The Love of Books and Why It Matters

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Image Credits:
All images from Pixabay/Pexels unless otherwise stated with many created in Book Brush. Book cover images from Chapeltown Books and Bridge House Publishing. Screenshots taken by me, Allison Symes. Hope you had a good weekend. Busy one here in that I took in a murder mystery play, cleared a load of leaves, and got on with plenty of writing. Lady hasn’t appreciated the fireworks at all but thankfully they didn’t go on for too long.

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Hope you have had a good Tuesday. Lady got to see her Hungarian Vizler and Rhodesian Ridgeback pals again today and all three of them had a great time in the park.

Writing wise, I’m looking forward to welcoming Penny Rogers to Chandler’s Ford Today on Friday.

My Flash NANO campaign is going well so far. Looking forward to having a go at today’s prompt later on this evening.

Character Tip: What is the most important thing about your character for you? Is it how they look? Is it their attitudes? Is it something specific they’ve done (or not done) which makes life better for someone else? Bound to be story ideas there!

Hope today has gone well. Another busy Monday here though Lady did get to see her Hungarian Vizler and Rhodesian Ridgeback pals today. Good time had by all.

Have begun my Flash NANO campaign for a final year. This is the last one ever (boo hoo!) but I have used one of the stories I’ve drafted so far this year as my YouTube video for this week. Will share in separate post shortly. See further down under From Light to Dark and Back Again. It is great fun to take part in the challenge again though.

Writing Tip: I’ve found it useful, when responding to any prompt, to just get a draft down as quickly as I can. I then hone and polish it later after a break away from it but there is something about quick writing which I find helps make the ideas flow fast too. I like to try to capitalize on that.

Hope you have had a good weekend. The weather has been a mixed bag. Nice to see all of the autumn leaves around though. Am having to take the dog out earlier due to the clocks going back an hour recently. Fireworks season has also started. Lady isn’t keen on these, as you can imagine, but we have a good routine to help her though I wish folk would switch to the silent fireworks. You can get them more easily now.

Writing wise, I’ll be on to flash fiction Sunday afternoon/evening shortly and am looking forward to sharing a fabulous interview with Penny Rogers (aka Penny Dale), a fellow Bridge House Publishing author, on Chandler’s Ford Today next week.

Am also busy preparing two reviews. I like writing these though the challenge is in ensuring you give enough away to show what a good show was performed without giving away too much of the story line.

For the very famous plays, this isn’t so much of an issue because the story line is already famous. But for lesser known plays, I don’t want to spoil the story in case people can get to see it elsewhere.

Busy day. Author newsletter out again. (1st November 2025). Cant believe where the time goes.

Had a fabulous time watching a murder mystery play at the Dovetail Centre in Chandler’s Ford today. Will review in due course but firstly on Chandler’s Ford Today, there will be a fab interview with Penny Rogers (also known as Penny Dale). Link up on Friday.

Then I’ll be reviewing Ghost Train recently performed by The Chameleons. Then I’ll review the murder mystery play I saw today. This was wonderfully called The Business of Murder (written by Mike Standing – great story line).

So there’s a lot going on and all of it fun I’m glad to say!

Facebook – From Light to Dark and Back Again

Hope today has gone well. Mixed bag weather wise.

Our characters are mixed bags too. Nobody is fully perfect or evil (in most kinds of fiction). So think about what you like and dislike in your characters? What can you get from that to give you ideas for some flash pieces?

It’s Monday, a hectic, dark and damp one! Time for a story then and this week’s YouTube video from me is the result of a Flash NANO prompt for this year. This is pretty good going from me as Flash NANO only started on Saturday (1st November)! Hope you enjoy my story Back In Time.


Flash is wonderful for putting a different spin on fairytales.Indeed, it is my favourite kind of flash story to write (and read). I tend to focus on a “side” character to the main story and show something of them and have found this works best when kept short. There is no time for it to be gimmicky but it can pack a punch when it needs to do so. Fairytale flash is often wonderful for humour too and I do love short sharp tales which end with a laugh.

November is a month full of memories. I know every month is to an extent but I particularly feel this for November because of Remembrance Sunday.

So how can we use memories in our flash fiction pieces when the word count is limited? Memories often take up a lot of words when written down after all.

I’ve found the best way of managing this is to focus on one particular memory for one particular character and that is their story. Sometimes that will result in a flash piece of under 500 words but more often I’ve found I have needed 750 to 1000 words here.

Having said that, these stories can be incredibly touching and are moving to write (and I hope to read too).

Goodreads Author Blog – The Love of Books and Why It Matters

One of my most frustrating moments as a writer and reader came at a Book Fair I had a table at some years ago. The Book Fair was wonderful, I loved being with fellow writers and joy of joys, I sold books. So what was frustrating?

Simply it was when I overhead someone go past by my table and saying very loudly “I don’t like books”. I had to bite my tongue because the obvious retort to that was “why are you here then” but I figured that retort wouldn’t help.

The comment saddened me too,. What was behind the dislike? Problems with reading? Or simply they hadn’t found a genre (ore more) of books which appealed to them? Or did they simply think reading wasn’t for them?

One challenge all writers face now is having to compete with other forms of entertainment. Now I love books, I love music, I love films, and have no problem in enjoying all of these things but is it me or do people these days feel they have to stick to one creative thing they like and no more?

I am also conscious all writers owe a huge debt to those writing for children of all ages. If you can get a child hooked on to books early in life, they are likely to keep the habit of reading for pleasure going and that is what the love of books matters.

No love of books and you miss out on so many wonderful stories because they’re not all made into films! Even when they are, why not check out the original book anyway?

I do hope the forthcoming festive season will lead to more books being bought for all ages and this Christmas someone will get to discover the love of reading for the first time.

I do think that is such a special moment.

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