Tag: Having fun with your writing

Story Judging

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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 good few days. Autumn coming in rapidly here and Lady and I have had our first soakings of the month! Looking forward to sharing two fabulous author interviews on Chandler’s Ford Today towards the end of the month plus I hope to have news of another writing event in October before long. Meantime, keeping busy writing and editing here. Huge advantage to this is I keep dry!

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Facebook – General and Chandler’s Ford Today

Lady and I had another soaking this morning. We may have been marginally less wet than yesterday but there wasn’t much in it!

On a much happier note, I’m pleased to share Story Judging for Chandler’s Ford Today this week. I look at where competition judges can tell how much (or little) editing has been done on the pieces they get to read and I share what I think story judges are looking for. I also share handy tips.

Hope you find the post useful and good luck if you are entering competitions. I find they’re a great discipline for helping you to get used to writing to deadlines.

Story Judging

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Lady and I had a real soaking this morning! Hope it wasn’t too bad where you are. Only time I was pleased to get wet today was when I went swimming!

Don’t forget Story Judging is up on Chandler’s Ford Today this week. Link up tomorrow. See above. Will be back to see The Chameleon Theatre Group’s latest production in October so will review that in due course for CFT too.

I’ve mentioned before I often use Zoom to record stories and play them back. Well, I was glad I did last night. A story I’ve got in mind for submission has to come in at under the three minutes mark. Discovered mine was over four! Have already edited the piece so hope it will now be to the right time length but I will re-record later and make sure. I’ve found it is the only sure way to make sure my timings are right.

 

Hope you have had a good day. Lady had a cracking time in the park with her pal, Coco, and then got to see two other rescue dog pals she sees every now and then. Grand time had by all. Rain held off too so will count that as a win.

I’ve been thinking of music and books a lot recently, partly inspired by the recent Classic FM Movie Music Hall of Fame chart which they played on Bank Holiday Monday. Wonderful music and many of the pieces relate to books or plays. Shakespeare turned up a few times for that chart. Would like to think he would be pleased about that. (Jane Austen and Charles Dickens were represented in there too).

Character Tip: Why not see what your character’s musical tastes are and why they have them? This could reveal something about their background and/or personality. Also think about a piece of music which would suit your character and think about why it would be that one. (If you pick Jaws, you are either writing about a shark or your character is of the kind I am likely to avoid!).

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Facebook – From Light to Dark and Back Again

It’s Friday. It’s the end of the working week for many of us. Weather here has been frightful too. So definitely time for a story then and I hope you like my latest on Friday Flash Fiction – The Clock.

Screenshot 2024-09-06 at 09-03-25 The Clock by Allison Symes - Friday Flash Fiction

Names can reveal a lot about characters such as age and social status. Sometimes I know the character’s job before I know the name but sometimes that occupation inspires my name choice. In Being Yourself (Tripping the Flash Fantastic), I knew my character was a librarian and then worked out a name to suit (I came up with Jane Stephens for this one).

Sometimes I don’t need to worry about names at all as I know the story will work best in the first person but even there I can show a character referring to or talking to someone else by name. What they call someone can be enlightening too. Do they use the full name? Do they use a contraction? When they speak the name is it with affection or contempt?

 

I’ve mentioned before you can have a lot of fun writing flash because, despite the limited word count, there is much you can do with it.

For example, I write across the whole spectrum from 50 words to the full 1000 and pretty much everything in between. I also mix up the genres I write in here and also the moods of the stories. I mix up writing in first and third person. I’ve occasionally used second person too.

But I also mix up the formats I use so sometimes I use acrostics (especially on Facebook and my blog round up). I have also written flash pieces in diary format, as letters, and in poetic form too. At some point I may have a go at flash in tweets because that is do-able.

The important thing in all of this? Having fun with it! You have to enjoy what you write/the process of writing and accept you are in for the long haul.

But the joy of creating something you hope others will enjoy I think is a great thing and feedback from sites like Friday Flash Fiction is enormously encouraging too. You can’t assume anything in the writing life but you can give it your best shot and have fun as you do that.

Being open to improving your craft matters too but that is fun in itself when you have the support of fellow writers. It is my experience the writing community is a tremendously supportive one and it is lovely being part of that.

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Fairytales with Bite – Rough Justice

Justice can be very rough indeed in the fairytale world. The prince didn’t expect to be turned into a beast in Beauty and the Beast, did he?

But for a wider fantasy setting, what would count as rough justice? Would it be the misuse of magic for aggressive purposes or would it be the withholding of magic when it could be used to help a character?

Who determines the usage of magic and when that usage spills over into abuse of power? Someone has to set the rules. There would have to be some rules given the lack of them would lead to anarchy, though you could give some thought to who would want to stir that up in your setting.

If someone is after power, which is what characters so often want (just so like us, eh?), how would they stir up that anarchy and then bring it under control again so they could rule?

Often when there is a power struggle, justice and truth are trampled on. Who would bring these things back and how would they do it? Who would ensure justice was just that only without any rough bits?

Story ideas there I think!

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This World and Others – Good -v- Evil

One of the things I love about fairytales is they call out evil for what it is. There is a clear divide between good and evil.

It doesn’t mean good characters are flawless – they’re not, any more than we are. It does mean they know what is right and wrong at least at the basic levels and the heroes here, to my mind, are those who are prepared to stand up for what is right, regardless. (See The Lord of the Rings, the Narnia series and so much more for more on that).

In your setting, is the divide clear? Would your readers know who they should be rooting for to succeed? Yes, sometimes you can have a “good villain”. The Sheriff of Nottingham, as played by the much missed Alan Rickman, in Robin Hood, Prince of Thieves is one such but it was still right he did not succeed in the end.

The problem with evil winning is it is so depressing. The brute forces win, characters are oppressed, where is the hope in that kind of story? Indeed, where is the story? Frankly, we also see enough of all of that in the news!

So we need characters then who are prepared to stand up against evil. They’re not always going to get it right. Many of them will die. (To paraphrase Lord Farquaad in Shrek, that is a sacrifice the bad guys are prepared to make!).

But the interesting story is when those on the side of good do take up a stand against evil. We want to see what they do and whether it succeeds or not. If they face setbacks, which I would expect, do they overcome those? How do they overcome them? Is the cause of good upheld successfully?

One of the joys of fantasy and fairytales is when good is upheld. It gives hope. Yes, it may be escapism but I’ve never seen the problem with that. I want characters in conflict with each other and the right ones succeeding in the end. I guess I have wanted that ever since I first read the classic fairytales. I’ve seen no reason to change that view!

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WRITERS NARRATIVE SUBSCRIBER LINK

This time I’m sharing the November 2023 edition of the magazine which focused on novels. My article is on Writing Novels and I shared what I learned from writing my (as yet) unpublished novel.

 

AMAZON AUTHOR CENTRAL – ALLISON SYMES

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Late Running, The Inside of a Ping Pong Ball, and Why Books are Special to Me

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Image Credit:-

All images from Pixabay/Pexels unless otherwise stated. Some images created in Book Brush using Pixabay pictures.

Book cover images from Chapeltown Books and Bridge House Publishing.

Image of Wendy H Jones kindly supplied by her. Many thanks to Janet Williams (my lovely editor at Chandler’s Ford Today) for the image of me reading at a book signing at our local railway station (yes, really!). Also to Geoff Parkes and Penny Blackburn for their images of me reading at various Swanwick Writers’ Summer School Open Prose Mic night events. All great fun.

And I think I’ve finally cracked the “most unusual title for a blog post” category! Read on to find out how the inside of a ping pong ball is relevant for my flash fiction writing this week. If you had asked me last week whether I would anticipate such a thing, the answer would have been a firm “no”! How much can change in a week?!

Facebook – General

A huge thanks to the #DundeeCityWriters – I was talking to them over Zoom last night on the topic of flash fiction (naturally!) and it was such fun. Many thanks for hosting me.

(Also one of the best ways to show what flash fiction is to read some out and I always enjoy doing that. I’m hoping the Open Prose Mic Night will be on again at Swanwick Writers’ Summer School this year. Flash works well for this kind of thing. You can’t go on for too long for one thing!).

My Chandler’s Ford Today post this week is on the subject of Favourite Lines. I’ve touched on this topic before but for this post I will also be looking at how catchphrases and repetition can help us form said favourite lines. Looking forward to sharing that on Friday.

Use personal reviews to help you generate character and story outlines. Image via Pixabay.
And a good book cover is the first advert to draw readers in to finding out!


Many thanks for the wonderful responses to my rather unusual tale, The Inside of a Ping Pong Ball, which I posted yesterday (see below) in reply to a writing challenge set by #WendyHJones on Wordy Chat. (The latter is a Facebook group set up by fellow Association of Christian Writers member, Maressa Mortimer – lots of giggles and chats about the writing world – naturally we meet on Zoom).

I have two standard ways of getting into a story. By far my favourite is working out who the character Is, what their main trait is etc as that usually gives a pretty good idea of the kind of story in which such a creation would appear. But my other way into a story is with a promising title and that was the take I took on this one.

The Inside of a Ping Pong Ball not only gave me my title, it set the tone (with a title like that it had to be a humorous tale), and therefore the kind of character likely to be in it.

Humour can be shown in expression, writers must use words! The right ones in the right way too! Image via Pixabay.
I’ve yet to see the lightbulb appear above my head! Pixabay
Great characters should show humour. I love both of these two! Image via Pixabay.


As promised yesterday, here is the flash fiction tale I wrote in response to a challenge set on Wordy Chat the other night. The story title says it all!

The Inside of a Ping Pong Ball

Look, don’t blame me. I have to travel in whatever vessel I can find and blend in with my surroundings. I am in what you humans call a sports hall doing various horrid things with balls and bats and making yourself all sweaty. So gross!

But it means I am currently curled up inside a ping pong ball. It’s cramped in here. I’ve had to shrink my normal size down by well over 80% to get in here. Trust me that is not a comfortable experience.

I am here to study you lot on the order of the big bosses. Personally, I would far rather have gone to the seaside.

But I have to go where the bosses tell me to go. (Would so love to tell them where they can go but they’re not forgiving of any kind of insubordination and I do like living so that rules this out).

To be honest with you, I think they’re preparing for an invasion.

I’m going to tell them not to bother.

I’ve seen the way you treat other ping pong balls. Smash them about with absolutely no thought. What would you do to the likes of an alien invader?

I tell you it is terrifying to think about.

So you lot have won. And I must get out of this ball before…

Arggh! Too late.

Ends.
Allison Symes – 2nd May 2021

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Hope you have had a good Saturday.

New author newsletter from me went out earlier today. See https://www.facebook.com/501180463318271/posts/3429068970529391/ if you missed this.

If you would like to receive the newsletter regularly, please sign up at my landing page at https://allisonsymescollectedworks.com – on receipt of the welcome email, you’ll get a link to a giveaway as well.

I’m enjoying putting the newsletters together and, unless there is some specific time urgent news, will keep these to monthly send outs.

In other news, as they say, the next couple of topics for Chandler’s Ford Today will be on Favourite Lines and Understanding. I look forward to sharing those blogs as it is always a joy to talk about favourite lines from books and I make the case for how reading encourages empathy in the latter post.

Am currently drafting a flash fiction story based on what is probably the most unusual location I’ve chosen to date. Well, I say chosen. It’s a response to a challenge set on Wordy Chat last night, where a group of writers from the Association of Christian Writers get together for a good giggle and lots of talk about writing related topics. Those who were at Wordy Chat last night will know what the location is but will share the story tomorrow! (See above – and I hope you enjoy it. I loved writing it).

Facebook – From Light to Dark and Back Again

Many thanks for the lovely responses to my story video Late Running. (See below for video). Also to The Inside of a Ping Pong Ball. (See above for story).

One lovely thing that came up with the latter was I used it in my talk to the #DundeeCityWriters group I spoke to via Zoom yesterday about flash fiction. I used it to prove my point that flash fiction lends itself beautifully to being able to set characters anywhere!

And the great thing? Dundee City Writers is led by #WendyHJones who set the topic of The Inside of a Ping Pong Ball at last week’s Wordy Chat!

What goes around etc etc!

Still, I think I am going to have to try very hard to think of a more unusual setting for a flash fiction story!

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Pleased to share my latest story video. Hope you enjoy Late Running. Pun intentional (and indeed for a lot of my flash fiction it is a case of no pun knowingly overlooked! Why the fondness for puns? I love them anyway but for flash, having words and phrases that can carry double meanings helps with (a) impact and (b) keeping that old word count nice and trim!).

Over on my author page at https://www.facebook.com/allison.symes.50 I’ve shared a flash fiction story, The Inside of a Ping Pong Ball, which was written in response to a writing challenge set by Scottish crime writer, #WendyHJones. It is certainly a top runner for the most unusual writing challenge I’ve responded to (!) but it was great fun to do.

And it is important to have fun with your writing. Okay, there are times when it won’t feel that way. I find being over-tired can sap the joy out of writing (and everything else come to that) so I try to avoid getting into that state.
But one lovely thing about flash fiction, especially if you’re working on a longer project and it is proving to be a slog-fest, drafting a very short story can be a refreshing break from your main writing work and you have something else to submit elsewhere later.

And when I am tired, just jotting down a couple of hundred words, whether it is a full flash tale or will end up being part of a longer one, still makes me feel connected to the creative process. That in itself makes me feel better.

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One of the best ways to demonstrate flash fiction to people is to read some to them! I’ve done this a few times now at things like the Swanwick Writers’ Summer School Open Prose Mic and even at book signings. (That led to sales -win-win there!). I’ve found the 100-word stories (aka the drabble) work best for this. They don’t take too long to read and demonstrates the capacity of flash fiction well, especially for impact on a reader.

I’ve mentioned before here and on my author page that reading work out loud is great for literally hearing whether your dialogue is as smooth as you think it is. What looks good written down doesn’t always work so well when spoken out loud. But this technique also works for the rest of your prose. If you stumble over something, you can be sure your readers will too. And again with flash it is easy to read a piece out loud and hear whether or not something is working.

My reading at the local railway station. Image by Janet Williams
From the back at The Hayes. Image by Allison Symes
Time to reflect! Image by Allison Symes
The grounds are lovely at The Hayes. Will miss being there this year. Image by Allison Symes
Many thanks to Geoff Parkes for this image of me reading at the Swanwick Writers’ Summer School Open Prose Mic Night.
Many thanks to Penny Blackburn for this image of me reading at another Open Prose Mic Night at Swanwick.
I really liked taking part in the Prose Open Mic slot at Swanwick this year. Image via Pixabay

 

Goodreads Author Blog – Why Books are Special to Me

I could write chapter and verse on this week’s topic, appropriately enough. So where to start on why books are special to me?

My love of books and stories comes from my late mother who encouraged my love of reading and taught me to read before I started school. Books were regularly given as presents. I would often buy books with pocket money and money gifts sent by my relatives for Christmas etc. I went to the library a lot.

Best of all, Mum had a lovely collection of books herself, which I now have. And I so wanted to have a collection of my own (which I have). As well as being read to as a child, which is so important, I saw Mum read for pleasure herself more often than I could say. It sent the unspoken message that this was definitely an okay thing to do – and it is!

Then there are the books with particular meaning. I treasure the Bibles given to me by my late parents and the one given to me by my son.

I love The Reader’s Digest of Classic Fairytales two volume set. I spent hours reading those and loving the beautiful illustrations. I remember the shock I first had on reading The Little Mermaid in here and discovering fairytales didn’t always have happy ever after endings. I identified with the way The Ugly Duckling felt and cheered when all did work out well in the end. (You know full well as a kid it doesn’t always work that way in life, You know it even more as an adult).

I treasure my paperback of The Lord of The Rings and my copy of Pride and Prejudice.

For me, there is absolutely nothing about a book to dislike.

I like my paperbacks, my hardbacks, my audio and ebooks. The format doesn’t matter. The fact it is a book does!

Happy reading!

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