READING, WRITING, ARITHMETIC, POETS ON TRAINS

I love this stuff, sometimes! First,
a monthly spoken word event now held in the wonderful ambiance of an upstairs room at The Wheatsheaf, Rathbone Place, London – where apparently, my hero Dylan Thomas used to drink.

TOTD is run by a couple of writing friends from the old Fiction Workhouse days. The room is great – private bar, stained glass in the bay window, not too big, not too small. This event was a platform to publicise 100 Stories for Haiti, of which you will hear much more over the next few weeks as the guru Greg McQueen will be dropping in soon. So many of the readers were contributors to this brilliant anthology – Martin Reed, Jac Catanneo, Katy Darby (of Liars League fame). Jac also read a contribution for Joel Willans who lives in Helsinki – and Martin read Greg’s own contribution – about the morning he was moved to DO something to help. I read my contribution, Naming Finbar, and a second piece called Creative Writhing (no that’s not a typo) which took Martin by surprise, as it required him to stand in as an adolescent snake. I sold a couple of books after announcing I'd give a fiver from each sale to the Haiti appeal.

Do submit to TOTD. It’s a great event, and if you are picked you are invited to read your work. Submission details HERE

Then I caught the train through all sorts of odd places to get to Hatfield – eg, Potter’s Bar. I love that name. Who were the original Potters at the Bar? Did they get very drunk? Did they just potter? I ended up at a hotel shaped like a plane, on a roundabout in Hatfield – fell into bed and slept like a complete tree. (‘Log’ is too insignificant!).

Today, I was at GET WRITING 2010 - see HERE
organised by Verulam Writers’ Circle, held at the stunning de Havilland Campus of the University of Hertford. I was giving a workshop lasting one hour – in which I was to cover flash fiction, flash writing and writing prize winning short stories - It was quite a packed workshop! It seemed to go down well – and I was delighted to see so many blokes in the room – that is unusual, and rather nice. Great to meet up again with Jon Pinnock who blogs HERE and who is writing a hilarious series called Mrs Darcy and the Aliens – a sort of Jane Austen spoofette. Jon is part of the Verulam Writers. He’d also acted as postman, receiving boxes of books for me from Salt – (seriously, thanks very much, Jon).

I slipped into the back of the main lecture theatre to hear a talk by two publishing professionals. Very interesting to hear. Very necessary. And very hard to listen to. Phrases like ‘Brand Marketing’, and ‘cutting our lists,’ and ‘many writers will only be published in digital form in the future’ and ‘today’s writers MUST be prepared to sell their books themselves’. But it was realistic – and as I say, necessary to hear.

Book sales and signing went briskly during lunch. Both Short Circuit and Glass Bubble sold rather well!
And then after lunch, there was the announcement of the winners of the inaugural short story competition, and a talk from the final judge, Adele Geras. She spoke hilariously about surviving 90 titles. NINETY!! She did explain that some were children’s picture books with about a page of text… But in among the hilarity there were some real gold nuggets of pragmatism – sensible advice for writers on how to survive, mentally and physically. And she remembered to plug Nicola Morgan’s blog, Help! I Need a Publisher - as well, handing out cards.
I was so pleased – Adele was one of the first people who read Glass Bubble and gave me a ‘review comment’. I was so thrilled. And I made sure I went up afterwards and said thanks properly. Lovely lovely to meet her - poor woman, she had to put up with a hug.
And the poet on the train. Actually, there are three! I travelled last night with two, one of whom has been published on Ink Sweat and Tears. They attended Tales of the Decon, and were helping me not to get lost, which I do rather well. And our nattering was overheard by a young guy who also writes poetry, and was on his way to a poetry/guitar gig in a caravan near … guess where… Potter’s Bar! So good company all round.
Phew.

SHORT CIRCUIT VISITS THE SHORT REVIEW!

The next stop on my bloggy tour is with The Short Review blog. And there is the chance to WIN a copy of Short Circuit, thanks to both Short Review and Salt Publishing for that! Editor Tania Hershman has a great essay in the book - actually, an essay that had one writer (an editor as well) messaging me this week to say it had completely changed her view of flash fiction, and above all, the flash writing process.
Tania asked me a very good question - would readers, as opposed to writers, find Short Circuit an interesting book? Would it make them read more short stories??? Get thee over there to find out what I said.

And visit The Short Review too! I reviewed a book called The Town of Fiction, by The Atlantis Collective. Review HEREAnd there are some terrific collections up this month - so much to read, so little time!

Reviewing this time was hard... I was very aware that I had a self-published book from a writing group in my hands. And in case any of the writers therein are reading this, take comfort from the fact that reviews are necessarily subjective, to some extent. And go read the review of Tales of the Decongested II - a terrific anthology which contains one of my fave flashes, one that takes the record for 'please read that one' requests. So I turn to it for a nice warm glow, to see nothing mentioned... except:

I loved some of the stories, and disliked others. Reading this collection is like a raffle where everyone wins something – it just depends on your literary taste. You could walk home with a gruesome troll figurine or with a real nugget of gold – and this totally depends on which page you open the book

See? That's me - the gruesome troll figurine! Ha!
My particular gruesome troll can be read, in part online, HERE... you'll have to imagine where the italics went!

TALES OF THE DECONGESTED

Friday night, last Friday of the month, it's Tales of the Decongested short story readings at the Gallery space, Foyles, Charing Cross Road.

I travelled up with Workhouser Jo Horsman (who has been sort of working with me for about 18 months, and who has her own style, magic stuff. I don't think she has subbed work that hasn't been accepted somewhere, yet...). Jo was reading for the second time.

Also reading was writing friend Steve Finbow. Steve brought along his writing friend Toby Litt, so that was nice, meeting Toby.

Lovely to meet and have a drink later with another reader, Justine Mann, who came second in this year's Fish International Short Story Comp. Congrats!!