Tag: Allison Symes – author newsletter

Caring for Characters and Story Twists

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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 have had a lovely Easter weekend. I’ve loved the church services and, separately, listening to the Classic FM Hall of Fame for 2024. (When will Fantasia on a Theme by Thomas Tallis by Ralph Vaughan Williams make it to No. 1? So deserves it. You feel like you’re going back in time listening to that!).
Am so looking forward to sharing Part 1 of a very special two part interview with Sophie Neville for Chandler’s Ford Today. Sophie is best known for her role as Titty in the classic children’s film Swallows and Amazons but she has done so much else too. More to come in the interviews. Part 1 up on Friday.

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Hope you have had a good day. Shorter swimming sessions for the next couple of weeks due to the Easter holidays. Lady may well be getting longer walks in the afternoon, not that she’ll mind. She loved seeing her Hungarian Vizler and Rhodesian Ridgeback buddies today. Lady came back from that tired but happy (which is my standard look when I come back from a swimming session!).

Writing Tip: What is it about your characters which appeal to you the most? What makes you care about what happens to them? Sorting that out so you know will help you create characters which appeal to readers too.

433946484_10161810925617053_1614668251130398056_nLady got to see her Hungarian Vizler and Labradoodle pals this morning. Bank Holiday Mondays (as today is in the UK) always feel like a strange kind of Sunday to me. It was nice to see some spring weather though.

Newsletter went out this morning. No April Fool’s about that! Link to the current edition here but if you like the look of this and would like to sign up do head over to my landing page at my website. Separate link for that here.

Managed to get a fair bit of writing done over the weekend and am going through PowerPoints I’m due to present (one next week!). Am so looking forward to sharing Part 1 of a wonderful two part interview with Sophie Neville (Swallows and Amazons) for Chandler’s Ford Today on Friday. Be sure not to miss. Sophie discusses her incredible creative life. Very inspiring.

Screenshot 2024-04-02 at 20-11-29 Allison Symes - April 2024 - Flash LightHappy Easter! Nice to have some spring weather to go with it, though I understand the rain is due back again later, alas. Lady had a nice surprise today as she got to see her Hungarian Vizler chum at lunchtime.

When do I know a character will “work”? There’s no one single thing, to be honest, but when I can know how and why they would react in any given circumstance, that is a good sign. It shows me I’ve outlined them deeply enough.

Sometimes I will come across or think of something which will make me think Character X in Story Y would say exactly that, and this is another good sign. Sometimes I can come across something a character of mine in a story would not say and that, funnily enough, is useful as well because it then makes me think of what they would come up with instead. (I’d also know why here).

Knowing my characters well enough has been an enormous help to me. Having different ways to create characters (crucial as I am inventing characters a lot!) is invaluable. And knowing the characters gets me a long way to knowing what their stories will be and why. Story structure is not a glamorous thing but, for me, it underpins all the fiction I write.

434386649_10161807265932053_5419165843243315380_nIt’s the small victories in life which really make you want to cheer at times. Today (30th March 2024) is the first day this year I’ve had my washing out on the line and got it dry! Yippee! Also happy to see my bluebells are beginning to emerge.

Many thanks to all who have subscribed to my author newsletter since last time. Welcome aboard and many thanks to the longer term subscribers too. Your support is much appreciated. (Next letter due out on 1st April – not an April Fool’s, honest!).

Writing wise, I am so looking forward to sharing Part 1 of a very special two-part interview with the lovely Sophie Neville on Chandler’s Ford Today. Sophie is still very well known for her role as Titty in the children’s classic film, Swallows and Amazons. She has gone on to have a superb career in TV (in front of and behind the camera) and in writing and has recently won awards for her scripts too.

There is so much to discuss with her (if anyone could be said to have immersed themselves in the creative life, it is Sophie) and I am so looking forward to sharing the first part next Friday, 5th April. Link up on Friday. Don’t miss!

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The joy of flash fiction and story collections is in having “bite size” reads which are so easy to dip into. I often mention using pockets of time for writing and that is a great and useful thing to do. I’ve found it has made me more productive because I’ve got ideas waiting for me to assess and then write up.

But why not use pockets of time for your reading too? I tend to use my lunch break for this but it helps me to read more and that is never going to be a bad idea!

What I like about the CafeLit and Bridge House Publishing anthologies especially is getting to read other authors in one book. That shows me whether I like their style or not and, assuming I do, it makes it far more likely I will check out their own longer works of fiction.

If you would like to know where to start, why not check out the Bridgetown Cafe Bookshop which covers the works of authors writing for Chapeltown Books too. So am not unbiased here but well produced story anthologies are a joy to read so why not check them out?

Screenshot 2024-04-02 at 20-21-49 The Bridgetown Café Bookshop

It’s Monday. Okay it’s a Bank Holiday Monday in my part of the world and we’ve even had some sunshine, hooray! Still time for a story though. Hope you enjoy Unfair, my latest on YouTube. (Short and sweet this one).

 

Happy Easter! Don’t forget my author newsletter is out again tomorrow. Not too late to sign up. Just head on over to https://allisonsymescollectedworks.com for that.

What I find useful in compiling my newsletter is adding bits and pieces to it throughout the month as thoughts occur to me and then editing appropriately a few days before it goes out. I also do a couple of test runs to make sure all is okay.

Flash is great to share on a newsletter too. Doesn’t take up much room(and this is another reason why I also add links to my stories on Friday Flash Fiction here as well. Easy enough to click on a story title that takes your fancy and have a quick read over a cuppa. Challenge to me? Coming up with intriguing story titles but it is good to be kept on the old writing toes here!

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My flash fiction collections, From Light to Dark and Back Again and Tripping the Flash Fantastic, are square books. The design makes them stand out and they are ideal gift books, as someone rightly pointed out in a wonderful review for the latter.

Fabulous collection of poems and flash fiction. Some made me giggle, some made me gasp, all surprised me! I found it a real page turner, as the stories had such unexpected twists and turns! Some were actually quite moving. Highly recommend this! Makes a lovely present as well, with its (to me) unusual shape.

All of the Chapeltown flash collections are in this shape as part of an overall branding style. I think it works well though I accept I am biased (and bound to be so) here! The paperbacks are a great size to fit into pockets, bags etc so again are ideal for a train/bus ride read. Very easy to take with you (and even easier still if you go for the Kindle version of them!).

Flash with Amazon and Barnes and Noble

Goodreads Author Blog – Story Twists

I love twists in stories as long as they suit the character and situation. An early one I came across was in The Murder of Roger Ackroyd by Agatha Christie, whom I understand received complaints about what she did here. Can’t say more without giving things away but it is a great book and I highly recommend it especially if you like twists.

I use twists a lot in my own flash fiction. For a very short tale like this, often my closing line is the twist. I have done this with the “standard” twist but have also written humorous twist endings. All good fun to do.

The tricky bit is ensuring that the twist does come across as “natural”. It must fit in with what has been revealed about the character and their situation, otherwise it will look like a “fix” to get the author out of a tight corner. My favourite twists are when I look back through the story, having read it through, and then spot the clues to the twist which is about to be revealed. Naturally I learn a good deal for my own writing studying things like that.

This is where I think writers are so lucky. To write well, we need to read well and widely. So if we ever did need an excuse to have a book in our hands, that’s it, right there, regardless of whether there is a twist or not!

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WRITERS NARRATIVE SUBSCRIBER LINK

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AMAZON AUTHOR CENTRAL – ALLISON SYMES

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Favourite Aspects of Writing

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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. Had a lovely time with family for a family birthday. Lady had a smashing time. Lots of cuddles, extra food, and she just adores being with people. One shattered but happy dog at the end of the evening! Writing going well and will have another workshop to do in November which I’m looking forward to doing. Not that far away now. I can hardly believe we’re into October already.

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It’s hard to say what is my favourite thing about writing.

For fiction, I love coming up with characters. Always did like the idea of inventing my own people/other beings of choice. This is from a woman who has written from the viewpoint of a mother dragon, mind you!

For non-fiction, I love it when an idea for a blog post sparks other ideas and I know the post will end up being useful and I hope entertaining too. I am so glad the days of dull but worthy non-fiction works has finally bitten the dust. Not before time. I recall going to libraries as a child and the non-fiction section contained rows of huge encylopedias and the like. Wasn’t going to encourage me to read there – and I loved reading back then just as much as I do now.

I think most people have creative skill. It’s a question of working out what it is and then deciding if you want to develop it or not. I can’t draw. I can sing. I can’t dance. I can write. There has to be a creative outlet somewhere – or at least there has to be for me and writing is it.

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Lady got to play with her two special girlfriends, the Rhodesian Ridgeback and Hungarian Vizler, today. Great time had by all. Missed the thunder and heavy rain thankfully – that came in later. Lady thankfully isn’t frightened of storms but she doesn’t like them either. Her policy is to get up and move to what she considers to be the safest room in the house. Once she’s done that, she’s happy again!

Many thanks for the comments coming in on The Old Days, my latest tale on Friday Flash Fiction. Have you been to a school reunion? See what my characters make of their one in this story.
Screenshot 2023-09-29 at 10-11-20 The Old Days by Allison Symes

Wow! October already. Author newsletter out earlier today. I share some thoughts on finding ideas this time along with the usual news and story links. Hope you enjoy.

Will be celebrating the joys of The Writing Community for Chandler’s Ford Today later this week. Looking forward to sharing that post on Friday.

It was fantastic to catch up with my lovely editor here, Janet Williams, in person yesterday. Great to have a good chat and I am looking forward to seeing Wyrd Sisters with her to be performed by The Chameleon Theatre Group towards the end of the month.

It will be the first time I’ve seen a Discworld play and given the story is such a strong one, I just know the play will be something special. Plan to review in due course for CFT.

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Posting at a different time today as have a family birthday do. Lady loves these events. Everyone makes a good fuss of her and she usually gets more snacks than usual. It isn’t even her birthday! See photo above! Fab time doesn’t begin to cover it…

What events would your characters want to celebrate? If your story is in a fantasy/sci-fi setting, are birthdays celebrated as we know them or is the date of birth considered irrelevant? Could they consider the day someone graduates to be more important, for example? What events would characters be compelled to honour in some way, whether that compulsion is imposed by family, friends, the wider society, or the government?

There needs to be a sense your characters have a life away from your story. You can imagine Character X going to school even if that is not part of the tale. Characters will have memories so what would they consider important enough to recall?

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Facebook – From Light to Dark and Back Again

Hope you have had a good day. One of my favourite writing exercises is to jot down promising opening lines I will flesh out at a later date. I often use odd pockets of time for this and the great thing is when I have more time at my desk I’ve already got ideas to think about.

If an opening line still grips me a couple of weeks or so after I drafted it, I then run with it. I outline my character and work out how that opening line would apply to them. That nearly always sparks the kind of story they would have to be in for this to happen. Basic story structure in place and away I go with my first draft.

My opening line from Seeing Is Believing (Tripping The Flash Fantastic) reads When Ben was unwell, strange signs appeared in the sky above his house. That was fun to flesh out! I worked out who Ben was (not all of this is in the story. Only I needed to know it). I also worked out from that why strange signs would be associated with him. Then I was away on my first draft.

As I am writing flash and short stories a lot, I am always looking for ways into character creation. I also like mixing up the kinds of writing exercise I use. It keeps me on my toes and they all generate ideas.

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It’s Monday. Autumn is really coming in now with the dark evenings starting in my part of the world as early as 7 pm. It’s still Monday. There has been heavy rain. Dog really wished it hadn’t thundered, though not scared of it. (She just moves to what she thinks is the safest part of the world and treats it as an inconvenience!). Definitely time for a story then. Hope you enjoy Escape, my latest on YouTube. One of my darker tales, this one.

 

Amazon have an offer on the paperback of From Light to Dark and Back Again. Details in the link below. A fantastic review here refers to FLTDBA as “An eclectic mix of flash fiction, from an author with a great imagination.” I always appreciate reviews received and it is a great way to give some feedback to an author.

So please do consider leaving reviews. My example above proves it doesn’t have to be long. As well as being an obvious morale boost, reviews can help authors with their marketing. I review too – and not just on books.

I do a fair amount of online shopping and I always check the reviews out on products new to me. I find them a useful guide. And yes I am a great believer in reviewing and being reviewed – to me it is only right to be on both sides of the coin here!


Posting outside usual times due to family commitments (nice ones!). Flash has to focus on moments. Events are often held around a specific moment such as a birthday in a character’s life or an event considered to be important if it is some sort of ceremony. Can you use this as a backdrop to your tale?

If it is meant to be central, your flash tale will focus on why an event is important to your character but you can’t go on at length. So hone down your event to a specific thing your character is focussed on – an outline for your story will come from that.

If the event is a birthday, your character may wish to focus on the cake. Maybe they never had one before? Maybe their attempts at baking have gone wrong and someone has come to their rescue meaning for once they’re looking forward to eating their birthday cake?

You get the idea. I’ve found figuring out what really matters to my character helps me to write them and their tale up more efficiently.

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Goodreads Author Blog – Books as Presents

I’ve long loved receiving books as presents. Next best thing is receiving book tokens so I can go out and buy my own books later. And I love giving books too. If I’ve loved a book, I can think of nothing more lovely than sharing that experience with a friend by getting them to read the book too.

Paperbacks and audio books are by far the easiest formats to go for and I must admit I love seeing book shaped presents under the Christmas tree. Okay, you can’t really disguise them but why would you want to? The anticipation of discovering what book has been bought for you is great. Don’t want anything spoiling that.

Matching up books with friends is a fun game too (and a nice one). Putting potential book lists together is also a pleasurable task and I will be starting mine soon for the Christmas season. Readers and writers are the easiest people in the world to buy presents for – we always want books. Well done, us!

As for books I’ve received, all are treasured. People have chosen well for me and I appreciate that.

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WRITERS NARRATIVE SUBSCRIBER LINK

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AMAZON AUTHOR CENTRAL – ALLISON SYMES
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To Outline Or Not To Outline

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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.
Another glorious week here and Lady has got to play with her best girlfriends (and her gentleman friend, a smashing Aussie Shepherd) so all is right with her world. Writing wise, I have got some smashing author interviews coming up on Chandler’s Ford Today, the first of which will be next week (9th June). So looking forward to sharing these. I always learn something from author interviews and it is a pleasure and privilege to conduct some!

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Pleased to share To Outline or Not to Outline for Chandler’s Ford Today this week. I share thoughts on what I find useful about outlining and also how you don’t need to plan out everything. Hope you find the post useful. Suitable for planners and pantsers!

To Outline or Not To Outline

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Hope you have had a good day. Lady got to play with her Rhodesian Ridgeback pal today and to show off again in front of her Hungarian Vizler buddy. Lady has had a fab day! Mine has not been bad either – I loved my swim earlier today.

Also got my author newsletter out (do see link).

Pleased to say I’ll be running a workshop again in early July and am looking forward to that.

Writing going well, lots to get on with, which is how I like it. Hope to be sending in a competition entry next week and I’ve another draft to work on too.

Plus there will be author interviews again soon on CFT as I mentioned yesterday. Love doing those and it is a great pleasure to share them.

Allison Symes - June 2023 - Workshops and Book Fairs

 

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Looking forward to sharing To Outline or Not To Outline on Chandler’s Ford Today on Friday. (See above). The good news here is an outline can be what you want it to be. I just need enough to get me started on a piece. More on this later in the week.

Author newsletter out tomorrow. Author interview coming up on Chandler’s Ford Today on 9th June. More details nearer the time.

Making good progress on a draft of a story for a competition. I hope to be submitting this sometime next week. And I’ve come across another competition I’d like to have a go at so that gives the old brain box something to be thinking about.

May be a graphic of 1 person and text that says "The writing life is addictive but fun. The support of other writers makes a huge difference."

Facebook – From Light to Dark and Back Again

Telling It As It Is is my latest flash fiction piece on Friday Flash Fiction. My character, Sarah, lives up to the title but… well see for yourself via the link. (A huge thanks for the wonderful comments coming in on this one already).

Screenshot 2023-06-02 at 09-42-22 Telling It As It Is by Allison Symes

I’ve written flash stories as diary entries before now. (Losing Myself in Tripping the Flash Fantastic). I find I need to use towards the upper word count (1000 words) for these as I want to give a good selection of “entries”.

The other fun I have with this kind of story is being able to get the diary “writer” not to just reveal their story but what they think about other characters who they’re involved with. Well, diaries are often of a confessional nature, yes?!

With my story, I gave some thought about how many entries there were to be, over what time span, and how the diary would end. I knew there would be a twist at the end and I then worked out how to get to that point logically. I then filled in the “gaps”! Great fun to do and something I must have another go at some point.

It was fun inventing the character and their diary entries. For one thing, I had to think about why they might want to write something down for someone else to deliberately see which was the hub of this particular tale.

May be an image of one or more people and text that says "I've been known to interview my characters to find out what they are capable of. Another good technique would beto be write a diary from their viewpoint. What would they want to write down?"

There is an offer on From Light to Dark and Back Again at the moment on Amazon. See the link to my Author Central page for more.

In both of my collections, I mix up the word counts of the stories so there are some at the 100 words count, others at 250, still others at 500, and some at the 750 to 1000 range. As with the mood of story varying, I did this deliberately. This is to try to give a good idea of what flash can do and be.

Also some stories genuinely work better at the upper end of the count. Others are best being “punchy” and kept to under 300 words.

Allison Symes

Flash with Amazon and Barnes and Noble

Fairytales with Bite – Character Planning

Whether I write my fairytales with bite or other kinds of flash fiction/short story, I’ve found planning my characters to be so helpful. If I can picture them, so will readers and that is the point. What do I mean by “picture them”? Simply that if these characters could become real somehow, they would be believable. Readers should be able to imagine them being able to exist too.

Some writers need to know what their characters look like. For me that’s not so important. I like to know their attitudes, their main traits as so many things can come from those. For one thing traits have a direct impact on likely behaviour.

When I am writing about characters with magical abilities, I like to work out what they can do and what they can’t. I also like to know if they can improve their skills. While tales about magical schools have been done (!), they will continue to be done. It is what you can bring to the mix that will make your tale stand out (and it would have to stand out given the illustrious predecessors here).

If a character can improve their skills, I could write up stories about how they do so, their failures, their successes etc.

If they can’t, I’d want to look at why this is and what is getting in their way. Can they overcome the “system” to get the chance to improve their skills?

As for what magic they can do, there are story ideas on working out how the character uses these.

I would want some limitations on magical ability so the character has to use other methods to achieve their objectives. A wand getting someone out of trouble all the time isn’t going to keep the reader’s interest. It is what a character does when that isn’t an option which will grab attention and hopefully hold that attention.

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This World and Others – Impact of Your Setting

Setting can sometimes act like a character in its own right. Think about The Hound of the Baskervilles, Wuthering Heights, anything by Dickens. You can’t imagine those stories being set anywhere else, right?

So think about why you have chosen the setting you have and how your characters manage within it. They don’t necessarily need to manage well. The setting can act as an obstacle.

Can your readers visualize your setting? What do they have to know about it to be able to picture it? Again, as with characters mentioned in Fairytales with Bite, I believe planning is necessary especially if you’re hoping for a series of books.

Planning things out will give you confidence in what you write. You know how the government works, you know how people are employed, you know how technology works, if there is any,. A lot of that won’t appear in your stories but you need to know it to be able to convey what you do need to show your readers. That includes the setting and an industrial society will look very different from a non-industrial one, just to name one example.

Think about whether your setting is prone to natural disasters and how that would be something your characters have to learn to cope with. But again a reader will need to know early on that natural disasters are possible within your environment, otherwise it will look like coincidence.

Think about what you need to know. From there you can work out what the readers needs to know.

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AMAZON AUTHOR CENTRAL – ALLISON SYMES

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Opening Lines, a Reading Acrostic, and a Reader Hub

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Image Credits:-
All images from Pixabay/Pexels unless otherwise stated. Book cover images from Chapeltown Books and Bridge House Publishing. Screenshots (and photo of Lady) were taken by me, Allison Symes. Many thanks to Dawn Kentish Knox for taking the photo of me reading at a previous Bridge House Publishing event. Very much looking forward to going to the 2022 one!
Hope you have had a good few days – weather stormy and then next day gorgeous sunshine. It’s a case of looking out of the window and thinking big coat or not today then! This will be the position for the next few months – certainly till at least early March.

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Facebook – General

Hope you’ve had a good day. Lady got to play with her “boyfriend”, a lovely tri-coloured Aussie Shepherd today. Both got a good run!

Am looking forward to sharing Part 2 of my interview with Jenny Sanders on Chandler’s Ford Today on Friday. This week we’ll be discussing short stories and flash fiction, other areas in which our paths have crossed, writing wise.

Have booked my tickets for the Bridge House Publishing event in London on 3rd December. Looking forward to that very much. Will be giving a reading at that event too. Flash is ideal for that kind of thing – you cannot go on for too long!

 

To say Lady and I got wet this morning is something of an understatement. Had Noah been passing, we’d have thumbed a lift.

Now I use Book Brush to design graphics with and I love using their tools to help me achieve great images for my blog posts. (I use them all the time for Chandler’s Ford Today, Authors Electric, Mom’s Favorite Reads, More than Writers etc). I’ve now set up my Reader Hub page on this (it is a new feature) where I can share pictures, my social media links and a bit about what I write, all in one handy place. Very pleased with this and am sure it will prove useful.
Screenshot 2022-11-21 at 20-00-26 Allison Symes - Author Reader HubProgressing well with Flash NANO. One of my pieces for this I plan to use for my YouTube tale this week so look out for that when I share the link tomorrow. See below. I’ve mentioned before about having a “stock” of stories ready for competitions, markets etc. Taking part in Flash NANO is a great way to build up a good stock!

I’ve shared a couple of my pieces on the Flash NANO Facebook group (as these stories needed little alteration) but I won’t share everything there because I know there is plenty of work to do on my other tales before I want anyone else seeing them! Having said that, I am loving reading what others are sharing here – it does to pay to read in your genre as well as outside of it. It always reminds me of why I love the flash format. And it is such a fun thing to do so win-win!

 

Hope you have had a good day. Many thanks for the lovely comments coming in on Cat Chat, my new tale (or should that be tail?) on Friday Flash Fiction. I write stories from an animal’s point of view every so often. They’re fun to do. But, as with any story, the character voice must be strong enough to be convincing.

Am looking forward to sharing Part 2 of my interview with Jenny Sanders on Chandler’s Ford Today next week (and again thanks to all who have responded so well to Part 1 where the post was shared on social media yesterday. Lots of memories about schools programming from years ago!) Part 2 will look at where Jenny and I cross paths with regard to short story and flash fiction writing.

Screenshot 2022-11-18 at 16-56-02 Cat Chat by Allison Symes

Facebook – From Light to Dark and Back Again

Am looking forward to the Association of Christian Writers Flash Fiction group meeting on Zoom next week. It is a lovely time to catch up with writing news, share details of competitions etc, and I usually share a short presentation.

Writing wise, I am already beginning to think about stories for a future (fourth) collection. It does take time to build these up but Flash NANO is going to be a good contributor here!

Have got a story in draft which I want to enter for a competition before the year is out. Currently resting it but hope to have another look at it over the weekend. I can’t stress enough how useful it is to have time away from a story as I find I pick up various things to put right having given myself enough distance away from the piece. It really is worth doing.

Time away

It has been the kind of Monday that makes Noah wonder if it’s time to set sail again so definitely time for a new YouTube story from me. This one, Looking and Finding, is one of my responses to the Flash NANO challenges set so far for this year. The 19 word story, all in! Hope you enjoy it. (I didn’t include the title as part of the word count for this or for the Flash NANO challenge itself but this was great fun to write and will resonate with cat owners and Tom and Jerry fans in particular).


What makes for a good opening line for me? It’s something that draws me in, sets up an interesting premise, and gives me that “I’ve got to find out what happens here” feeling. Only one way to do that – read the story – job done! But…

The job is only done if that vital closing line does its job well and delivers on the promise set by the opening one.

This is why I like to outline my flash and other stories. I don’t need to work out everything but I do need to know how I am going to get from A to B with a rough idea of the stopping points on that journey. In a flash tale, even at the 1000 words upper limit, I often only need a line (which will form the basis of Start Point A), a rough line about what happens in the middle, and another line summing up how the story finishes (my finishing point B). For a longer tale I might need a couple of lines for each of the three points of my story.

I’ve found outlining doesn’t take too long and has saved me a lot of grief. I no longer box myself into a corner with my story. I’ve only scrapped two stories in my time because I hadn’t outlined and I did box myself in as a result of that.

Don’t forget my author newsletter goes out on the first of the month and I do share tips here, especially those pertinent to flash story writing. Last time I shared a pdf I’d created for a flash fiction group I run on Zoom (the ACW one). If you’d like to sign up head over to my landing page at https://allisonsymescollectedworks.com – you would be most welcome! A big thanks to all who are already subscribers too.

One of the Flash NANO challenges is in the form of an exercise I’ve done before – to cut a story in half word count wise. It’s a great exercise to work on your editing skills as the story still has to make sense and to not lose anything important to its meaning. This kind of exercise though is not the type you can do in five minutes. What I’m hoping to do with mine is have it done by the end of Flash NANO at the end of the month.

Goodreads Author Blog – READING ACROSTIC

R= Reading is wonderful and inspires further stories to be written.
E = Educational and entertaining – what is there not to like?
A = Animals, aliens, all sorts of characters end up being the heroes and villains in the stories.
D = Dialogue in books and stories is like overhearing an intriguing conversation where you have to find out what happens.
I = Imagination – reading fires this up considerably even if you don’t write yourself.
N = Novels, novellas, short stories, flash fiction, non-fiction, articles, books, magazines – there is something to suit you somewhere!
G = Great reading can cross centuries – there is no time limit on how long a book or story can be good for.

Screenshot 2022-11-19 at 18-01-56 Reading Acrostic

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