stereotyped. ‘How do you

pin down an age, now? I think we need to talk about age in a new way, and that’s why The Lady has survived. We get readers who are in their nineties, and write in about having got their first job as a nanny or cleaner through The Lady. And then you get young people who love it because they’ll get jobs through the small ads. And then there are the forty and fifty-year-olds, so we stand between Grazia and Good Housekeeping.’ The Lady’s coverage is as wide-ranging as its readers’ interests. ‘We cover literally anything,’ said Maxine. ‘Everything that you’d have in a women’s magazine. This issue we’ve got Miranda Hart on the cover – she’s a perfect person for us – very intelligent, talented, had a bit of a problem in her thirties and forties with what she wanted to do. And then she came back, and she’s talking about friends and friendships and the people who supported her. We don’t want to be Vogue or Grazia or Hello! We want to say, this is what normal life is like, and it can be difficult. It’s okay to say, I’ve been depressed, I’ve gone through the menopause.’ Health and wellbeing coverage is realistic and practical. ‘The new issue of has Britt Ekland talking about having Botox in her sixties. So our health message is, if you want to have the tweakments, this is our advice. And these are the alternatives. I think what we’re trying to do is say that age doesn’t have to be a number. How we think about age no is so different.’ The Lady’s jobs ads are a unique selling point for readers interested in widening their horizons. ‘Most of our readers are people who have done the most amazing things,’ said Maxine. ‘Lots of our readers answered an advert in The Lady which

Audience participation with Punchdrunk The Third Day, the world’s first immersive TV drama from Punchdrunk, will air on Sky and HBO in May. The first episode of The Third Day to be screened will be Summer, which sees Sam (played by Jude Law) drawn to a mysterious island whose inhabitants are determined to preserve their traditions. Following Summer, there will be an immersive live theatre event from world-renowned company Punchdrunk where audience members will be able to inhabit the story as it happens. Audiences will also be able to follow the events online. The Third Day will conclude with three episodes of Winter, starring Naomie Harris and written by Kit de Waal, Dean O’Loughlin and Dennis Kelly. The Third Day has been created by writer Dennis Kelly and Punchdrunk artistic director Felix Barrett. It will screen in May on Sky Atlantic and NOW TV in the UK and Ireland, and HBO in the US. Website: www.punchdrunk.com/project/the-third-day/ www.writers-online.co.uk

meant they could work abroad. The Lady opens doors. People see it as an old fashioned magazine because it’s been going since 1885 but the reason it’s lasted as long as it has is that it’s got people appeal. I never want to patronise those readers. You can be 100 years old, you can be forty or fifty or twenty, and you can be having an incredible life. That’s the unique thing about The Lady. Our readers want to live and see the world and do their own thing. If I were a nineteen, twenty-year-old woman then why not look at The Lady and say, I’m going to be a housekeeper for a really rich person in London, or Russia, or Italy?’ A good feature for The Lady gets to the heart of the issue. ‘It should be well-written, very honest, and prepared, if it’s first person, to talk about their lives and include something that would make the feature personal,’ said Maxine. Factual accuracy and grounding the piece in relatable detail are also important. ‘Back it up with some facts! Find some good facts and figures and add a little bit of emotion as well.’ Maxine is happy to accept freelance contributions. ‘As long as the writer has a good idea, and a good pitch. Be very specific about what you can do, and what you want to write about. The thing that really annoys me is people who email me and haven’t read the magazine – pitch something specific that you think the editor will actually like. Write for women who are probably 45 and upwards – 45 to 75. Write as you feel. And also, interview people as you feel. We need interesting stories about how people feel.’ The starting rate is 20p a word. Email: [email protected]; website: https://lady.co.uk

Vision thing The theme for the HG Wells Short Story Competition 2020 is ‘Vision’. The competition is for original, unpublished short stories between 1,500 and 5,000 words on the theme. There are two prize categories. The £1,000 Margaret and Reg Turnhill Prize is for writers under 21. The Grand Prize for writers over 21 is £500. Winners and runners-up will be published in an anthology. There is no entry fee for writers under 21. In the over-21s category, the entry fee is £10 per story, and £5 for students. The closing date is 6 July. Website: https://hgwellscompetition. com/ APRIL 2020

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Competitions Short Stories always required for Scribble, the short story magazine. Over £100.00 in prizes every quarter, with critiques offered on any unsuitable material. Each issue of Scribble contains 82 pages of quality iction, readers’ letters and advice for writers. For further information and submission guidelines, please visit www.parkpublications.co.uk or send a s.a.e. to Park Publications, 14 The Park, Stow on the Wold, Cheltenham, Glos. GL54 1DX.

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To enter: • 750-word short story competition (see p33) For stories, maximum 750 words, on any theme; entry fee £6, £4 for subscribers; closing date, 15 April. Ref Code: Mar20/750

How to enter Competition Rules 1 Eligibility All entries must be the original and unpublished work of the entrant, and not currently submitted for publication nor for any other competition or award. Each entry must be accompanied by an entry form, printed here (photocopies are acceptable), unless stated. Open Competitions are open to any writer, who can submit as many entries as they choose. Entry fees are £6, £4 for subscribers. Subscriber-only Competitions are open only to subscribers of Writing Magazine. Entry is free but you can only submit one entry per competition. 2 Entry Fees Cheques or postal orders should be payable to Warners Group Publications or you can pay by credit card (see form). 3 Manuscripts Short stories: Entries must be typed in double spacing on single sides of A4 paper with a front page stating your name, address, phone number and email address, your story title and word count and the name of the competition. Entries will be returned if accompanied by sae. Electronic entries should be a single doc, docx, txt, rtf or pdf file with the contact details, etc, on p1, and your story commencing on the second page. Poetry manuscripts: Entries must be typed in single spacing with double spacing between stanzas on single sides of A4. Entrant’s name, address, telephone number and email address must be typed on a separate A4 sheet. Entries to poetry competitions cannot be returned. Electronic entries should be a single doc, docx, txt, rtf, odt or pdf file with the contact details, etc, on p1, and your poem on the second page. All manuscripts: Receipt of entries will be acknowledged if accompanied by a suitably worded stamped and addressed postcard. Entrants retain copyright in their manuscripts. You are advised not to send the only copy of your manuscript. Enclose an sae if you want your manuscript to be returned. 4 Competition Judging Competition judges will be appointed by Writing Magazine and the judges’ decision will be final with no correspondence being entered into. 5. Notification Winners will be notified within two months of closing date after which date unplaced entries may be submitted elsewhere. Winning entries may not be submitted elsewhere for twelve months after that date without permission of Writing Magazine who retain the right to publish winning entries in any form during those twelve months

• Haunted short story competition (see p33) For short stories, 1,500-1,700 words, on the theme ‘haunted’; entry fee £6, £4 for subscribers; closing date, 15 May. Ref Code: Apr20/haunted

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For writing, 1,500-1,700 words, on a journey of some kind; free entry, subscribers only; closing date, 15 April. Ref Code: Mar20/Journey

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MARCH 2020

95

My Writing Day

ANA JOHNS The US writer tells Lynne Hackles how a life-changing diagnosis led to a novel inspired by real-life events linked to a little-known era in US and Japanese history

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na Johns, a former competitive martial artist, studied journalism and worked over twenty years in the creative arts field before turning her hand to fiction. ‘I’ve always loved writing but didn’t attempt a full novel until a lifechanging diagnosis of multiple sclerosis in 2008 provided the opportunity to pursue it,’ she says. ‘To regain my mobility and health, I sold my business, hired a nutritionist, then started training with my two (then) young boys in Okinawan karate, which now makes me laugh. I couldn’t balance so chose a sport that demanded it. My goal was to keep our family’s focus on something positive. It worked. My oldest son and I travelled all over the country competing in the professional karate circuit while working toward our black belts. Within two years, I earned the title in kata forms for both national and international divisions. I knew then I’d won more than just trophies... I’d won back my life. So, what was I going to do with it? Write! ‘Now, as a full-time writer, I tend to stick to a schedule. I’m up between 4 and 5am and most days hit the gym before settling in at my desk. When our boys were still at home, my workday ended when they arrived home from school, otherwise the interruptions were constant, but now, as empty nesters I’ve found if I’m in the zone I’ll just keep writing.’ Described as ‘a powerful and heartbreaking literary debut’ The Woman In The White Kimono is based on the author’s own family story. ‘Several highpoints have occurred with the book’s publication,’ Ana continues. ‘Not only did we debut on the Globe and Mail’s bestsellers list in Canada, but the novel is still sitting on 96

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their historical fiction bestsellers list. Another bright spot was the midwest book tour my US publisher, Park Row Books with Harper Collins/Harlequin, sponsored. And when The Woman In The White Kimono was chosen as a BBC Radio2 Book Club Pick my UK publisher, Legend Press, flew me to London for the live interview. Such a thrill! But the readers’ response to the novel has been the absolute highlight. I’ve received countless letters and messages from people telling me the novel resonated on a deeply personal level. Learning their heart-breaking stories has meant the world. ‘Although The Woman In The White Kimono is a work of fiction, it’s crafted from historical events, real people, and true stories, including my father’s story of the beautiful Japanese girl he loved while enlisted in the US Navy. Her family had invited him to a traditional tea, but despite him learning the required etiquette and practicing his Japanese, upon meeting him, an American sailor, they refused him as a suitor. His story, and hundreds just like it, inspired the novel. ‘The novel is told in dual narratives. In the first, Tori Kovac in present-day America, put her career as an investigative reporter on hold to act as caregiver for her dying father. When Tori finds and reads a tattered letter covered in Japanese symbols, she learns a shocking revelation – one that calls into question everything she understood about her father, her family, and herself. ‘In the second narrative, we unpack the secrets of the letter and meet Naoko, a seventeen-year-old Japanese girl in post-WWII 1950s Japan. A time when ancient traditions clashed with American culture forcing unimaginable choices with consequences that would ripple www.writers-online.co.uk

LISTEN TAP HERE To hear an extract from The Woman in the White Kimono

across generations. ‘I endeavoured to make both narratives as historically accurate in both environment and social protocol as possible. This research was labour intensive, six years, with some days only a single paragraph making it onto the page. The internet was invaluable, not only for its numerous articles and resources, but for the ability to virtually travel the world and meet those with first-hand experience – US vets and Japanese brides. But it was in finding and meeting the one hundred adult children born to Japanese women and American servicemen who were surrendered to the Elizabeth Saunders Home orphanage in Japan that made all the difference. To put it in perspective, ten thousand babies were born to Japanese women and American servicemen before, during, and after the occupation, but most didn’t survive. They did. ‘While The Woman In The White Kimono began with my father’s story and evolved with characters inspired by US military vets and the adoptees, it’s really not a story about them so much as for them. I hope they see it as a love letter. One of hope and ultimately triumph because they survived.’ Website: www.anajohns.com

Writing place ‘I’m fortunate to have a dedicated home office where I sit at a white French writing desk with a pretty treelined view. A small chandelier from my old studio holds sentiment and the light just so overhead and the walls are lined with white bookcases, favourite novels, and small framed photos of family and friends. Oh, and the opposite wall is home to a large project table my husband built for me with idea board. It’s a lovely place to lose myself in a story and work.’

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N OT E S F R O M T H E M A R G I N

Male order Writers often fall unwittingly into creating gender stereotypes, says Lorraine Mace, as she gives them – and herself – a dressing down

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have been wondering how many writers are subconscious sexists. I don’t mean the deliberate nastiness of putting anyone down because of gender, but in the sense of writing our characters into gender confining boxes without even realising we are doing so. This is not something I would normally think about, but a writer friend recently told me he was shocked to find he had pigeonholed one of his characters and only saw what he’d done when his wife read the story and challenged him on it. My friend (who has asked to remain nameless, so I am going to call him John) had crafted a story with a strong female lead. He thought he’d really hit the right note by making her subordinate sidekick male. The pair were on the trail of a seedy minor drug dealer, not realising they were straying into much deeper waters. The minor dealer was working for a very dangerous man indeed. So far so good. The female called the shots and the man followed her commands. That is, until she was caught by one of the goons who worked for the drug baron. At this point, everything John had intended went out the window and the old stereotypical pattern kicked in. The helpless female needed to be rescued by her gallant male partner. Not only that, but her gratitude caused her to look at him in an entirely new light. He was her hero! John’s wife threw the pages at him when she’d finished reading. ‘I thought you were going to make the woman the strong character in the story,’ she said. ‘But I did,’ said John, truly believing he had. It was only when she made him read the final pages in isolation that he realised he should have had the man captured and the woman carry out the rescue. As John said, ‘I really didn’t intend to be that kind of stereotypical writer, but that’s how my male brain took the story!’ To be fair, it’s not just a male trait. An author I worked with years ago, a woman this time, had a tendency to make her female characters run away, scream, cry, wail and shake, while all the male characters were bold, brave, courageous and keen to protect their families from flesh-eating monsters. I can remember asking her at 98

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the time what she would have done if someone or something had tried to eat her own children. Would she have run away and left them to their fate? ‘Absolutely not,’ she replied. ‘I’d have picked up anything I could find to use as a weapon and gone at them, no matter what size, to protect my babies.’ I’m pleased to say she got the message and the women of her world fought bravely alongside the menfolk – apart from one or two females who were either cowards or collaborators, but as that applied to a few of the men as well, that was fine. Which brings me on to a male author whose book I worked on. He created a fabulous fantasy world based on a matriarchal society. However, when that society came under attack, all the heroes with one exception, were male. The person sent to find help was male. The leader of the group of mercenaries he brought back to the village was male, as were all the fighters under the prince’s command, bar one solitary female who was so emotionally damaged she made mistakes that put the others at risk. To be fair, in the final scenes she sacrificed herself to save everyone else, but this was her only claim to courageous behaviour. Surely, in a matriarchal society there would be female warriors? Why create such a society if you are still going to perpetrate gender stereotypes within it? So then I started thinking about my own writing. Was I also guilty of subconscious gender bias? I was fairly certain I wasn’t. How could I be when I’d created Detective Sergeant Cathy Connors? Known as CC to her friends and those few colleagues she allows to get close enough, she is a forceful character who doesn’t take nonsense from anyone. She terrifies the local bad guys because of her martial arts skills. She’s intelligent, funny, loud, outrageous in dress and attitude and I love her to bits. I was feeling really smug until it hit me that CC is the only strong female I’ve created. My books are very much male dominated. Note to self: stop being sexist!

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Competition

Guide OVERION £1 MILL n to be wo izes

2020

in writing pr

MORE THTOAENNTE7R50 COMPS

INSIDE OUR BIGGEST COMPETITION GUIDE YET: DETAILS OF OVER 750 COMPETITIONS TO ENTER PRIZE MONEY TOTALLING £1.1 MILLION READ WINNING ENTRIES FROM PAST COMPETITIONS PLUS: GET A SNEAK PEEK AT UPCOMING WM COMPETITIONS

You can do it!

NEWL

DIGITA SPECIAL

Take a deep dive into Dickens’ iconic novel to understand his storytelling techniques and style, and how those might be applied to your own work. This guide includes a detailed look at Oliver Twist’s style, structure, characters and more.

DOWNLOAD on any device today via Pocketmags:

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EDITOR’S LETTER

Competition

Guide OVER to be won

2020

£1 MILLION

Competition Special

2020

in writing prizes

Dear Reader

750 MORE THAN TO ENTER COMPS

INSIDE OUR BIGGEST COMPETITION GUIDE YET: DETAILS OF OVER 750 COMPETITIONS TO ENTER PRIZE MONEY TOTALLING £1.1 MILLION READ WINNING ENTRIES FROM PAST COMPETITIONS PLUS: GET A SNEAK PEEK AT UPCOMING WM COMPETITIONS

You can do it!

Published by Warners Group Publications plc, 5th Floor, 31-32 Park Row, Leeds, LS1 5JD, UK Main office: 0113 200 2929 Fax: 0113 200 2928 Subscriptions: 01778 392 482 Advertising: 0113 200 2925 Editorial: 0113 200 2919 Marketing: 0113 200 2916 Creative Writing Courses: 0113 200 2917 Website: www.writers-online.co.uk Publisher: Collette Smith Email: [email protected] Editor: Jonathan Telfer Email: [email protected] Assistant editor: Tina Jackson Email: [email protected] Senior designer: Nathan Ward Email: [email protected] Editorial designer: Mary Ward Email: [email protected] Editorial designer: Rajneet Gill Email: [email protected] Marketing: Lauren Beharrell [email protected] Advertising sales manager: Sarah Hopton [email protected] Classified sales: Louise Clarke Email: [email protected] Subscriptions: [email protected] Creative Writing Courses: [email protected] Competitions: [email protected] WM Competitions, Warners Group Publications plc, The Maltings, West Street, Bourne PE10 9PH, UK. Typeset by: Warners Group Publications plc, 5th Floor, 31-32 Park Row, Leeds LS1 5JD

Long-term WM readers will know that I usually like to use this spot to encourage you to enter competitions and spread your wings, and this year is no different! The fact is, entering competitions is great for your writing in so many ways: encouraging you to try something different or unexpected; honing your technique, putting in the practice and learning what does and doesn’t work; overcoming your fears of rejection and building your confidence in getting your work out there; possibly, with a win, even lining your pockets and helping you get your name better known. In this supplement, we’ve collected information on more competitions than ever, over 750 worldwide to enter over the course of the next nine months. If you’re looking to try something new, there’s bound to be something there to set your imagination alight, and if you already have a preferred genre, we’ve got something for you too, from flash sequences and haiku to business book proposals and screenplays... at lengths to suit every commitment level, from 30 words to 300 pages. So even if you think you know what competitions are out there, I guarantee you will find something new in the next thirty pages: at the very least, a brand new major competition from Writing Magazine,, launching on p31, with no set theme and a £1,000 prize. We’ll look forward to seeing your entries! Jonathan Telfer, Editor

Winning words 4

WM competition programme Get a sneak peek at the Writing Magazine competition programme for the rest of 2020

21 Competition winner: Read the winning entry from our web-exclusive Timely Topic competition on the theme ‘Throne’

27 Competition winner: Read the winning entry from our web-exclusive Timely Topic competition on the theme ‘Island’

31 The Writing Magazine Grand Prize Win £1,000 in our big new open short story competition

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competitions 2020 Creative writingtitions until the end of 2020, Details of over 750 compe with total prize money of over £1.1m

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All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording or otherwise, without the prior permission of Warners Group Publications plc. No responsibility can be taken for artwork and photographs in postage. Whilst every care is taken of material submitted to the editor for publication, no responsibility can be accepted for loss or damage. Email submissions preferred. All mss must be typewritten and accompanied by a sae for return. © Copyright Warners Group Publications plc. ISSN 0964-9166 Warners Group Publications plc are not able to investigate the products or services provided by the advertisers in Writing Magazine nor to make recommendations about them. Readers should make sensible enquiries themselves before sending money or incurring substantial costs in sending manuscripts or other material. Take particular care when responding to advertisers offering to publish manuscripts. While few conventional publishers seek a financial contribution from authors, many such advertisers do seek a payment (sometimes thousands of pounds) and readers should remember there can be no guarantees such publishing arrangements will prove profitable. There have been cases in which subsidy publishers have provided unduly optimistic reports on manuscripts to encourage authors to commit themselves to financial contribution. Readers should be aware of this and should not allow their judgment to be blurred by optimism. Manuscript advisory services do normally charge for their time, but agents normally do not (although some agents do quote a reading fee). While Warners Group Publications plc cannot act as a licensing or accreditation authority, they will investigate complaints against advertisers. Complainants must, however, send complete documentation and be willing for their names to be disclosed.

Writing Magazine - Competition Guide 2020

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COMPETITION GUIDE 2020

£250

Open competitions

TO BE WO N

Sharpen your pencils and plots with a sneak peek at our competition programme for the end of 2020 All the competitions previewed on this page are open to any writer. Enter online at www.writers-online.co.uk or see the relevant issue of Writing Magazine for more details. Prizes are £200 and £50 each month, with publication in WM for the winner. Please note, competitions will open for entries on publication of the full competition details in the relevant issue of Writing Magazine.

EVERY MO

NTH

JULY Dark tales From creepy spec fic to bleak psychological thrillers, make you story nasty and ghastly so it puts the frighteners on us to win this competition.

AUGUST Love SEPTEMBER Dystopian Whatever genre you chose to write and whatever issues caused your dystopia to exist, explore the idea of ‘what if’ to create future and alternative worlds in stories you enter.

OCTOBER 500 Words Keep it short to get a sweet result. Make every word count as you tell any kind of story, in any kind of style or form as long it’s no longer than 500 words.

NOVEMBER Epistolary People writing to each other is a great way for writers to drip-feed their story, so tell yours via letters, emails, tweets, texts... even smoke signals!

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Who loves who and how the situation plays out is up to you – we’re looking for all kinds of love stories, from those that break your heart to the ones that make you believe in happy ever after.

Writing Magazine - Competition Guide 2020

DECEMBER Open The choice is yours for this competition – any story, any style, any genre. It’s up to you. Just make sure it’s a winner!

COMPETITION GUIDE 2020

SUBSCRIBER–ONLY

£125

Short story competitions

TO BE WO N

The short story competitions previewed here are open only to subscribers of Writing Magazine. Enter online at www.writers-online.co.uk or see the relevant issue of WM for more details. Prizes are £100 and £25 each month, with publication in WM for the winner.

SEPTEMBER First person

JULY Stranger Who is the stranger in your story, are they friend or foe, and what effect do they have on the fictional world they enter? We’re looking forward to meeting the strangers in your stories.

EVERY MO NTH

Whether your first-person narrator is reliable or unreliable, letting your story unfold in their own words lets you experiment with voice, style and point of view.

NOVEMBER Senses Play with texture and style in your fiction by bringing the senses to life in words. Sight, sound, touch, taste, hearing – how will you convey these in your story?

Open poetry competitions

£150

TO BE WO N

EVERY MO NTH

AUGUST Different reality Use your poetic imagination to depart from reality and conjure different possibilities in poems of any style.

DECEMBER Open

OCTOBER Crime poem Crimes against a person? Crimes against humanity? Chose any style, from ballads to beat poetry, to rhyme the crime and win this competition.

What’s the best unpublished poem you’ve written all year? Whatever style it is, and whatever subject, that’s the one to enter in WM’s annual Open Poetry Competition.

Writing Magazine - Competition Guide 2020

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COMPETITION COMPETITION GUIDE 2020 2020

N O I T I T E P M CO

GUIDE 2020 Pick your favourites and start scheduling your entries with over 750 competitions to enter. This could be the year you win big!

APRIL Alpine Fellowship Writing Prize Prose on the theme ‘Forgiveness and Retribution’ up to 2,500 words Prizes: £10,000; £3,000, £2,000 Free entry Closing date: 1 April

Black Lawrence Press Hudson Prize An unpublished collection of poems or short stories Prizes: $1,000 and publication Entry fee: $25 Closing date: 1 April

Orison Books Poetry and Fiction Prizes

Tusculum Review Poetry Chapbook Prize

Novels, novellas or fiction collections of at least 30,000 words; poetry collections, 50-100 pages Prizes: $1,500 and publication in each category Entry fee: $30 Closing date: 1 April, annual

Poetry manuscripts, 20-30 pages Prizes: $1,000 and publication Entry fee: $20 Closing date: 1 April

The Pinch Literary Awards Fiction and non-fiction, each under 5,000 words; up to 3 poems, any length Prizes: $1,000 and publication in each category Entry fee: $20, $10 each additional Closing date: 1 April

Cowles Poetry Book Prize Poetry collections, 48-100 pages Prizes: $2,000 and publication Entry fee: $25 Closing date: 1 April

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Highly enjoyable annual competition for humorous and spoof poetry, up to 250 lines Prizes: $1,000, $250, ten $100 Honorable Mentions Free entry Closing date: 1 April Tel: +1 413 320 1847 [email protected] www.winningwriters.com/wergle

Red Hen Press Non-Fiction Award A non-fiction manuscript, over 150 pages Prizes: $1,000 and publication Entry fee: $25 Closing date: 1 April

Four Way Books Levis Prize in Poetry

Saturnalia Books Poetry Prize

Poetry collections, 48-100 pages Prizes: $1,000 and publication Entry fee: $30 Closing date: 1 April

Poetry collections, longer than 48 pages Prizes: $1,500, $500 and publication Entry fee: $30 Closing date: 1 April

Globe Soup Travel Writing Competition

Short Grain Contest

Unpublished travel writing, up to 1,000 words Prizes: £1,000 and publication Entry fee: £8 Closing date: 1 April

Poetry, max 100 lines, or fiction, max 2,500 words Prizes: Can$1,000, $750, $500 and publication, in each category Entry fee: $40, international entries $60 Closing date: 1 April

Killer Nashville Claymore Award

SPR Book Prizes

Unpublished manuscripts with elements of thriller, mystery, crime or suspense Prizes: $3,000 prize fund, plus publication Entry fee: $40 Closing date: 1 April

Books published on Amazon before entry, never available elsewhere Prizes: SPR reader review packages on Amazon Entry fee: $30 Closing date: 1 April

www.writers-online.co.uk

Wergle Flomp Humor Poetry Contest

Writing Magazine - Competition Guide 2020

Puerto Del Sol Competitions Fiction and non-fiction, max 25 pages; up to 3 poems Prizes: $500 and publication in each category Entry fee: $9 Closing date: 2 April

Torch Prize for Creative Non-Fiction One piece of creative non-fiction, up to 30 double spaced pages Prizes: $500 and publication Entry fee: $23 Closing date: 2 April

Edge Hill Short Story Prize Published short story collections Prizes: £10,000, £1,000 Readers’ Prize Free entry Closing date: 3 April

Red Planet Prize New TV series drama scripts Prizes: Script commission and masterclasses with award-winning writers Free entry Closing date: 3 April

COMPETITION GUIDE 2020

Furious Fiction

York Poetry Prize

Loraine Williams Poetry Prize

500-word short stories, written in 55 hours Prizes: Aus$500 Free entry Closing date: 5 April, first Sunday each month

Poems up to 40 lines Prizes: £600, £150, £75, £50. £40; £100 for best international entrant; York postcode prize £50 Entry fee: £7.50, £12 for 2, £15 for 3 Closing date: 13 April

Up to three poems, up to ten pages total Prizes: $1,500 and publication Entry fee: $15 Closing date: 15 April

Kraken Book Prize for MiddleGrade Fiction Middle-grade books, 120-350 pages Prizes: $750 and publication Entry fee: $25 Closing date: 6 April

Wainwright Golden Beer Book Prize Novels on the outdoors, nature and UKbased travel writing Prizes: £5,000 Free entry Closing date: 8 April

GVCA New Deal Writing Competition Short stories, up to 10,000 words, inspired by a painting, shown on the website Prizes: $200, $100, $50 Entry fee: $5 Closing date: 10 April

Oberon Poetry Prize Single poems, submit up to 3 Prizes: $1,000 and publication Entry fee: $18 Closing date: 10 April

Laura Literary Awards Short stories, up to 1,500 words; poems, up to 60 lines Prizes: Aus$780 prize fund Entry fee: $10 Closing date: 10 April

NYC Midnight Screenwriting Challenge Screenwriting tournament in three heats spanning four months Prizes: $3,750, $1,250, $500, $300, $200; plus software Entry fee: $45-$55 Closing date: register by 12 April

Retreat West Micro Fiction Competition Fiction, 100 words exactly, to a prompt posted on the website at the start of each month Prizes: 50% of total entry fees received Entry fee: £4 Closing date: 12 April, monthly

Agha Shahid Ali Prize in Poetry Poetry collections, 48-100 pages Prizes: $1,000 and publication; $500 Entry fee: $25 Closing date: 15 April

Bulwer-Lytton Fiction Contest Deliberately bad opening lines to novels, comic writing inspired by Edward BulwerLytton’s notorious Paul Clifford opening, ‘It was a dark and stormy night...’ Prizes: Modest prizes ($250 Grand Prize), but a lot of interest Free entry Closing date: 15 April

CantoMundo Poetry Prize Poetry collections, 48-90 pages, by Latinx writers Prizes: $1,000 and publication Entry fee: $28 Closing date: 15 April, TBC

Etel Adnan Poetry Prize Poetry collections, 48-90 pages, by a writer of Arab heritage Prizes: $1,000 and publication Entry fee: $25 Closing date: 15 April

Everything Change Climate Fiction Contest Short fiction, up to 5,000 words Prizes: $1,000, 9x$100 Free entry Closing date: 15 April

Magpie Award for Poetry Unpublished poems up to 100 lines Prizes: $500, 2x$50 Entry fee: $25, $10 each subsequent Closing date: 15 April

New Ohio Review Prizes Fiction and non-fiction, up to 20 pages, and poetry, up to 6 Prizes: $1,500 in each category Entry fee: $20 Closing date: 15 April

Panther Creek Book Award in non-fiction Unpublished book-length non-fiction Prizes: $1,000 and publication Entry fee: $20 Closing date: 15 April

RA & Pin Drop Short Story Award Short stories up to 4,000 words Prizes: A reading by a special guest at an evening at the Royal Academy of Arts Free entry Closing date: 15 April, TBC

Slope Editions Book Prize Unpublished poetry collections, 40-90 pages, by US poets Prizes: $1,000 and publication Entry fee: $25 Closing date: 15 April

Zone 3 Press Award Poetry manuscripts this year, 48-80 pages Prizes: $1,000 and publication Entry fee: $20 Closing date: 15 April

Gulf Coast Contests Stories and essays, up to 25 pages, or up to 5 poems of no more than 10 pages Prizes: $1,500, 2x$250, in each category Entry fee: $23 Closing date: 15 April

Hektoen International Essay Competition Articles, up to 1,600 words, related to medical humanities Prizes: $3,000 plus publication; $800 Free entry Closing date: 15 April, TBC

C Michael Curtis Prize Short story collections, 140-220 pages, by writers who lived in the US southern states Prizes: $10,000 and publication Entry fee: $25 Closing date: 1 April

Prism Grouse Grind Prize for V Short Forms Fiction and non-fiction, up to 300 words Prizes: Can$500, $150, $50 Entry fee: $15 Closing date: 16 April

Omnidawn Broadside Poetry Prize

Leicester Writes Short Story Prize

Sustainable Societies: Fulllength Film Screenplays

Single poems, 8-24 lines Prizes: $1,000 and publication Entry fee: $10, $5 each additional Closing date: 13 April

Short stories up to 3,000 words Prizes: £125, £50, £25 Entry fee: £7, £3 Leicestershire writers Closing date: 20 April

Film screenplays on sustainable living Prizes: £500, £200, £100, 3 x £50 Free entry Closing date: 18 April, TBC

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COMPETITION GUIDE 2020

Quiet Man Dave Prize

Mairtín Crawford Awards

Craft Short Fiction Award

Flash fiction and non-fiction, up to 500 words Prizes: £1,000, £200, £50 Entry fee: £5 Closing date: 17 April Tel: 0161 247 1787 [email protected] www2.mmu.ac.uk/qmdprize/

3-5 poems; short stories, up to 2,500 words Prizes: £500 and invitation to read at Belfast Book Festival Entry fee: £6 Closing date: 29 April

Short stories up to 5,000 words Prizes: $2,000, $500 and $300, and publication Entry fee: $20 Closing date: 30 April

Adrienne Rich Award for Poetry

Dark Tales Short Story

Up to three poems, max 10 lines total Prizes: $1,500 Entry fee: $15 Closing date: 30 April

Ongoing monthly comp for horror and scifi short stories, up to 5,000 words Prizes: £100 for each monthly winner plus publication in Dark Tales Entry fee: £4, £8 with critique, £20 with edit and critique Closing date: monthly, last day each month

Dr William Henry Drummond Poetry Contest Poems, up to 50 lines, by Canadian residents Prizes: Can$300, $200, $100, 8x$75, 8x$50 Entry fee: $10 Closing date: 19 April, TBC

Bath Short Story Award Short stories up to 2,200 words, in any style and on any subject Prizes: £1,200, £300, £100, £50 for the best local writer, £100 Acorn Award for the best story by an unpublished writer Entry fee: £8 Closing date: 20 April

53-word Story Contest Stories of exactly 53 words, to a different prompt each month Prizes: Publication in Prime Number magazine; free book Free entry Closing date: 21 April, and 21st of each month

Poets Meet Politics International Open Poetry Competition Poems up to 40 lines, related to politics Prizes: €500, €250, €100 Entry fee: €12 for up to three Closing date: TBC, 22 April in 2019

Sixfold Short Story and Poetry Contest Short stories, up to 20 pages, and poetry, up to 10 pages Prizes: $1,000 and publication, in each category Entry fee: $5 Closing date: 23 April, quarterly, 23 July and 23 October

Agnes Lynch Starrett Poetry Prize Poetry collections, over 48 pages, by unpublished poets Prizes: $5,000 and publication Entry fee: $25 Closing date: 30 April

Aitken Alexander Non-Fiction Prize First book proposals, 3,000-4,000 by academics Prizes: £25,000 and publication Free entry Closing date: 30 April

Al Blanchard Award Crime fiction, up to 5,000 words, set in New England or by authors from there Prizes: $100 Free entry Closing date: 30 April

Berkshire Prize Poetry manuscripts, 48-88 pages, by poets who have had no or one collection published Prizes: $3,000 plus publication Entry fee: $30 Closing date: 30 April

Bristol Short Story Prize Stories on any theme, up to 4,000 words Prizes: £1,000, £500, £250, 17 £100 shortlisted. All published in prize anthology Entry fee: £9 Closing date: 30 April

Poems, up to 50 lines, on the theme ‘Is royalty relevant?’ Prizes: £200 and publication Free entry Closing date: 27 April

Grindstone Literary Prizes Short stories, up to 3,000 words; poems, up to 40 lines Prizes: £500, £200, 4x£50 in each category Entry fee: £8 Closing date: 28 April, for short stories, 28 May for poems

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Chapbook-length prose and poetry manuscripts, 18-44 pages Prizes: $1,000 and publication Entry fee: $20 Closing date: 30 April

FanStory Busy programme of competitions, closing every few days, for flash, short stories, poetry and more Prizes: $100 each comp Free entry, but for (paid) site members only Closing date: 30 April, constant

Furphy Literary Award Unpublished fiction or narrative non-fiction on the theme ‘Australian life’, under 5,000 words, by Australian residents Prizes: Aus$15,000, university residency, publication Free entry Closing date: 30 April

Ghost Story Supernatural Fiction Award Short stories, 1,500-10,000 words, with supernatural themes, broadly defined Prizes: $1,000, 2x$250 Entry fee: $20 Closing date: 30 April

Grey Hen Poetry Competition Carlo Annoni Prize

Holland Park Press

Diagram/New Michigan Press Chapbook Contest

For plays in Italian or English on issues relating to the LGBTQ+ community Prizes: €1,000 in each language Free entry Closing date: 30 April

Cranked Anvil Short Story Competition Short stories, up to 1,500 words; quarterly Prizes: £150, £75, £30 Entry fee: £5, £3 for second, £2 for third Closing date: quarterly, 30 April, 31 July, 31 October [email protected] https://crankedanvil.co.uk/shortstory/

Writing Magazine - Competition Guide 2020

For poems, up to 40 lines, by women 60+ Prizes: £100, £50, £25, website publication Entry fee: £3, £10 for four Closing date: 30 April Tel: 01535 645711

Hastings Writers Room ‘Misrepresentation’ Short stories, up to 1,500 words, on the theme ‘misrepresentation’ Prizes: Gold and silver memberships of Retreat West Entry fee: £6, £10 for two Closing date: 30 April [email protected] www.hastingswritersroom.org/competitions

COMPETITION GUIDE 2020

Hillary Gravendyk Prize

Nimrod Literary Awards

Poetry collections, 48-100 pages, by US poets Prizes: $1,000; $1,000 for best entry from South California Entry fee: $20 Closing date: 30 April

Fiction up to 7,500 words or 3-10 pages of poetry, by US residents Prizes: $2,000, $1,000 in both categories, plus publication Entry fee: $20 Closing date: 30 April, annual

Inkitt Short Story and Fanfic Contests

Poetica Christi Press Annual Poetry Competition

Monthly competitions for short stories, 5,000-10,000 words, and fanfic, over 7,500 words Prizes: $150, $50, $30 Free entry Closing date: 30 April, last of each month

Poems on a theme TBA, max 50 lines, by Australian residents Prizes: Aus$300, $100 Entry fee: $7 Closing date: 30 April

Poetry International Prize Iowa Poetry Prize Poetry collections, 50-150 pages Prizes: Publication by University of Iowa Press under a standard contract Entry fee: $20 Closing date: 30 April

John Byrne Quarterly Award Quarterly prize for any creative work by Scottish residents Prizes: £500 Free entry Closing dates: quarterly, 30 April, 31 July and 31 Oct

Louise Bogan Award Poetry collections, 48-70 pages, by US poets Prizes: $1,000 and publication Entry fee: $25 Closing date: 30 April

Poems, submit up to 3 Prizes: $1,000 and publication Entry fee: $15, $3 each additional Closing date: 30 April

Poetry collections, 48-84 pages Prizes: $1,000 and publication; 2x$250 Entry fee: $25 Closing date: 30 April

Momaya Press Short Story Competition Short stories up to 3,000 words on the theme of ‘outsiders’ Prizes: £110, £55, £25 Entry fee: £11 Closing date: 30 April

Flash Fiction Day (NZ) Prize Short stories, up to 300 words, by New Zealand residents Prizes: NZ$1,000, $400, $100; $200, $100 and $50 youths Entry fee: $10 Closing date: 15 April

Trio Award for first and second Poetry Books Poetry collections, 48-70 pages, by US poets Prizes: $1,000 and publication Entry fee: $25 Closing date: 30 April

MAY Carter V Cooper Short Fiction Competition

Non-fiction, 1,000-10,000 words Prizes: $200, $100 Free entry Closing date: 30 April

Short fiction, up to 10,000 words Prizes: Can$10,000, $5,000 Entry fee: $30 Closing date: 1 May

SA Writers College Short Story Competition

Crucible Poetry and Fiction Competition

Short stories, up to 2,000 words by unpublished South African writers Prizes: R10,000, R5,000, R2,500 Free entry Closing date: 30 April

Short stories up to 8,000 words; up to 5 poems Prizes: $150, $100 Free entry Closing date: 1 May

Curt Johnson Prose Awards Biennial prize for unpublished fiction (novels or short story collections, no less than 30,000 words) by Black and Asian women in the UK Prizes: £3,000, £1,250, £750, plus training and consultations Entry fee: £10 Closing date: 30 April

Sow’s Ear Poetry Review Chapbook Contest Poetry collections, 22-26 pages Prizes: $1,000 and publication Entry fee: $40 international entries Closing date: 30 April

Ware Poets Open Poetry Competition Poems up to 50 lines Prizes: £600, £300, £150, £150 sonnet prize Entry fee: £4, £12 for four, £3 thereafter Closing date: 30 April

New Women’s Voices Award Chapbook poetry collections, 16-35 pages, by unpublished women Prizes: $1,000 and publication Entry fee: $16 Closing date: 30 April, annual

Short stories, essays or other prose, up to 6,000 words. International entries welcome Prizes: $3,000 and ten $100 honourable mentions, in each category Entry fee: $20 Closing date: 30 April Tel: +1 413 320 1847 [email protected] www.winningwriters.com/tomstory

Preservation Foundation General non-fiction contest

SI Leeds Literary Prize Marsh Hawk Press Poetry Prize

Tom Howard/John H Reid Fiction and Essay Contest

Writing Quarter

Fiction and non-fiction, up to 8,000 words Prizes: $1,500, $500 and publication in each category Entry fee: $20 Closing date: 1 May

Elizabeth Jolley Short Story Prize Unpublished short stories between 2,000 and 5,000 words Prizes: Aus $5,000, $3,000, $2,000, £2,500 between 3 commended Entry fee: $25 Closing date: 1 May

Francis MacManus/RTE Radio 1 Short Story Competition Stories between 1,800 and 2,000 words from writers from Ireland Prizes: €3,000, €2,000, €1,000, 7x€250 Free entry Closing date: 1 May, TBC, early May

Gwendolyn MacEwen Poetry Competition

Monthly; short stories, up to 3,000 words Prizes: Aus$30 Free entry Closing date: 30 April, last of each month

A suite of poems, up to 24 pages Prizes: Can$1,500, $1,000, $500 best poem by a Canadian Entry fee: $25 Closing date: 1 May, TBC

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COMPETITION GUIDE 2020

The Hal Prize Fiction and non-fiction, up to 2,000 words; poems, no more than a page, by US writers Prizes: Cash prizes and publication Entry fee: $5 Closing date: 1 May

Writers Digest Self-Published Book Awards Fully self-published books in English Prizes: $8,000; $1,000 for best in each of 8 categories Entry fee: $125, $99 before 1 April Closing date: 1 May

Julia Darling Fellowship Travel fellowship for published/produced writers living in the north of England Prizes: £2,000 Free entry Closing date: 1 May, TBC

Shore Scripts Short Film Fund

Malahat Review Far Horizons Awards

London Independent Story Prize

Short scripts between 3 and 13 pages Prizes: Production budget of up to $15,000 Entry fee: $50 Closing date: 2 May

Nick Darke Award Full-length stage plays Prizes: £6,000 Free entry Closing date: 4 May

Leapfrog Press Fiction Contest Book-length fiction, over 22,000 words Prizes: $1,150 advance and publication; $150 for finalists Entry fee: $33 Closing date: 5 May, TBC

Wilbur Smith Author of Tomorrow Up to 3 poems, up to 60 lines each; short stories, up to 3,500 words Prizes: Can$1,000 Entry fee: International entries$35 Closing date: 1 May

Meyerson Fiction Prize Short stories, up to 8,000 words, by writers who have not had a book published Prizes: $1,000 and publication Entry fee: $25 Closing date: 1 May, TBC

Peseroff Prize Up to three poems, any form or content Prizes: $1,000 and publication Entry fee: $10 Closing date: 1 May

Poetry London Clore Prize Poetry up to 80 lines Prizes: £5,000, £2,000, £1,000, 4 x £500 Entry fee: £7, £3 subscribers Closing date: 1 May

Questions Writing Prize Short stories, 1,500-2,000 words by Australian writers aged 18-30 Prizes: Aus$2,000 Free entry Closing date: 1 May

Rialto Nature and Place Poetry Competition Nature poems up to 40 lines Prizes: £1,000, £500, £250 Entry fee: £7 for the first poem, £4 thereafter Closing date: 1 May

Richard Snyder Publication Prize Poetry collections, 48-96 pages Prizes: $1,000 and publication Entry fee: $27 Closing date: 1 May

Stan and Tom Wick Poetry Prize Unpublished full-length poetry collections, 50-70 pages Prizes: $2,500 and publication Entry fee: $25 Closing date: 1 May

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www.writers-online.co.uk

Short stories, max 1,500 words; flash, 300 words; screenplays, max 30 pages Prizes: £100 for stories and flash, Final Draft software for screenplays Entry fee: £7, £5 for flash, £10 for screenplays Closing date: 3 May, quarterly [email protected] www.londonindependentstoryprize.co.uk

Adventure stories by writers aged 12-21 (1,500-5,000 words), or under 11 (up to 500 words) Prizes: £1,000, ages 16-21; £100, 12-15; £100, under-11s, plus book tokens for school Free entry Closing date: 5 May

Iota Shots Awards

Short stories, up to 1,500 words Prizes: $350, $250, $125 Entry fee: Aus$14 Closing date: 3 May

For short poetry pamphlets, 16-20 pages, up to 40 lines a page Prizes: up to two poets will receive 50 copies of their ‘poetry shots’, published by Templar Poetry, with launch events and opportunity to appear at live Templar Poetry events Entry fee: £17 (£18 online) Closing date: TBC, 6 May in 2019

Stringybark Times Past Award

Booksie Flash Fiction Contest

Short stories, up to 1,500 words Prizes: $350, $250, $125 Entry fee: Aus$14 Closing date: 3 May

Flash fiction, up to 500 words, inspired by a picture on the website Prizes: $500, $100 Entry fee: $6.95 Closing date: 8 May

Stringybark Tales with a Twist Award

Anthony Cronin International Poetry Award

Erbacce Prize for Poetry

Poems up to 40 lines Prizes: €300, €200, €100 Entry fee: €10 Closing date: TBC, 4 May in 2019

Up to five pages of poetry Prizes: Publishing contract Free entry Closing date: 8 May

Billy Roche One Act Play Award

Live Canon International Poetry Competition

One act plays Prizes: €300, €200, €100 Entry fee: €10 Closing date: TBC, 4 May in 2019

Colm Tóibín International Short Story Award Short stories, 1,800-2,000 words Prizes: €700, €500, €300 Entry fee: €10 Closing date: TBC, 4 May in 2019

Times/Chicken House Children’s Fiction Comp For full-length novels, 30,000-80,000 words, suitable for readers aged 7-18 Prizes: Publication deal worth £10,000. All longlisted writers receive an editorial report Entry fee: £15 Closing date: 4 May

Writing Magazine - Competition Guide 2020

Poems of any length Prizes: £1,000, £100 Greenwich Prize, performance and publication for shortlist Entry fee: £6.50, £12 for two, £16 for three Closing date: 12 May

Atlanta Review International Poetry Competition Up to three poems, any length Prizes: $1,000 and publication Entry fee: $10 Closing date: 15 May

Atlantis Short Story Competition Short stories up to 2,500 words Prizes: $300, $100, $50, feedback and publication Entry fee: $10 Closing date: 15 May, TBC

COMPETITION GUIDE 2020

Brick Lane Bookshop Short Story Prize

Ploughshares Emerging Writer Contest

Smokelong Quarterly Award for Flash Fiction

Short stories, 1,000-5,000 words Prizes: £1,000, £250, £100 Entry fee: £10 Closing date: 15 May

Fiction and non-fiction, each under 6,000 words; 3-5 pages of poetry Prizes: $2,000 in each category, plus publication Entry fee: $24 Closing date: 15 May, TBC

Fiction, up to 1,000 words Prizes: $2,000, $200, $100; finalists, $50 Entry fee: early bird $13.50 for up to 2; $15.50 after 27 April Closing date: 24 May

Janet B McCabe Poetry Contest 2 poems, up to 40 lines Prizes: $1,500, $300; plus publication Entry fee: $20 Closing date: 15 May

Lorian Hemingway Short Story Competition Short stories up to 3,500 words Prizes: $1,500, 2x$500 Entry fee: $15 before 1 May, then $20 Closing date: 15 May

Pleiades Press Editor’s Prize for Poetry Poetry collections, over 48 pages Prizes: $3,000 plus publication Entry fee: $25 Closing date: 15 May, TBC

Live Canon Collection Competition

Prophecy Creek award for Speculative Fiction

Poetry collections of 35+ poems Prizes: Three will be chosen for publication Entry fee: £12 Closing date: 25 May

Unpublished book-length speculative fiction Prizes: $1,000 and publication Entry fee: $20 Closing date: 15 May

Wigtown Poetry Competition

Raymond Carver Short Story Prize Annual competition for short stories, up to 10,000 words Prizes: $1,500, £500, $250, two $125 editor’s choices Entry fee: $17 Closing date: 15 May

For poems, up to 40 lines in English, Scots or Scots/Irish Gaelic Prizes: £1,500, £200; Gaelic Prize £500, £200; Scots Prize £500, £200 Entry fee: TBC, in previous years, £6.50, £17 for three, £5 after that Closing date: 29 May Tel: 01988 402036 [email protected] www.wigtownpoetryprize.com

Stanley Kunitz Memorial Prize

Willowdown Books Cunningham Short Story Competition

Black Orchid Novella Award

Up to three poems, three pages total Prizes: $1,000 and publication Entry fee: $15 Closing date: 15 May

Short stories, 1,000-3,000 words Prizes: $125 Entry fee: $12 Closing date: 15 May

Traditional mystery novellas Prizes: $1,000 and publication Free entry Closing date: 31 May

20 20

This internationally acclaimed competition is open for entries on 1 January, offering opportunities for all writers. Now in its seventeenth year, we know several past winners have achieved success in the publishing world.

WELLS

There are FOUR categories, with significant cash prizes.

Festival of Literature International Competitions

NOVEL Synopsis and opening chapters, up to 15,000 words

F ro m 1 A p r i l t o 3 0 Ju n e 2 0 2 0

SHORT STORY Up to a maximum of 2,000 words

POETRY

POEM

£1000, £500, £250

WRITING WITHOUT RESTRICTION Exciting and original - write whatever you like!

SHORT STORY £750, £300, £200

The competition is organised by the Yeovil Community Arts Association with highly esteemed guest judges from the literary world

A BOOK FOR CHILDREN £750, £300, £200

For full entry details please see our website at

The Yeovil Community Arts Association is a registered charity (no 299372). All profits from The Yeovil Literary Prize are used to promote the arts and artistic endeavours in and around Yeovil.

Entry fee £6

and a local prize of £100 01749 673244

Or write to Liz Pike at YCAA, The Octagon Theatre, YEOVIL, BA20 1UX for an entry form. Please send an SAE.

Entry fee £6

and the Wyvern local prize of £100

CLOSING DATE 31st MAY 2020

www.yeovilprize.co.uk

Entry fee £6

and the Hilly Cansdale local prize of £100

A poem with a maximum of 40 lines

YOUNG POETS £150, £75, £50

Entry fee £3

wellsfestivalof literature.org.uk wellsfestivalofliterature.org.uk competitions@wellsfestivalof wellsfestivalofliterature.org.uk literature.org.uk

Writing Magazine - Competition Guide 2020

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11

COMPETITION GUIDE 2020

Bacopa Literary Review Contest

Elixir Press Fiction Award

Short stories (1,000-1,500 words), creative non-fiction (up to 2,500 words), poetry (up to 3 pieces, 88 lines each), haiku and mixed genre; all details TBC Prizes: $300 in each Free entry Closing date: 31 May

Novels and short story collections, 120-500 pages Prizes: $2,000 and publication Entry fee: $40 Closing date: 31 May

Bath Novel Award For the first 5,000 words of a novel, plus one-page synopsis Prizes: £3,000; 2nd: agent introductions and manuscript feedback; 3rd: Cornerstones online course Entry fee: £28 Closing date: 31 May Tel: 07791 974681

Black River Chapbook Competition Unpublished poetry chapbooks, 16-36 pages Prizes: $500 and publication Entry fee: $15 Closing date: 31 May, biannual, and 31 Oct

Bluepencilagency First Novel Prize The first chapter of an unpublished novel up to 5,000 words Prizes: £1,000, manuscript review, introduction to literary agent Nelle Andrew Entry fee: £20 Closing date: 31 May

Bridport Prize For short stories (up to 5,000 words), novels (first 8,000 words), poetry (up to 42 lines) and flash fiction (up to 250 words) Prizes: £5,000, £1,000, £500 and ten £100 highly commendeds for short stories and poetry; £1,000, £500, £250, three £100 highly commendeds for flash fiction; £1,000, £500, 3x£100 for novels, plus editorial guidance Entry fee: £9 per flash fiction, £10 per poem, £12 per short story, £20 novel Closing date: 31 May [email protected] www.bridportprize.org.uk A single poem or collection, totalling up to 600 words, by a Canadian citizen or resident Prizes: Can$6,000, 4 x $1,000 runners-up Entry fee: Can$25 Closing date: 31 May

Eden Mills Writers Festival Literary Contest Short stories and creative non-fiction up to 2,500 words; up to 5 poems. All details to be confirmed. Prizes: Can$250 in each category Entry fee: $15 Closing date: 31 May

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www.writers-online.co.uk

3,000-8,000 words total, made up of flashes up to 500 words each Prizes: mentoring, Retreat West membership Entry fee: £10 Closing date: 31 May

Frogmore Poetry Prize For poems, any theme/style, up to 40 lines Prizes: 250 guineas, 75 guineas, 50 guineas, plus subscriptions to The Frogmore Papers Entry fee: £4 Closing date: 31 May

Shooter Short Story Competition

Frome Festival Short Story

Shore Scripts Screenwriting Contest

Short stories, 1,000-2,200 words, any theme Prizes: £400, £200, £100, extra prizes for local entrants Entry fee: £8 Closing date: 31 May

Hastings Writers Room 5/29 Flash Fiction Competition For sequences of five 29-word stories, which should work as a collection Prizes: Gold and silver memberships of Retreat West Entry fee: £7, £10 for two Closing date: 31 May [email protected] www.hastingswritersroom.org/competitions

International Welsh Poetry Competition Poems up to 50 lines Prizes: £500, £250, £100, plus 17 runners-up Entry fee: £5 Closing date: 31 May

Jeff Sharlet Memorial Award for Veterans Creative writing in any genre, up to 20 pages, by a US military veteran or personnel Prizes: $1,000 plus publication, $750, 3 x $500 runners-up Free entry Closing date: 31 May

Reflex Quarterly Flash Fiction CBC Poetry Prize

Retreat West Novelette in flash Prize

Stories between 180 and 360 words Prizes: £1,000, £500, £250 Entry fee: £7 Closing date: 31 May, quarterly, 30 Aug and 30 Nov

Southword Fiction Chapbook Competition Novella, short story collection, collection of flash fiction or a mixture of stories and flash, 10,000-15,000 words Prizes: Two winners (Irish and International) will have their chapbook published with €250 advance and 20 complimentary copies Entry fee: €25 Closing date: 31 May Writing Magazine - Competition Guide 2020

Stories up to 5,000 words Prizes: £400, £100 Entry fee: £7, £10 for two Closing date: 31 May

Contests for feature, TV pilot and short film scripts Prizes: prizes totalling $20,000 Entry fee: $40 Closing date: 31 May, early deadline

Yeovil Literary Prize For novels (opening chapters and synopsis, up to 15,000 words), short stories (max 2,000 words, poems (up to 40 lines), writing without restrictions, Western Gazette best local writer Prizes: Novel: £1,000, £250, £100; Short story and poetry, £500, £200, £100; Writing without restrictions: £200, £100, £50; Local prize: £100 Entry fee: Novel: £12; Short story: £7; Poetry: £7 for one, £10 for two, £12 for three; Writing without restrictions: £5 Closing date: 31 May

JUNE Boulevard Poetry Contest Groups of three poems by a writer who has not had a book published Prizes: $1,000 Entry fee: $16 each category Closing date: 1 June

Gertrude Stein Award Short stories, up to 8,000 words Prizes: $1,000 Entry fee: $20 Closing date: 1 June

Lush Triumphant Literary Awards Short stories, max 3,000 words, creative non-fiction, max 4,000 words; up to five poems, max 15 pages Prizes: Can$1,000 and publication in each category Entry fee: $30 Closing date: 1 June, TBC

Moon City Press Poetry Award Poetry collections, over 48 pages Prizes: $1,000 and publication Entry fee: $25 Closing date: 1 June, TBC

COMPETITION GUIDE 2020

Room Creative Non-Fiction Contest Essays, up to 3,500 words Prizes: $500, $250, $50 and publication Entry fee: International entries $42 Closing date: 1 June

Short Fiction Prize Short stories, up to 7,500 words, by current students of North American universities and colleges Prizes: $1,000 and a place at the Southampton Writers Conference Free entry Closing date: 1 June, TBC

Sustainable Societies: Novel Full length novels touching on ideas of sustainable societies Prizes: £500, £200, £100, 3 x £50 Free entry Closing date: 2 June

Bruntwood Prize for Playwriting For full-length (at least an hour) new stage plays written in English, which have not been published or professionally performed Prizes: £16,000 for the winner, Judge’s Award £8,000, Original New Voice Award £8,000 Free entry Closing date: 5 June, TBC

Farnham Flash Fiction Competition For flash fiction, up to 500 words, on any subject Prizes: £75, £25, £25 for best entry featuring Farnham Entry fee: £5 Closing date: 5 June [email protected] http://www.farnhamfringefestival.org

Writers Digest Annual Writing Competition Prose, various lengths, 2,000-4,000 words; poetry up to 32 lines Prizes: $5,000 overall; $1,000, $500, $250, $100, $50, 5x$25 in each of 9 categories Entry fee: Stories $35, poetry $25; $30/$20 before 4 May Closing date: 5 June

Christopher Smart Poetry Prize Poetry collections, 48-120 pages Prizes: $2,000 and publication Entry fee: $25 Closing date: 6 June

Goi Peace International Essay Contest for Young People Essays of 700 words or fewer in English, German, Spanish, French or Japanese, by writers aged under 25 Prizes: ¥100,000, 2x¥50,000, in each category Free entry Closing date: TBC, 15 June in 2019

Writers’ Weekend Winchester and Writing Magazine Short Fiction Contest The Writers’ Weekend Winchester and Writing Magazine are teaming up to run the Short Fiction competition to celebrate the opening of the first Writers’ Weekend, 10-12 July, at the University of Winchester. 65 Literary agents, commissioning editors, published authors and industry professionals will visit the Hampshire city to give 19 talks, 18 workshops, and over 700 one-to-one sessions with emerging writers keen to pitch their work and receive supportive feedback. Competition winners will be announced at the Writers’ Weekend.

For all details and to book, visit: www.writersweekend.uk

Writing Magazine and Writers’ Weekend Short Story Competition Submit quality short stories on any subject, theme or period (no children’s stories). Length should be 1,500-3,000 words for each entry. Each entry must be a complete story. Entries will be judged by Writing Magazine, for their originality and storytelling excellence. First prize is £250, publication in Writing Magazine and one year’s subscription to Writing Magazine, with subscriptions for second and third.

The closing date is 19 June and the entry fee is £10, or £8 for WM subscribers.

To enter, visit: https://writ.rs/wmwinch

Other Writers’ Weekend competitions are: Skylark Fabulous Fiction for Fives to Teens Competition For the first 3,000 words of a fiction book for children, aimed at three age groups (5+, 8-12, or 12+). Specify the audience you are writing for and include a one-page synopsis, with the finished word count (if complete), in the same file. First prize is £500, with a one-to-one editorial consultation by phone or Skype for first, second and third.

The Bright Agency Picture Book Competition Submit a text of no more than 600 words in prose or verse for children aged 3-6. First prize is £500 and a one-to-one editorial consultation by phone or Skype, with written editorial feedback for second and book prizes for third.

The Opening of a Novel Competition Submit the first three pages (12pt double-spaced) of their novel, plus a 600-word maximum synopsis. Any theme or period. First prize is £250, with book prizes for second and third. Written feedback offered on this competition for an additional fee.

Deadline for all competitions is 19 June Winners will be announced at the Writers’ Weekend Winchester, 10-12 July, and on the Writers’ Weekend website.

For all details and to enter, please visit: www.WritersWeekend.uk Writing Magazine - Competition Guide 2020

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13

COMPETITION GUIDE 2020

Hastings Literary Festival Writing Competition

Living Springs Publishers Stories Through the Ages Competition

Short stories, up to 2,500 words, short stories by BAME writers, up to 5,000 words, poems, up to 40 lines, and flash fiction, up to 500 words Prizes: £200, £100, £50 each category, plus bespoke writer’s surgery for best entry from a Sussex writer Entry fee: £7.50, £5 each subsequent Closing date: 7 June

Short stories, 900-4,000 words, by writers in various adult age ranges Prizes: $500, $200, $100 in each category Entry fee: $25 Closing date: 15 June

ALCS Award for Educational Writing Traditionally published non-fiction that enhances learning Prizes: £2,000 Free entry Closing date: 10 June

Victoria University Short Story Prize for New Writers Short stories up to 3,000 words Prizes: Aus$6,000, 2x$1,000 Entry fee: $20 Closing date: 10 June, TBC

Aurora Poetry & Short Fiction Open Competition For short stories up to 2,000 words and poems up to 40 lines Prizes: £500, £150 and a Writing School East Midlands course £50 in each category; £100 and development for the best entry from an East Midlands writer Entry fee: £9, £7 for subsequent entries Closing date: 8 June TBC

Canterbury Festival Poet of the Year Competition Poems up to 60 lines Prizes: £200, £100, £50, £25; people’s choice, £25; best read, sparkling wine Entry fee: £5 Closing date: 15 June’

Crabbe Competition Poems, up to 50 lines, by Suffolk poets/ members of the Suffolk Poetry Society Prizes: £600, £300, £150, 2 x £75 Entry fee: £3 Closing date: 15 June

Creative Future Writers’ Award Poetry up to 200 words, short fiction up to 2,000 words, by disadvantaged writers Prizes: £10,000 in development opportunities Free entry Closing date: 15 June, TBC, 15 June in 2019

Hummingbird Flash Fiction Prize Short fiction, up to 1,000 words Prizes: Can$300, $75 Entry fee: $15 Closing date: 15 June

14

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Narrative Prize The best short story, novel excerpt, poem, play, graphic story or piece of literary nonfiction published in Narrative Prizes: $4,000 Free entry Closing date: 15 June, TBC

Omnidawn Poetry Chapbook Contest Poetry collections, 20-40 pages Prizes: $1,000 and publication Entry fee: $18 Closing date: 15 June

Queen Mary Wasafiri New Writing Prize Poetry (up to five poems), fiction and life writing up to 3,000 words Prizes: £1,000 in each category plus publication in Wasafiri Entry fee: £10 for one category, £16 for two categories Closing date: 15 June

Segora Short Story and Poetry Competitions Short stories between 1,500 and 3,000 words, poems up to 50 lines, vignettes up to 300 lines, one-act plays Prizes: £300, £100, £50 for poetry and short story, £100 for vignettes; £150, £50 for plays; prize presentation in France, TBA Entry fee: £5 poems and vignettes, £8 story, £12 play Closing date: 15 June Tel: 00 33 5 49 80 22 96  [email protected] www.poetryproseandplays.com

Sunday Times/University of Warwick Young Writer of the Year Award The best full-length published or selfpublished work of fiction, non-fiction or poetry by an author under 35 Prizes: £5,000, 3 x £500 Free entry Closing date: 15 June, TBC

AAWP Slow Canoe Creative Non-Fiction Prize Unpublished, narrative-driven non-fiction, to emerging writers from Australasia Prizes: Aus$500 and a fully subsidised visit to the Australasian Association of Writing Programs (AAWP) conference Entry fee: Aus$20 Closing date: 30 June Writing Magazine - Competition Guide 2020

Bath Flash Fiction Award Thrice-yearly competition for flash fiction up to 300 words Prizes: £1,000, £300, £100, 2x£30 Entry fee: £9 Closing date: 16 June, and October TBC

Eyelands International Short Story Competition Short stories up to 2,500 words on the theme ‘numbers’ Prizes: A week’s holiday for two on Serifos Entry fee: €10 TBC Closing date: 20 June

A Midsummer Tale Narrative Writing Contest Literary fiction and creative non-fiction, 1,000-5,000 words, on a theme TBC Prizes: $50, $15, $10 Amazon gift cards Free entry Closing date: 21 June, annual

McLellan Poetry Prize Poems up to 80 lines Prizes: £1,500, £300, £150, 6x£25 Entry fee: £6, £5 additional Closing date: 21 June, TBC, 21 June in 2019

Wild Words Summer Solstice Writing Competition 1,000 words of poetry, prose, song or spoken word. Theme TBC Prizes: One-hour mentoring session, online publication Entry fee: £7 Closing date: 21 June

Troubadour International Poetry Prize Poems, up to 45 lines Prizes: £2,000, £1,000, £500; smaller prizes Entry fee: £5, €6, $7 per poem Closing date: 22 June

Adelaide Plains Poetry Competition Poems, up to 60 lines, on theme ‘vision’ Prizes: Aus$700 fund Entry fee: $10, $5 additional Closing date: 26 June

James White Award Science fiction (broadly defined), 2,0006,000 words, by non-professional writers Prizes: £200, plus publication in Interzone Free entry Closing date: 28 June, TBC

Retreat West Themed Flash Fiction Prize Fiction, up to 500 words, themed each quarter Prizes: £200, 2x£100 Entry fee: £8 Closing date: 28 June (theme ‘music’); 27 Sept (theme ‘glass’); 29 Dec (theme ‘bridges’)

COMPETITION GUIDE 2020

VS Pritchett Memorial Prize

Drue Heinz Literature Prize

Unpublished short stories between 2,000 and 4,000 words Prizes: £1,000 plus publication in RSL Review and Prospect online Entry fee: £5 Closing date: 28 June, TBC

Short fiction collections by writers with a record of publication Prizes: $15,000 Free entry Closing date: 30 June

Audio Arcadia Short Story Competition Short stories up to 5,000 words Prizes: Anthology publication, royalties Entry fee: £6.50 Closing date: 30 June

Aura Estrada Short Story Contest Short stories, up to 5,000 words, theme TBC Prizes: $500 and publication Entry fee: $20 for US/Can/Western European entrants; otherwise free Closing date: 30 June

Blue Mountain Arts Poetry Card Competition Biannual competition for greetings card poems Prizes: $350, $200, $100 Free entry Closing date: 30 June

Boston Review Annual Poetry Contest Up to 10 pages, of up to 5 poems Prizes: $500 and publication Entry fee: $20 for US/Can/Western European entrants; otherwise free Closing date: 30 June

British Czech & Slovak Association Short stories and non-fiction, up to 2,000 words, exploring the links between Britain and the Czech/Slovak Republics at any time. The suggested, but optional, theme for 2020 is ‘sporting’ Prizes: £400, £150, publication in the British Czech & Slovak Review Free entry Closing date: 30 June

British Fantasy Society Short Story Competition For any kind of fantasy short stories, horror, sf, magic realism etc, up to 5,000 words Prizes: £100, £50, £20, plus year’s membership of BFS and publication BFS Horizons Entry fee: £5, free for BFS members› Closing date: 30 June, TBC

Poetry collections, 48-90 pages Prizes: $1,000 and publication Entry fee: $25 Closing date: 30 June

Earlyworks Press Flash Fiction

Moth Short Story Prize

Flash fiction, up to 100 words Prizes: £100; cash and books Entry fee: £5, £20 for up to 6 Closing date: 30 June

Short stories up to 5,000 words, any theme Prizes: First €3,000; second, writing retreat at in France and €250; third, €1,000 Entry fee: €15 Closing date: 30 June

Earlyworks Press Poetry Competition Poems, up to 40 lines Prizes: £100; cash and books Entry fee: £5, £20 for up to 6 Closing date: 30 June

Flash 500 Competitions Flash fiction, up to 500 words Prizes: £300, £200 and £100 Entry fee: £5, £8 for two Closing date: 30 June, quarterly, 30 Sept, 31 Dec

Henshaw Short Story Competition Quarterly competition for short stories up to 2,000 words, any theme Prizes: £200, £100, £50 Entry fee: £6 Closing date: 30 June, quarterly, 30 Sept, 31 Dec

Hidden Review Arts Playwrighting Award Full-length, unpublished and unproduced play scripts Prizes: $1,000 and a script in hand reading Entry fee: $20 Closing date: 30 June

New Millennium Writing Awards Fiction and non-fiction, up to 7,499 words, flash fiction, up to 1,000 words, up to three poems, total five pages max Prizes: $1,000 in each category Entry fee: $20, $35 for two, $45 for three Closing date: 30 June

North Street Book Prize Self-published books, max 200,000 words, in the following categories: mainstream and literary fiction, genre fiction, creative nonfiction & memoir, poetry, children’s picture book, graphic narrative Prizes: $5,000 overall winner, $1,000 category winners, $250 honorable mentions Entry fee: $65 Closing date: 30 June Tel: 1 413 320 1847 [email protected] https://winningwriters.com/north

Poetry Book Awards Independently or self-published poetry books Prizes: £200, £100, £50 Entry fee: £25 Closing date: 30 June

Impress Prize for New Writers Full-length debuts from unpublished fiction and non-fiction writers. Submit book proposal and sample chapter totalling no more than 6,000 words Prizes: £500 and publication by Impress Books Entry fee: £25 Closing date: 30 June, TBC

Preservation Foundation biographical non-fiction contest

L Ron Hubbard Writers of the Future

Scribble Quarterly Short Story

Quarterly competition for fantasy and SF short stories Prizes: $1,000, $750, $500 each quarter; overall $5,000 for best of year Free entry Closing date: 30 June, quarterly, 30 Sept and 31 Dec

Divine Chocolate Poetry Comp For poems on a chocolatey theme, ‘Where does the chocolate journey begin?’, in two kids’ and one adults’ categories Prizes: Divine chocolate, goodies, book tokens Free entry Closing date: 30 June, TBC

Marystina Santiestevan First Book Prize

Biographical non-fiction, 1,000-10,000 words Prizes: $200, $100 Free entry Closing date: 30 June Ongoing quarterly competitions for short stories, up to 3,000 words Prizes: £75, £25, £15 in each issue Entry fee: £3 (£5 with critique); free for annual subscribers Closing date: 30 June, Quarterly Tel: 01451 831053

Lascaux Prize for Flash Fiction

Sentinel Literary Quarterly Poetry Competition

Short stories, up to 1,000 words; up to 3 per entry Prizes: $1,000 and publication Entry fee: $15 Closing date: 30 June

Poems up to 50 lines Prizes: £250, £100, £50, £30 x 3, £15 x 3 Entry fee: £5, discounts for more Closing date: 30 June, quarterly, 30 Sept, 31 Dec

Writing Magazine - Competition Guide 2020

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COMPETITION GUIDE 2020

Tupelo Broadside Prize 3-5 poems, max 21 lines each Prizes: $350 for three winners Entry fee: $22 Closing date: 30 June

University of Canberra ViceChancellor’s International Poetry Poems, max 50 lines Prizes: Aus$15,000, $5,000, 4x$50 Entry fee: $25 Closing date: 30 June, TBC, 30 June in 2019

Wells Festival of Literature Short stories between 1,000 and 2,000 words; poems up to 35 lines; stories for children (first three chapters); young poets, up to 35 lines) Prizes: £1,000, £500, £250, £100 local prize; £750, £300, £200, local prize of £100, in poetry and children’s categories; £150, £75, £50 in young poets’ category Entry fee: £6 each category, £3 for young poets Closing date: 30 June Tel: 01749 673244 admin@wellsfestivalofliterature.org.uk www.wellsfestivalofliterature.org.uk

JULY Canadian Stories Contest Prose up to 3,000 words; up to 3 poems – worldwide writers welcome but entries must pertain to Canada Prizes: 6xCan$350, 2x$175, 2x$50 Entry fee: $20 Closing date: 1 July

Conium Review Innovative Short Fiction Contest Short stories and flash, up to 7,500 words – as a single or multiple stories Prizes: $500 Entry fee: $15 Closing date: 1 July

Beth Chatto Writers’ Prize For short stories, novel extracts or creative non-fiction in which a garden or landscape is an essential element, by writers in Essex Prizes: £200, £100, £50 Entry fee: Closing date: 1 July

Mere Literary Festival Poetry Competition Poems up to 40 lines Prizes: £300, £100, £50, 3 x £15 Entry fee: £4.50, £3.50 for each subsequent Closing date: 1 July

William Van Wert Fiction Award Short story or novel extracts, up to 25 pages Prizes: $1,000 and publication Entry fee: $17 Closing date: 1 July

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HG Wells Short Story Competition Short stories between 1,500 and 5,000 words on the theme of ‘vision’ Prizes: £1,000 prize for writers under 21, over 21s £500 Entry fee: £10, £5 under 21 Closing date: 6 July

Boardman Tasker Award for Mountain Literature Book-length literature (fiction, nonfiction, drama, poetry) concerned with the mountain environment Prizes: £3,000 Free entry Closing date: 15 July

Crab Orchard Series in Poetry First Book Award Poetry collections, over 48 pages, by US citizens Prizes: $2,500 and publication Entry fee: $25 Closing date: 15 July, TBC

Doris Gooderson Short Story Competition Short stories up to 1,200 words, open theme Prizes: £200, £100, £50, winning entries may be published in the annual anthology Entry fee: £5 Closing date: 15 July [email protected] www.wrekinwriters.co.uk

Petrichor Prize Finely crafted unpublished fiction manuscripts, 120-350 pages Prizes: $1,000 and publication Entry fee: $25 Closing date: 15 July

Prism Creative Non-Fiction Competition Creative non-fiction, max 6,000 words Prizes: Can$1,500, $600, $400 Entry fee: International entries $45 Closing date: 15 July

Ledbury Poetry Festival Poetry Competition Poetry up to 40 lines Prizes: £1,000 and a week at Ty Newydd Entry fee: £5.75, £3.50 each additional Closing date: 16 July

Beverly Prize for Literature Book-length manuscripts of fiction, nonfiction, poetry, drama, memoir, or criticism. Prizes: £1,000 and publication Entry fee: £25 Closing date: 21 July

Hawk Mountain Short Story Collection Award Unpublished short story collections Prizes: $1,000 and publication Entry fee: $20 Closing date: 30 July

AAWP/UWRF Translators’ Prize Fitzcarraldo Editions Novel Prize Unpublished novels over 30,000 words Prizes: £3,000 advance, publication by Fitzcarraldo Editions Free entry Closing date: 15 July

Francine Ringwold Fiction up to 5,000 words or up to 5 pages of poetry Prizes: $500 in both categories, plus publication Entry fee: $12 Closing date: 15 July, annual

Muriel Craft Bailey Memorial Poetry Award Poems up to 40 lines Prizes: $1,000, $250, $100 Entry fee: $5 Closing date: 15 July

AAWP Australian Short Story Festival Short Story Prize 2020 Short stories, up to 3,000 words, by writers across Australasia Prizes: Conference, travel and accommodation for the Australian Short Story Festival Entry fee: Aus$20 Closing date: 31 July Writing Magazine - Competition Guide 2020

Translations of prose, up to 3,000 words, or poems, up to 30 lines, into English Prizes: A fully subsidised visit to the Australasian Association of Writing Programs (AAWP) conference, including accommodation and air fares Entry fee: Aus$20 Closing date: 31 July

Craft First Chapters Contest The first chapter(s) of an unpublished novel Prizes: $2,800 and publication Entry fee: $20 Closing date: 31 July, TBC, 1 April in 2019

F(r)iction Literary Contests Thrice-yearly comp for fiction and creative non-fiction, 1,000-7,500 words, poems, up to 3; flash, up to 750 words Prizes: $1,000 for short stories, $300 each for poetry and flash Entry fee: $15 stories; $8 flash, $12 for 3; $10 poems, $12 for three Closing date: 31 July, TBC, thrice yearly

Foyle Young Poets of the Year Poetry from writers aged 11-17 Prizes: Publication in an anthology, mentoring, Arvon writing residency Free entry Closing date: 31 July, TBC

COMPETITION GUIDE 2020

Competition Listings

HISSAC Annual Open Short Story

London Magazine Poetry Prize

Seán Ó’Faoláin Short Story Comp

Short stories up to 2,000 words, flash fiction up to 500 words. No connection to Scotland is needed either by theme or entrant. Prizes: £200, £75 and £50 in both categories Entry fee: £5, £12 for three, £18 for five Closing date: 31 July Tel: 01862 932266 [email protected] www.hissac.co.uk

Poems up to 40 lines Prizes: £500, £300, £200 Entry fee: £10 Closing date: 31 July, TBC

Short stories up to 3,000 words Prizes: €2,000, week-long at Aman Cara Writers’ and Artists’ Retreat, €500, 4x€250 Entry fee: €18 Closing date: 31 July

Ilkley Literature Festival Short Story and Walter Swan Poetry Competitions Short stories, 1,000-2,000 words; poems up to 30 lines Prizes: £200 for short stories, £200, £100, £75 for adult poems, £100, £75, £50 for 1825s’ poems Entry fee: £5 Closing date: 31 July, TBC

Lune Spark Young Writers’ Short Story Contest Short stories, up to 1,500 words, by writers aged 10-13 or 13-16 Prizes: $500, $250, $100; Book Cover Prize, $100 Entry fee: $15 Closing date: 31 July

Norwich Writers’ Circle Olga Sinclair Open Short Story Competition

Winchester Poetry Prize Poems up to 40 lines Prizes: £1,000, £500, £250, £100 for a Hampshire-based poet Entry fee: £5, £4 for subsequent entries Closing date: 31 July

Short stories up to 2,000 words on the theme of ‘news’ Prizes: £500, £250 and £100 Entry fee: £9, £7 each subsequent Closing date: 31 July Tel: 07585 308604 [email protected] http://norwichwriters.wordpress.com

Wirral Festival of Firsts Open Poetry Competition Poems up to 40 lines Prizes: £200, 2x£50, £50 for best Wirral poet Entry fee: £4, £10 for three Closing date: 31 July

Red Hen Press Novella Award Novellas, 15,000-30,000 words Prizes: $1,000 and publication Entry fee: $25 Closing date: 31 July

AUGUST

Scribble Annual Article Comp

Buzzwords Open Poetry Comp

Articles, up to 1,500 words on the theme ‘My Writing Life’’ Prizes: £50, £25, £15, publication in Scribble Entry fee: £3 Closing date: 31 July

Poems up to 70 lines Prizes: £600, £300, 5 x £50, Gloucestershire Prize of £200 Entry fee: £4, £10 for 3 Closing date: August, TBC

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Writing Magazine - Competition Guide 2020

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COMPETITION GUIDE 2020

Sydney Hammond Memorial Short Story Competition

Dreamquest One Poetry and Writing Contest

Short stories, up to 1,000 words, on the theme ‘if only...’ Prizes: Aus$250; anthology publication Entry fee: Aus$10 Closing date: 1 August

Stories in any format, double spaced, max 5 pages; poems, up to 30 lines Prizes: $500, $250, $100 for writing category; $250, $125, $50 for poetry Entry fee: $10 writing, $5 poetry Closing date: 15 August Tel: 1 773 633 9179 [email protected] www.dreamquestone.com

London Independent Story Prize Short stories, max 1,500 words; flash, 300 words; screenplays, max 30 pages Prizes: £100 for stories and flash, Final Draft software for screenplays Entry fee: £7, £5 for flash, £10 for screenplays Closing date: 2 August, quarterly [email protected] www.londonindependentstoryprize.co.uk

Iowa Prize for literary non-fiction Book length literary non-fiction, 40,00090,000 words Prizes: Publication by University of Iowa Press under a standard contract Entry fee: $10 Closing date: 15 August

TS Eliot Prize First poetry collections, published in the UK this year Prizes: £25,000, 10x£1,500 Free entry Closing date: 2 August

Room Poetry Contest

Constance Rooke Creative NonFiction Award

Bodley Head/FT Essay Prize

Up to 3 poems, max 150 lines total Prizes: $500, $250, $50 and publication Entry fee: International entries $42 Closing date: 15 August

Creative non-fiction, 2,000-3,000 words Prizes: Can$1,000 Entry fee: International entries $45 Closing date: TBC, was 5 Aug in 2019

Essays up to 3,500 words by writers between 18 and 35 Prizes: £1,000, £500, publication Free entry Closing date: TBC, 16 August in 2019

Costa Short Story Award

Retreat West Novel Prize

Short stories, up to 4,000 words Prizes: £3,500, £1,000, £500 Free entry Closing date: 5 August, TBC

Unpublished novels Prizes: Retreat West publishing contract and £500 advance, MS critique and editorial report Entry fee: £15 Closing date: 18 August

Fischer Prize Poems, up to three pages, by US poets Prizes: $1,000 plus $500 travel to awards ceremony; 5x$200 plus $100; $500 for best entry from a Colorado poet Entry fee: $10 Closing date: 30 August

Thomas Paine Award Unpublished book-length political writing Prizes: $1,000 and publication Entry fee: $22 Closing date: 30 August

Aesthetica Creative Writing Short stories up to 2,000 words, poetry up to 40 lines. Any theme, form or style Prizes: £1,000 for winners in each category, publication in Creative Writing Annual, a year’s subscription to Granta, books courtesy of Bloodaxe Books and Vintage, a consultation with Redhammer Management for the fiction winner, full membership of The Poetry Society for the poetry winner Entry fee: £12 per poetry submission; £18 per short fiction submission Closing date: 31 August Tel: 01904 629137 [email protected] www.aestheticamagazine.com/creativewriting-award

Autumn House Poetry Chapbook

Over The Edge New Writer of The Year Poetry (three poems of up to 40 lines or one of 100 lines); short stories, up to 3,000 words Prizes: €1,000 in cash prizes (€300 each for winning poet and short story writer, €400 for the overall winner), publication for winning poet, plus readings at Over the Edge Entry fee: €10, €7.50 for each of multiples Closing date: 7 August, TBC

1/2 K Prize Prose, under 500 words, in any genre Prizes: $1,000 and publication Entry fee: $20 Closing date: 15 August

Broadside Poetry Prize Two poems, 10-30 lines each Prizes: $500 Entry fee: $12 Closing date: 15 August

Omnidawn Open Poetry collections, 40-120 pages Prizes: $3,000 and publication Entry fee: $27 Closing date: 17 August

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Elyne Mitchell Writing Award Fiction or non-fiction, up to 2,500 words, on the Australasian rural experience Prizes: Aus$1,000, $500 Entry fee: $15 Closing date: 22 August, TBC

Robert Graves Prize Open competition for poems up to 40 lines Prizes: Winners will be published in POEM magazine Entry fee: £5, £3 each additional Closing date: 23 August, TBC

Biographers’ Club Tony Lothian Prize An uncommissioned biography by a firsttime biographer. Submit a proposal of no more than 20 pages, including synopsis, sample chapter (both double-spaced), CV, sources and a note on the market for the book. Mandatory entry form available on the website. Prizes: £2,000 Entry fee: £15 Closing date: TBC, 30 August in 2019 Tel: 0207 359 7769 Writing Magazine - Competition Guide 2020

Poetry chapbooks, 15-30 pages Prizes: $1,000 and publication Entry fee: $20 Closing date: 31 August

Blue Mesa Review Summer Competition Fiction and non-fiction, up to 6,000 words; up to 3 poems Prizes: $500 in each category Entry fee: $12 Closing date: 31 August

Cinnamon Pencil Mentoring Competition 10 poems, two short stories or the first 10,000 words of a novel Prizes: A place on the Cinnamon Pencil mentoring scheme Entry fee: £12 Closing date: 31 August, TBC

Diana Woods Memorial Award in Creative Non-fiction Essays, up to 5,000 words; biannual Prizes: $250 plus publication in Lunch Ticket Free entry Closing date: 31 August, (and 28 Feb)

Exeter Flash Competition Flash fiction up to 750 words Prizes: £200, £100, £50 Entry fee: £6 Closing date: 31 August, TBC

S H O R T S TO RY C O M P E T I T I O N W I N N E R

King of the Roundabout

Timely topic:

Throne

1st place £100

by Liz Gwinnell

Liz Gwinnell is a solicitor specialising in prison law. When she is not behind bars, she enjoys creating things out of words, wool and food and keeping three unruly cats in order at her home in Wiltshire. She collects vintage items and loves anything from the 1970s and 1980s. Liz had her first short story published in Writers’ News in the 1990s and has since written articles for the Wiltshire Times, The Bath Chronicle, The Lady, Teddy Bear Scene and Wiltshire Life and a licensing law handbook. She has won prizes in the Frome Short Story Competition, the Eyelands Greece Competition, Mslexia Flash Fiction Competition, and been short- and longlisted in the Bath and Bristol short story awards.

S

ometimes, things came flying over the fence. And sometimes, the woman next door shouted. She shouted a lot before the wicker chair came over. ‘Good job we wasn’t sunbathing,’ Dad said. Usually he threw the stuff back but you couldn’t throw a chair back. What if someone was on the other side of the fence? ‘They didn’t care about that when they threw it over,’ Mum grumbled. Dad put the chair in the shed and I went inside to do my homework. I had to write an essay about Kings and Queens and What Makes Them Important. The next day, the man next door went to live on the roundabout. ‘What do you mean he’s gone to live on the roundabout?’ Mum said,

pummelling Dad’s shirt with the iron. I showed her, pointing out the window at the top of the stairs. ‘Well,’ she said. ‘He must be mad.’ I got more sense out of Dad. ‘Why is he living on the roundabout?’ I asked him later that night. ‘Well son,’ Dad said, rubbing his chin.’Perhaps he don’t think he’s important.’ ‘Do people go and live on roundabouts if they don’t feel important?’ I asked. ‘Probably,’ he said. ‘I can’t think of no other reason.’ That night, as I was going to sleep, I thought about roundabouts and people who didn’t think they were important. And the next day I made him a throne. A throne would make him feel important. Kings felt important when they sat on thrones. I blew up balloons and I tied them around the wicker chair in the shed. I squirted glue and shook glitter and added a length of tinsel from the Christmas box. When I’d finished, I sat on it to test it out and it did make me feel a bit important or as

important as a ten-year-old boy could feel although I’m nearly eleven so I’ll be more important soon. I carried the chair to the roundabout and I ran between a gap in the cars and hoped Mum wasn’t looking out the window and I left it there for him to find when he woke up because I could hear him snoring somewhere inside the scrubby bushes. Dad saw him first. ‘Ere! Ella! You’ll never guess what!’ They were staring out of the landing window as the street lights came on. The man was sitting on the throne and it glowed and sparkled in the headlights of the cars. Some of the drivers tooted and he raised his arm and waved, just like a king. ‘Whatever is he doing sitting out there like that,’ Mum said, tea towel in hand, drying a plate that was already dry. I shrugged. ‘Maybe he’s being important,’ I said. That night, as I went to sleep, I thought about Kings and Queens and people who felt important again. And I thought that the next day, I might make him a Crown.

Also shortlisted in the Timely Topic: Throne Competition were: Lesley Evans, Cheltenham, Gloucestershire; Patricia Marson, Kirkcaldy, Fife; Caroline Newbury, Ditton, Kent; Annie Percik, Enfield; Paul Robinson, Brackley, Northamptonshire.

COMPETITION GUIDE 2020

Exeter Story Prize

Quill Prose Award

Michael Marks Awards

Short stories, any theme, up to 10,000 words Prizes: £500, £150, £100 Entry fee: £12 Closing date: 31 August Tel: 07722 144357 [email protected] www.creativewritingmatters.co.uk

Any prose work, over 150 pages, by a writer who identifies as queer Prizes: $1,000 and publication Entry fee: $10 Closing date: 31 August

For poetry pamphlets up to 36 pages, and for the publishers of poetry pamphlets Prizes: £5,000 for each award Free entry Closing date: 12 September, TBC

Scarlet Stiletto Awards

Hektoen International Summer Essay Competition

Fool for Poetry International Chapbook Competition Short collection of poetry, 16-24 pages Prizes: €1,000, €500, chapbook publication for both winners plus 25 copies Entry fee: €25 Closing date: 31 August Tel: +353 (0)21 4312955

Gabo Prize for Literature in Translation For translations of poetry or prose Prizes: $200 plus publication in Lunch Ticket Free entry Closing date: biannual, 31 Aug and 28 Feb

Gemini Magazine Flash Fiction Contest Short stories, up to 1,000 words Prizes: $1,000, $100, 4x$25, and publication Entry fee: $6 Closing date: 31 August

Haunted Waters Press Awards Fiction, max 7,500 words; up to 3 poems; up to 3 pieces of flash, up to 500 words Prizes: $250 and publication in each category Entry fee: $10 Closing date: 31 August

Crime and mystery short stories, up to 5,000 words, by Australian women Prizes: Aus$9,760 prize fund Entry fee: $25 Closing date: 31 August

Science Fiction Poetry Award Poems in three categories, dwarf (1-10 lines, or up to 100 words); short (11-49 lines, or up to 100 words); long (50+ lines or 500+ words) Prizes: $100, $50, $25 Entry fee: $2 Closing date: 31 August

Short stories up to 600 words, poetry up to 12 lines, flash fiction 100 words Prizes: £25 each category, anthology publication Entry fee: £1 per entry Closing date: 31 August

Unpublished first collections of poems (4595 pages) or short stories (120-280 pages) Prizes: $1,000 and publication Entry fee: $25 Closing date: 31 August

For picture books and middle grade stories for children on sustainability issues Prizes: £200 in each category Free entry Closing date: 14 September

Teens of Tomorrow

Gingko Prize for Ecopoetry

Future-focused diverse teen fiction, 2,0005,000 words Prizes: £200, £100, £50, anthology publication by Odd Voice Out Entry fee: £4 Closing date: 31 August

Poems up to 54 lines on ecological themes Prizes: £5,000, £2,000, £1,000 Entry fee: £7, £4 for each subsequent entry Closing date: 15 September, TBC

Full-length works of fiction Prizes: $10,000 and publication Entry fee: $28 Closing date: 31 August

SEPTEMBER

Children’s picture book manuscripts by US writers of colour and indigenous writers Prizes: $2,000, plus standard publishing contract; $1,000 Free entry Closing date: 31 August, TBC

Southampton Review Short Fiction Prize

Preservation Foundation Travel non-fiction contest

Diana Brebner Prize

Prole Poetry Pamphlet Competition 2018 Up to 35 pages of poetry Prizes: £100, publication Entry fee: £12 Closing date: 31 August, TBC

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First page of a novel and a one-page synopsis by a first-time writer Prizes: Start Up mentoring package Entry fee: £10 Closing date: 14 September

Sustainable Societies: Writing for Children

New Voices Award

Travel non-fiction, 1,000-10,000 words Prizes: $200, $100 Free entry Closing date: 31 August

New Voices Competition

St Lawrence Book Award

UNO Press Publishing Lab Prize Hysteria Writing Competition

Articles, up to 1,600 words, on a medical humanities theme TBC Prizes: $2,500 plus publication; $800 Entry fee: Closing date: 14 September, TBC

Short stories, up to 350 words Prizes: $500, $300, $200 Entry fee: $5 Closing date: 1 September Best poem, up to 30 lines, by a resident of Canada’s National Capital Region Prizes: Can$500 Entry fee: $25 Closing date: 4 September

Wellcome Book Prize Fiction or non-fiction with a medical or theme published in 2019, submitted by publisher Prizes: £30,000 Free entry Closing date: 9 September, TBC Writing Magazine - Competition Guide 2020

Kore Press Institute Poetry Prize Poetry collection manuscripts, 48-100 pages Prizes: $1,500 and publication Entry fee: $28 Closing date: 15 September

Surrey International Writers’ Conference Short stories, 2,500-5,000 words Prizes: Can$1,000, $150 Entry fee: $19 Closing date: 15 September

Transitions Abroad Writing Contest Essays or guides, 1,200-3,000 words on living, moving or working abroad Prizes: $500, $150, $100; $50 for all finalists Free entry Closing date: 15 September

Stroud Book Festival International Writing Competition Poetry up 40 lines, flash fiction up to 500 words; Katie Fforde Award for Mainstream Fiction excerpt up to 3,000 words and 200word synopsis Prizes: £500, £250, £100 in each category for poetry and flash fiction, £100 and 4-night writing retreat, £50 Katie Fforde award Entry fee: £5, £3 each additional Closing date: TBC, 22 Sept in 2019

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COMPETITION GUIDE 2020

Manchester Fiction Prize Short stories, up to 2,500 words Prizes: £10,000 Entry fee: £17.50 Closing date: 18 September Tel: 0161 247 1787 [email protected] www2.mmu.ac.uk/writingcompetition/

Manchester Poetry Prize Portfolio of poetry (3-5, maximum 120 lines) Prizes: £10,000 Entry fee: £17.50 Closing date: 18 September Tel: 0161 247 1787 [email protected] www2.mmu.ac.uk/writingcompetition/

Val Wood Prize Short stories up to 1,500 words, theme TBC Prizes: £100, £50, 2x£25, web publication Free entry Closing date: 21 September, TBC

TulipTree Review Genre Contest Fiction and non-fiction, up to 10,000 words, any genre, on the theme ‘underdogs’ Prizes: $1,000 and publication Entry fee: $20 Closing date: 23 September

KSP Writers Centre Short Fiction Competition Short stories, up to 2,500 words, by Australian residents or citizens Prizes: Aus$300, $150; $100, $50 for youths Entry fee: $10, $15 for 2, $20 for 3 Closing date: 25 September

Crab Orchard Review Student Writing Awards

Edinburgh International Flash Fiction Competition

Fiction or non-fiction, up to 4,000 words, or up to 3 poems, by US students Prizes: $250 in each category Free entry Closing date: 30 September, TBC

Stories up to 250 words Prizes: £600, £300, £150; £300 Scottish prize Entry fee: £6 Closing date: 30 September

Crowvus Christmas Ghost Story Competition Spooky stories, up to 4,000 words Prizes: £100, £75, £50 Entry fee: £3, £5 for two Closing date: 30 September

Darling Axe First Page First double-spaced page of a novel Prizes: Can$200 minimum Entry fee: $5 Closing date: 30 September, TBC

Dzanc Prizes Novels (40,000 words+), novellas (18,00040,000 words) and book-length short story collections Prizes: $5,000 for novels, $2,500 for ss collections, $1,500 for novellas Entry fee: TBC Closing date: 30 September

Ecologisers’ EcoSanta-themed Short Story Competition Short stories for children featuring Santa as an eco-champion, under 1,000 words Prize: £100 Free entry Closing date: 30 September Tel: 01851 820308 [email protected] www.ecologisers.com

New Guard Contests Fiction, up to 5,000 words, and up to three poems, total 150 lines max Prizes: $1,500 Entry fee: $22 Closing date: 27 September, TBC

Lascaux Prize for creative nonfiction Creative non-fiction, up to 10,000 words Prizes: $1,000 and publication Entry fee: $15 Closing date: 30 September

Acheven Book Prize Young adult fiction, 120-350 pages Prizes: $750 and publication Entry fee: $25 Closing date: 30 September

Bracken Bower Prize Best proposal for a business book on the challenges and opportunities for growth from a writer under 35 Prizes: £15,000 Free entry Closing date: TBC, 30 Sept in 2019

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Short stories, 1,000-5,000 words, poems up to 40 lines and scripts, up to 10 pages, on the theme ‘survival’ Prizes: Short stories £500, £100, £50; poems £100, £30, £20; scripts, £100 Entry fee: £10 Closing date: 30 September

Iowa Short Fiction Award Short story collections, at least 150 pages, by authors who have not had a book published Prizes: Publication by University of Iowa Press Free entry Closing date: 30 September

Salopian Poetry Society’s annual open poetry competition Poetry, any length Prizes: £250, £150, £100 Entry fee: £4, £10 for 3, £15 for 6 Closing date: 30 September

The Short Story Competition Short stories, 1,000-5,000 words. Prizes: £500, £100 Entry fee: £8 Closing date: TBC, 30 September

Tom Howard/Margaret Reid Poetry Contest Poems in two styles: open and traditionally rhymed, up to 250 lines. Prizes: $3,000 and ten $100 honourable mentions, in each category Entry fee: $15 Closing date: 30 September Tel: +1 413 320 1847 [email protected] www.winningwriters.com/tompoetry

Mslexia Women’s Fiction Awards In 2019 Short Story, Flash Fiction, Novel, Monologue Prizes: £10,000+ prize pot Entry fee: TBC Closing date: 30 September, TBC

World Around Us Chapbook AnthologyContest Poems, no longer than 36 lines Prizes: Can$100, $75, $50, $25x2 Entry fee: $5, 3 for $10 Closing date: 30 September

Red Hen Press Fiction Award Book-length fiction manuscripts, 150 pages minimum Prizes: $1,000 and publication Entry fee: $25 Closing date: 30 September

Caterpillar Story for Children Prize Short stories up to 2,000 words for children aged 7-11 Prizes: €1,000 Entry fee: €12 Closing date: 30 September, TBC

Hammond House International Literary Prize

Salisbury Story Prize Short stories, max 500 words Prizes: Writing academy place Free entry Closing date: 30 September, TBC Writing Magazine - Competition Guide 2020

OCTOBER Aryamati Poetry Prize Poems up to 40 lines, promoting peace and social change Prizes: 250 copies of your poem printed on special postcards, £100 worth of books, plus critiques Entry fee: £3, £1 each extra Closing date: 1 October

COMPETITION GUIDE 2020

American Literary Review Awards

Virginia Prize for Fiction

Short stories, up to 8,000 words, creative non-fiction, up to 4,000, and poems, up to 3 Prizes: $1,000 and publication, each category Entry fee: $15 Closing date: 1 October

For unpublished novels, at least 45,000 words, by women Prizes: development and publication of the winning novel Entry fee: £25 Closing date: 1 October, TBC

Anton Chekhov Award for Flash Fiction

Zoetrope All-Story Short Fiction Competition

Short stories , 500-1,500 words Prizes: $1,250, 3x$100 Entry fee: $16 Closing date: 1 October

Short stories, 1,000-5,000 words Prizes: $1,000, $500, $250 and publication Entry fee: $15 Closing date: 1 October, TBC

Mary C Mohr Awards

Imison Award

Short fiction and creative non-fiction, up to 30 pages, poetry, up to 10 pages Prizes: $2,000 and publication, each category Entry fee: $20 Closing date: 1 October

For original radio plays by new writers Prizes: £3,000 Free entry Closing date: 4 October

Tinniswood Award Mighty River Short Story Contest Stories, max 30 pages Prizes: $1,000 and publication Entry fee: $20 Closing date: 1 October

Original broadcast radio drama scripts Prizes: £3,000 Free entry Closing date: 4 October

Dalkey Creates Festival Prize Miller Williams Poetry Prize Poetry manuscripts, 60-90 pages Prizes: $5,000 and publication Entry fee: $28 Closing date: 1 October

Short stories up to 2,000 words; poems up to 30 lines Prizes: €1,000 in each category Entry fee: €15 Closing date: 6 October

Observer/Jonathan Cape/Comica Graphic Short Story Prize Graphic short stories Prizes: £1,000 plus publication; £250 Free entry Closing date: 11 October, TBC

Omnidawn Fabulist Fiction Chapbook Contest Single fantastical or magic realist stories, or collections, totalling 7,500-17,500 words Prizes: $1,000 and publication Entry fee: $18 Closing date: 12 October

Arkansas International Emerging Writers Prize Short stories, up to 7,500 words, by writers who have not had a book published Prizes: $1,000 and publication Entry fee: $20 Closing date: 13 October, TBC

Writers Digest Popular Fiction Awards Short stories, up to 4,000 words in the genres mystery/crime, horror, romance, SF/ fantasy, thriller/suspense or YA Prizes: $2,500, 6x$500; plus vouchers, consultations, publication Entry fee: $30 Closing date: 14 October, TBC

Calvino Prize Missouri Review Jeffrey E Smith Editor’s Prize Fiction and non-fiction, up to 8,500 words, any number of poems, up to 10 pages Prizes: $5,000 in each category Entry fee: $25 Closing date: 1 October

London Short Story Prize Short stories up to 5,000 words by writers with London postcodes Prizes: £1,000, 2x£250 Entry fee: £10 Closing date: 7 October, TBC

Fiction, up to 25 pages, in the style of Italo Calvino Prizes: $2,000 and publication, $300 Entry fee: $25 Closing date: 15 October

Event non-fiction contest

Patricia Dobler Poetry Award

KSP Writers Centre Poetry Competition

Up to 2 poems, each up to 75 lines, by US women aged over 40 Prizes: $1,000 and publication Entry fee: $20 Closing date: 1 October

Poems, up to 50 lines, by Australian residents or citizens Prizes: Aus$300, $150; $100, $50 for youths Entry fee: $10, $15 for 2, $20 for 3 Closing date: 9 October

Peter Porter Poetry Prize

Sustainable Societies: Short Film

Poems up to 70 lines Prizes: Aus$7,000, 4x$500 Entry fee: $25 Closing date: 1 October

Short films (between 3 and 20 minutes) touching on ideas of sustainable living Prizes: £500, £200, £100, 3 x £50 Free entry Closing date: 10 October, TBC

Psychopomp Short Fiction Award Short stories, 6,000 words max, pushing the boundaries of genre/form Prizes: $500 and publication Entry fee: $10 Closing date: 1 October, TBC

Gerald Cable Book Award

Wilda Hearne Flash Fiction Contest

Jake Adam York Prize

Flash fiction up to 500 words Prizes: $500 and publication Entry fee: $15 Closing date: 1 October

Poetry collections, over 48 pages Prizes: $2,000 and publication Entry fee: $25 Closing date: 15 October

Poetry collections, over 48 pages Prizes: $1,000 and publication Entry fee: $25 Closing date: 15 October

Writing Magazine - Competition Guide 2020

Creative non-fiction, max 5,000 words Prizes: Can$1,500, $1,000, $500; publication Entry fee: $34.95 Closing date: 15 October

Poets Out Loud Prize Poetry collections Prizes: 2x$1,000 and publication Entry fee: $28 Closing date: 15 October, TBC

Prism Pacific Spirit Poetry Prize Up to three poems, max 100 lines each Prizes: Can$1,500, $600, $400 Entry fee: International entries $45 Closing date: 15 October, TBC

Tennessee Williams New Orleans Literary Festival Plays (one-act, entry fee $25, closing date 1/10, prize $1,500), poetry (2-4, max 400 words total, $15, 15/10, $1,000), fiction (up to 7,000 words, $25, 1/10, $1,500) and flash (up to 500 words, $10, 15/10, $500) Prizes: all prizes include VIP festival passes Entry fee: $10-$25 www.writers-online.co.uk

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COMPETITION GUIDE 2020

Raven Short Story Contest

Barbellion Prize

Fiction, 250-2,500 words Prizes: Can$300 Entry fee: $20 Closing date: 15 October

Books in any style or genre, self or traditionally published, about life with long-term illness or disability Prizes: £600 Free entry Closing date: 31 October

Sequestrum New Writers Awards Fiction and non-fiction, up to 12,000 words; poems, up to 3, max 50 lines each Prizes: $400, $100, $25, both categories Entry fee: $15 Closing date: 15 October

Earlyworks Press Short Story

Poetry collections, 48-96 pages Prizes: $3,000 and publication Entry fee: $25 Closing date: 31 October

Short stories in two categories: up to 4,000 words, and up to 8,000 Prizes: £200; cash and books Entry fee: £5 for up to 4,000 words; £10 for 4,000-8,000 Closing date: 31 October

Blue Light Books Prize Poetry manuscripts, 48-75 pages Prizes: $2,000 and publication Entry fee: $20 Closing date: 31 October

Voices Israel Reuben Rose Poems, up to 41 lines Prizes: $500, $150, $50 Entry fee: $6 Closing date: 15 October, TBC

Dinesh Allirajah Prize Short fiction, 2,000-6,000 words, theme tbc Prizes: £500 and publication by Comma Press and on the Northern Soul website Free entry Closing date: 25 October, TBC

Retreat West Flash Fiction Prize Fiction, up to 500 words Prizes: £350, £200, £100, £15 for shortlisted Entry fee: £8 Closing date: 27 October, TBC

Retreat West Short Story Prize Short stories, 1,500-5,000 words Prizes: £400, £250, £150, £20 for shortlisted Entry fee: £10 Closing date: 27 October

Bradt ‘New Travel Writer of the Year’ Competition Travel writing, 600-800 words, containing a phrase TBC, by unpublished travel writers Prizes: A holiday and article commission Free entry Closing date: TBC, 6 October in 2019

Cannon Poets Sonnet or Not For 14-line poems that in some way reflect the sonnet form, or not Prizes: £500, £250, £150, up to ten £10 Entry fee: £5, subsequent entries £2.50 Closing date: TBC, 31 Oct in 2019

CBC Short Story Prize Short stories, up to 2,500 words, by Canadian citizens or residents Prizes: Can$6,000, 4x$1,000 Entry fee: $25 Closing date: 31 October

Charles Causley Poetry Comp

Eric Gregory Trust Fund Awards For a published or unpublished volume of up to 30 poems by a UK author aged under 30 Prizes: A share of up to £24,000 Free entry Closing date: 31 October

Finishing Line Press Open Chapbook Award Chapbook poetry collections, 16-35 pages Prizes: $1,000 and publication Entry fee: $15 Closing date: 31 October

Flash 500 Novel Opening Chapter & Synopsis Competition Novel opening, up to 3,000 words, and synopsis Prizes: £500, £200 Entry fee: £10 Closing date: 31 October

Indiana Review Creative NonFiction Prize Creative non-fiction, up to 5,000 words Prizes: $1,000 and publication Entry fee: $20 Closing date: 31 October

Non-fiction, up to 5,500 words Prizes: $1,500 Entry fee: $20 Closing date: 27 October

Original, unpublished poems on any subject up to 40 lines Prizes: £2,000 and writing residency at Cyprus Well, £250, £100, 5 x £30 Entry fee: £7, £4 each subsequent Closing date: 31 October TBC

Cinnamon Press Literature Award

Craft Flash Fiction Contest

River Teeth Literary Non-Fiction

10 poems, 2 stories or 10,000 words of a novel Prizes: Publishing contract Entry fee: £16 Closing date: 30 October

Short stories up to 1,000 words Prizes: $1,000, 4x$250, and publication Entry fee: $20 Closing date: 31 October, TBC

Creative non-fiction, 150-400 pages Prizes: $1,000 and publication Entry fee: $27 Closing date: 31 October

Minds on Fire Open Book Prize

Elixir Press Poetry Award

Sow’s Ear Poetry Review Contest

Poetry collections, 48-90 pages Prizes: $1,000 and publication Entry fee: $25 Closing date: 30 October

Poetry collections, over 48 pages Prizes: $2,000 and publication Entry fee: $30 Closing date: 31 October

Up to five poems Prizes: $1,000 and publication Entry fee: $30 Closing date: 31 October

Momaya Poetry Competition

Honickman First Book Prize

Vassar Miller Poetry Prize

Poems on the theme of ‘touch’ Prizes: £70, £35, £20, and publication Entry fee: £7 ($9) Closing date: 30 October

Poetry collections, over 48 pages Prizes: $3,000 and publication Entry fee: $25 Closing date: 31 October

Poetry collections, 50-80 pages Prizes: $1,000 and publication Entry fee: $25 Closing date: 31 October, TBC

VanderMey Nonfiction Prize

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Between 20,000 and 25,000 words of a prose WIP by a first-time author Prizes: £10,000, £1,000 for runners-up Free entry Closing date: 31 October, TBC

Benjamin Saltman Poetry Award

Steve Kowit Poetry Prize Poems, any length Prizes: $1,000, $250, $100, and publication Entry fee: $15 Closing date: 15 October

Deborah Rogers Foundation Writers Award

www.writers-online.co.uk

Writing Magazine - Competition Guide 2020

James Hearst Poetry Prize Up to 5 poems Prizes: $1,000 and publication Entry fee: $23 Closing date: 31 October

SHORT STORY WINNER TIMELY TOPIC: ISLAND Antony Reid writes multigenre fiction and poetry from a curious spit of land between the Dee, the Mersey and the Irish Sea where he tries to keep company with ‘the gold-hearted silver-tongued and quicksilver-minded’. He e-published a novella, A Smaller Hell, a few years ago, and is seeking representation for several novels, a feature screenplay and TV pilot.

Hashtag Junket

1st place £100

by Antony Reid

First time in Scotland. #ArrivingInStyle #GetToTheChopper Island’s beautiful, but guarded like Area 51 or somethin. Check out these guys. #MP5 #HecklerKoch En route to junket. Check out the castle. Wonder if Nosferatu’s home?

@DungerMoss Sweet. You didn’t get any weird stuff in your room? @JamesLeGibbon Jim I need sleep man. Champagne wiped me out.

They laid on AAALLL the goodies. #Champagne #Caviar

Tryin to get to sleep and this security guy knocks on my door, tells me to get showered and put on a robe. WTF? Guess it’s part of publicity stunt like Dunger said. #TheThingsWeDo #ActorsLife

Look who else is here! #OldBuddies #SummerBlockbusterBoys

So here I am walking through the castle’s main hall in my robe. Hair still wet. This security guy is pushy as hell. #hospitality #junket

Gotta say, the grand dame does NOT look seventy years old. Must be black magic. She’s givin a great speech. Can’t wait for screening tomorrow. #director #visionary

Creepy old elevator takin us waaayyy down. Startin to get some bad vibes lol. Anyone know how to fly a chopper? Need to get me off this island. Jk it’s all good. Security dude got some body odeurrrr tho lol. #SmellsLikeAZoo

Any of yall know what this is? Just got back to my room n found it painted on my door. Looks like some voodoo sh*t. Maybe I was right about the dame? #Witchcraft Ok, I’m seriously freaked out right now. The thing on the door ok, but the bathroom mirror? Moss, if you’re playin with me, Ima get you back.

They just stripped me naked. Moss, I swear, if this is a prank, you’ll be hearing from my lawyer lol. Some PR stunt. I’m standing naked in a crypt surrounded by extras in white masks. WHOOO creepy lmao. #MustTryHarder Ooh, the symbol. Ooh, more fake blood lol.

What the hell you paint this with, Moss? Your own blood? Shoulda took that therapist’s number off me back in Malibu, dude. This mess is sick. #TooFar

@DungerMoss Is that you to my 12? Sniff if it is.

@DungerMoss Listen, man… I’m sorry about you know who back in December. Had no idea you guys were dating. I thought we were ok?

@DungerMoss I knew it. Smelled your cheap moisturiser rofl. What the hell’s goin on? Twitch your robe if this is for the PR. @DungerMoss Prank?

@JamesLeGibbon You high, dude? @DungerMoss Lol nah just champagne. What’s the symbol?

@DungerMoss You’re freaking me out. What’s the weird knife for? Props do that for you?

@JamesLeGibbon Have literally no idea what ur talkin bout lol

@DungerMoss How you getting my msgs? Earpiece?

Also shortlisted in the Timely Topic: Island Competition were: Jake Blandford, Swindon, Wiltshire; Sarah Clark, Ipswich, Suffolk; Simon

@DungerMoss You didn’t paint it?

Yall got me haha. Not funny anymore.

@JamesLeGibbon Errrr no lmao. Ask ur agent. Probly publicity stunt for junket.

Yo, somebody call the cops. Something ain’t right here. HELP. PLEASE. This post has been deleted.

@DungerMoss About the other thing

Pressinger, Godalming, Surrey

This post has been deleted. @JamesLeGibbon Bruh, thats done forget it.

This post has been deleted.

www.writers-online.co.uk

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COMPETITION GUIDE 2020

Briar Cliff Review Contest

London Independent Story Prize

Poetry collections, 25-34 pages Prizes: $1,000 and publication Entry fee: $30 Closing date: 31 October

Short stories and essays, up to 5,000 words, or up to 3 poems Prizes: $1,000 in each category Entry fee: $20 Closing date: 1 November

Larry Brown Short Story Prize

Brick Road Poetry Contest

Short stories up to 4,000 words Prizes: $500, 2x$50 Entry fee: $10 Closing date: 31 October

Unpublished poetry collections, 50-100 pages Prizes: $1,000 and publication Entry fee: $25 Closing date: 1 November

Short stories, max 1,500 words; flash, 300 words; screenplays, max 30 pages Prizes: £100 for stories and flash, Final Draft software for screenplays Entry fee: £7, £5 for flash, £10 for screenplays Closing date: 1 November, quarterly [email protected] www.londonindependentstoryprize.co.uk

Lexi Rudnitsky First Book prize

Caledonia Novel Award

Poetry collections, over 40 pages, by US women Prizes: $1,000, publication; Italian retreat Entry fee: $30 Closing date: 31 October

The first 20 pages plus 200-word synopsis of a novel by an unpublished writer Prizes: £1,500, trophy Entry fee: £25 Closing date: 1 November, all details TBC

Jessie Bryce Niles Poetry Chapbook Contest

McKitterick Prize For the best first novel, published or unpublished, by an author aged over 40 Prizes: £4,000 Free entry Closing date: 31 October

Poetry Society National Poetry Competition For poems, up to 40 lines Prizes: £5,000, £2,000, £1,000, 7x£200 Entry fee: £7, £4 each additional Closing date: 31 October, TBC

Sunken Garden Chapbook Prize Poetry manuscripts, 20-36 pages Prizes: $1,000 and publication Entry fee: $25 Closing date: 31 October

Tom Gallon Trust Awards Short stories, up to 5,000 words, by authors who have had work published Prizes: £1,000 Free entry Closing date: 31 October

Vern Rutsala Book Prize Collections of poetry/flash, 60-90 pages Prizes: $1,000 and publication Entry fee: $25 Closing date: 31 October, TBC

Writeidea Short Story Prize Short stories, 1,000-3,000 words, by writers from Tower Hamlets Prizes: Mentoring from Kerry Hudson Free entry Closing date: 31 October, TBC

Book-length manuscripts by writers with at least 3 books of fiction published Prizes: $15,000 Entry fee: $25 Closing date: 1 November

Commonwealth Short Story Prize Original, unpublished short stories, 2,000-5,000 words, by writers from five Commonwealth regions Prizes: £5,000, £2,500 for each regional winner Free entry Closing date: 1 November

Unpublished novels, novellas or collections, by unpublished US writers Prizes: $2,000 and publication Entry fee: $30 Closing date: 1 November

Ronald Sukenick Innovative Fiction Contest Book-length fiction manuscripts Prizes: $1,500 Entry fee: $25 Closing date: 1 November

Scribble Annual Short Story Competition Stories up to 3,000 words on the theme of ‘haunted’ Prizes: £100, £50, £25, publication in Scribble Entry fee: £4 Closing date: 1 November Tel: 01451 831053 [email protected] www.parkpublications.co.uk

Writers Digest Poetry Awards Cutthroat Writing Awards Up to 3 poems, max 100 lines each, short stories or creative nonfiction, up to 5,000 words Prizes: $1,200, $250 in each category Entry fee: $20 Closing date: 1 November, TBC

Poems, up to 32 lines Prizes: $1,000, $250, $100; vouchers, consultations, publication Entry fee: $25 ($20 before 1 Oct) Closing date: 1 November, TBC

WS Porter Prize Gabriele Rico Challenge for Fiction Non-fiction, up to 5,000 words Prizes: $1,333 Entry fee: $20 Closing date: 1 November

John Steinbeck Award for Fiction Short stories, up to 5,000 words Prizes: $1,000 Entry fee: $20 Closing date: 1 November

Short story collections, 100-350 pages Prizes: $1,000 and publication Entry fee: $25 Closing date: 1 November

Odyssey House Victoria Short Story Competition Short stories up to 1,500 words, with a reference to drugs or alcohol, theme TBC Prizes: Aus$1,000, $100, $50 Entry fee: $10 Closing date: 2 November, TBC

Treehouse Climate Action Prize Poems that emphasise the vulnerability of our ecological condition Prizes: $1,000, $750, $500 Free entry Closing date: 1 November, TBC

Alice James Award

Edwin Markham Prize for Poetry

Walt Whitman Award

Carve Magazine Prose and Poetry

Up to 5 poems Prizes: $1,000 Entry fee: $20 Closing date: 1 November

Manuscripts, over 48 pages, by US poets Prizes: $5,000 plus publication Entry fee: $35 Closing date: 1 November

Fiction, non-fiction and poetry Prizes: $1,000 in each category Entry fee: $17 Closing date: 15 November

NOVEMBER

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Catherine Doctorow Innovative Fiction Contest

Nilsen Literary Prize

www.writers-online.co.uk

Writing Magazine - Competition Guide 2020

Unpublished poetry collections by US poets Prizes: $2,000, publication, $1,000 speaking fee Entry fee: $30 Closing date: 4 November

COMPETITION GUIDE 2020

Malahat Review Open Season Awards Fiction or creative non-fiction, up to 2,500 words; up to 3 poems, under 100 lines each Prizes: Can$2,000, publication, each category Entry fee: international entries $45 Closing date: 5 November

Bath Children’s Novel Award

Paul Torday Memorial Prize

For unpublished and independently published writers of children’s novels. Send first 5,000 words and synopsis Prizes: £3,000, manuscript feedback, Cornerstones online course worth £1,800 Entry fee: £28 Closing date: 29 November

A first novel by a writer 60 and over Prizes: £1,000 Free entry Closing date: 30 November

Perugia Press Prize First or second poetry collections, 45-87 pages, by US women Prizes: $1,000 and publication Entry fee: $27 Closing date: 15 November

Aeon Award

Robert C Jones Book Contest

Betty Trask Prize

A prose manuscript of more than 60 pages Prizes: $2,000 and publication Entry fee: $25 Closing date: 15 November, TBC

For published or unpublished, traditional or romantic (not experimental) first novels by authors under the age of 35 on 31 Dec Prizes: £20,000 total, to use for foreign travel Free entry Closing date: 30 November

Yale Series of Younger Poets Poetry collections, 48-64 pages, by emerging US poets Prizes: Publication Entry fee: $25 Closing date: 15 November, TBC

Short stories up to 10,000 in any spec fic genre Prizes: €1,000, €200, €100 Entry fee: €8.50 Closing date: 30 November

CP Cavafy Poetry Prize Poems, submit up to 3 Prizes: $1,000 and publication Entry fee: $15, $3 each additional Closing date: 30 November

Judith Wright Poetry Prize Poems by poets who have had no more than one collection published Prizes: Aus$6,000, $2,000, $1,000 Entry fee: $20 Closing date: 17 November, TBC

Neilma Sidney Short Story Prize Short stories up to 3,000 with a ‘travel’ theme Prizes: Aus$4,000, 2x$500 Entry fee: $20 Closing date: 17 November, TBC

Poetry Kit Autumn Competition Poetry of any length on any subject Prizes: £100, £50 Entry fee: £3.50, £8 for 3, £10 for 5 Closing date: 20 November, TBC

New Media Writing Prize Interactive fiction or non-fiction written specifically for digital delivery Prizes: £1,000, student prize of £500, £500 Dot Award, £750 journalism prize Free entry Closing date: 22 November, TBC

Shooter Poetry Competition

Fish Short Story Competition Short stories up to 5,000 words Prizes: €3,000 for first, a week at Anam Cara Writer’s Retreat in West Cork plus €300 expenses for second, €300 for third TBC Entry fee: €20 for the first, €10 thereafter TBC Closing date: 30 November, TBC

Gregory O’Donoghue International Poetry Competition Poems up to 40 lines Prizes: €2,000, week’s residency at the Tyrone Guthrie Centre; €500, €250, 10 x €50 Entry fee: €7, €30 for five poems Closing date: 30 November

Littoral Press Full Collection Poetry Competition Collections, 50-100 pages, by unpublished UK poets, predominantly on nature themes Prizes: Publication and 50 copies Entry fee: £20 Closing date: 30 November

Observer/Anthony Burgess Prize for Arts Journalism

Poems up to 100 lines Prizes: £100, £50, publication Entry fee: £3, £8 for three Closing date: November TBC, 24th last year

An 800-word cultural review Prizes: £3,000 and publication of prize essay in the Observer, 2 x £500 Entry fee: £10 Closing date: 30 November, TBC

Brunel Uni African Poetry Prize

Prairie Fire Contests

Groups of ten poems, up to 30 lines each, by African writers or whose parents are African Prizes: £3,000 Free entry Closing date: TBC, 30 Nov in 2019

Short stories, max 10,000 words; non-fiction, max 5,000 words; 1-3 poems, max 150 lines Prizes: Can$1,250, $500, $250, each category Entry fee: $32 Closing date: 30 November Writing Magazine - Competition Guide 2020

Queen’s Knickers Award Illustrated book for children aged 0-7 published in the last year Prizes: £5,000, £1,000 Free entry Closing date: 30 November

Robyn Mathison Poetry Prize Poems up to 40 lines, theme ‘earth’ Prizes: Aus$200, $50 Entry fee: $10 Closing date: 30 November

ServiceScape Short Story Award Short stories, up to 5,000 words, any theme Prizes: $1,000 Free entry Closing date: 30 November

Somerset Maugham Awards Published work of fiction, non-fiction or poetry by an author under 30 Prizes: prize fund of £10,000, to use for travel Free entry Closing date: 30 November

DECEMBER Anthony Hecht Poetry Prize First or second book-length poetry collections, 48-88 pages Prizes: £2,000 or $3,000, plus publication Entry fee: $27 Closing date: 1 December

Brooklyn Non-Fiction Prize Creative non-fiction about Brooklyn or its residents, up to 2,500 words Prizes: $500 Free entry Closing date: TBC, 1 Dec in 2019

Cafe Writers’ Open Poetry For poems on any theme, up to 40 lines Prizes: £1,000, £300, £200, 5 x £50, £100 Norfolk Prize Entry fee: £4, £10 for three, £2 each extra Closing date: TBC, 1 Dec in 2019

Jeff Marks Memorial Poetry Prize Up to 3 poems Prizes: $1,500, $500 and publication Entry fee: $20 Closing date: 1 December

DWL Short Story Contest Stories up to 5,000 words on any subject Prizes: $375, 3 x $100 Free entry Closing date: 7 December, TBC www.writers-online.co.uk

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COMPETITION GUIDE 2020

Fresh.ink competition

Moon City Short Fiction Award

Short stories (up to 7,500 words), novelettes (7,500-17,499), novellas (17,500-39,999) and novels (40,000+) Prizes: $1,000 (SS), $1,500 (novelette), $2,000 (novella), $3,000 (novel) Free entry Closing date: 1 December, TBC

Collections of short fiction, 30,00065,000 words Prizes: $1,000 and publication Entry fee: $25 Closing date: 15 December, TBC

Sillerman First Book Prize

Book length manuscripts of commercial fiction or non-fiction, up to 80,000 words Prizes: Author coaching, structural and line edit Entry fee: Aus$45 Closing date: 18 December

Poetry collection manuscripts, over 50 pages, by unpublished African poets Prizes: $1,000 Free entry Closing date: 1 December

Strokestown International Poetry Prize Unpublished poems for open competition. Unpublished comic poems for Percy French Prize for Comic Verse Prizes: €2,000, €700, €400; 7x€300 Entry fee: €6 Closing date: TBC, 6 Dec in 2019

HE Bates Short Story Competition Short stories up to 2,000 words Prizes: £500, £200, £100, £100 for best short story by a Northampton writer Entry fee: £6, £10 for two Closing date: 9 December, TBC

Irish Imbas Celtic Mythology Short Story Competition Short stories drawing on Celtic/Gaelic mythology Prizes: $500, $250, $100 and publication Entry fee: $7 Closing date: 10 December

Sunday Times Audible Short Story Award Short stories, up to 6,000 words, by authors with a record of publication Prizes: £30,000, five £1,000 shortlisted Free entry Closing date: TBC, 13 Dec in 2019

Chorley & District Writers’ Circle Annual Short Story Competition Short stories, max 2,500 words, theme TBC Prizes: £100, £50, 3x£20 Entry fee: £6, £10 for two Closing date: 15 December, TBC

Four Way Books It’s No Contest Book length manuscripts by New Yorkers Prizes: Publication Free entry Closing date: 15 December

Jhalak Prize For book of the year by a writer of colour Prizes: £1,000 Free entry Closing date: 15 December

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www.writers-online.co.uk

Hawkeye Publishing Manuscript Development Prize

Writers Digest Short Short Story Awards Short stories, up to 1,500 words Prizes: $3,000, $1,500, $500, 6x$100; plus vouchers, consultations, publication Entry fee: $30 ($25 before 15 Nov) Closing date: 19 December, TBC

Lazuli Literary Group Writing Contest Your best writing of any kind Prizes: $100 Entry fee: $10 Closing date: 20 December, TBC

Young Walter Scott Prize Historical fiction, 800-2,000 words, by writers aged 11-15 or 16-19 Prizes: £500 travel grant in each category Free entry Closing date: 20 December, TBC

Wild Words Winter Solstice Writing Competition 1,000 words of poetry, prose, song or spoken word, inspired by one of four quotes listed on the website Prizes: A Wild Words one-hour 1-1 mentoring session, online publication Entry fee: £7 Closing date: 21 December

Ruth Rendell Short Story Competition For short stories, up to 1,000 words Prizes: £1,000 and commission to write four further stories over the course of one year Entry fee: £15 Closing date: 22 December, TBC

Arkbound Short Story Competition Short stories between 500 and 1,000 words on the theme of time Prizes: £100, £50, £25, 3 x £10 Entry fee: £3. Arkbound will sponsor entries from disadvantaged people. Closing date: 31 December

Boulevard Emerging Writers Competition Fiction or nonfiction up to 8,000 words, by a writer who has not had a book published Prizes: Fiction, $1,500; non-fiction, $1,000 Entry fee: $16 each category, includes a subscription to the mag Closing date: 31 December

Lascaux Prize for short fiction Dead of Winter Horror Fiction Contest Fiction in any dark genre, word count TBC (3,000-5,000 last time) Prizes: $50, $15, $10 Amazon gift cards Free entry Closing date: 21 December

Dorset Prize Poetry collections, 48-88 pages Prizes: $3,000 and publication Entry fee: $30 Closing date: 31 December

Tamaqua Award for a Collection of Essays Unpublished essay collections Prizes: $1,000 and publication Entry fee: $22 Closing date: 31 December, TBC

Short stories, up to 10,000 words Prizes: $1,000 and publication Entry fee: $15 Closing date: 31 December

Moth Poetry Prize For a single unpublished poem Prizes: €10,000, 3 x €1,000 plus publication in The Moth Entry fee: €15 Closing date: 31 December

Ouen Press Short Story Competition Short stories, 4,000-10,000 words on a theme TBC Prizes: Cash prizes and publication (£300, 2 x £100 last time) Free entry Closing date: 31 December, TBC

For up-to-date competition details, all the latest competition launches and publication opportunities all year round, subscribe to Writing Magazine:

www.writers-online.co.uk Writing Magazine - Competition Guide 2020

WIN £1,000 in the

inaugural WRITING MAGAZINE

GRAND PRIZE

Win up to £1,000 in the first ever Writing Magazine Grand Prize, a new open competition for your short stories in any form, on any topic. The only stipulation is that your story should be a maximum 2,000 words. Runners-up prizes are £250 for second, £100 for third, a WM Course mini-critique for fourth and a twelve-month subscription for fifth. Stories will be judged by the Writing Magazine editorial team – editor Jonathan Telfer and assistant editor Tina Jackson – and the winner published in the October Writing Magazine Competition Supplement.

CLOSING DATE 30 JUNE

ENTER NOW: • Online, at http://writ.rs/wmgrandprize • By post, using the form on p95 of the main Writing Magazine The entry fee is £15, or £10 for WM subscribers. Your submissions should be in a single document, with your contact details on the first page. For full formatting guidelines, please see p95 of the main Writing Magazine.

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