Bridge House Publishing Celebration Event and Three Minute Santas

December 10, 2024Leave a comment

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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 and Storm Darragh didn’t do too much damage where you are. Has calmed a bit today (Monday 9th December) but bitterly cold. Had a fabulous time at the Bridge House Publishing Celebration event on Saturday 7th December, despite the weather, and I hope to write more about that for a Chandler’s Ford Today post for 20th December. Meantime many thanks to Debz Hobbs-Wyatt and Lynn Clement for the two selfies featured below. I interviewed Debz recently for CFT and I was Lynn’s editor on her The City of Stories (Chapeltown Books).

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Wow! Am not referring to the bitterly cold wind again today (though it did make me gasp) but to the fact Hannah Kate will have 23 authors, yes 23, on her Three Minute Santas show on North Manchester FM on Saturday, 14th December. This has to be a record but it will give plenty of wonderful stories to listen to. I’m also delighted to say I know five of the other authors who will be on the show!

Given the weather is unlikely to be much better at the end of this week, having a Saturday afternoon in listening to stories seems like a great idea to me. The show starts from 2pm. See link for more details.

Huge congratulations to all authors whose stories have been chosen. I’m looking forward to listening to all of the tales.

North Manchester FM: Hannah’s Bookshelf 3 Minute Santas Special, Saturday 14 December, 2-4pm

Bitterly cold, though less blowy, today. Not that Lady worried. She was thrilled to see her Hungarian Vizler and Rhodesian Ridgeback pals today. I was glad to get back in the warm (despite being layered up to the maximum!).

Many thanks for the lovely responses to my two posts yesterday about the Bridge House event. Much appreciated. I plan to write more about it for Chandler’s Ford Today for 20th December. This week’s post will be What I Look For In a Good Story and I heard plenty of those read out on Saturday afternoon!

Writing Prompt: Whenever I go anywhere, I use Google Maps to help me plan out best routes to my destination from Tube stations etc. Saves a lot of time. What would your characters do when going somewhere new? Are they the type to “wing it” or would they want to map things out?

What facilities would they have to be able to do something like this? Something more basic than what we have here or something far more advanced? Am sure there are stories here but also in how any maps are produced and could they be “hacked” by an enemy.

Had a wonderful time in London yesterday. So good to see everyone again. Enjoyed listening to the author readings and taking part in the same. Train was held up on the way back because the one in front of us hit a tree on the track. It held us up for an hour which I didn’t think was too bad given the circumstances. Not sorry to be at home today though as it’s still very gusty here.

Ironically last year I ran late for the Bridge House event because of issues with the trains. This year, despite the storm, the trains were running reasonably well in my part of the world and I was one of the first to reach the Theodore Bullfrog pub. (And where more appropriate venue for a writers’ event than a pub, I ask you!).

Writing Prompt: A seasonal one too! Take one of your Christmas tree decorations. What meaning does it have for you? Then hold that thought and apply it to a character. Who gave them the decoration or did they inherit it from a loved one? What’s the story behind it?

And many thanks to Lynn Clement for taking the image below.

Saturday 7th December 2024: Am on my way to the Bridge House Publishing Celebration event. Even managed to get an earlier train. Appreciate there are likely to be delays given the storm. Do take care out there.

Looking forward to catching up with friends, taking part in the author readings, and finding out the latest BHP news.

Will be sharing what I look for in a good story in next week’s Chandler’s Ford Today post. I do know I will be hearing plenty of good stories today!

Update: Now back home again and I heard many marvellous tales! Many thanks to Debz Hobbs-Wyatt for the picture.

Facebook – From Light to Dark and Back Again

Lady got to see her Rhodesian Ridgeback pal unexpectedly today and a lovely time was had by both dogs in very chilly conditions.

Pleased to discover there are five authors I know, along with myself, who will have work on Hannah Kate’s Three Minute Santas show on North Manchester FM on Saturday 14th December.

Do listen out for it. It will showcase some fabulous festive flash fiction. There are 23 authors involved in all, yes 23, so there will be a great range of styles and stories. And all of us had a maximum of three minutes.

The great thing with flash? None of us can go on at length. It defeats the object of the format!

Less is more, indeed.

It’s Monday. It’s a cold one. It’s a Monday after Storm Darragh. Definitely time for a story then. Hope you like my latest on YouTube – Reassurance.

After all, it’s always good to know someone has your back when you’re in need of reassurance, regardless of who you are.

Will be getting on with flash fiction Sunday afternoon shortly. Given the weather is still awful, I am so glad writing is something to be done indoors in the warm.

As well as catching up with longstanding Bridge House friends yesterday, including someone I’ve edited for them, I met up with one of the Association of Christian Writers Flash Fiction group at the Bridge House event and a dear friend from The Writers’ Summer School, Swanwick.

There is something lovely about the writing community in that we often cross paths in different ways. What united us yesterday was Bridge House and, of course, an overwhelming love for the written word. Something positive to think about on a grotty weekend weather wise I think.

Saturday 7th December 2024: I heard plenty of excellent flash fiction pieces and extracts from longer works read out at today’s Bridge House Publishing Celebration event. Open mic reading is a fabulous way to celebrate the format.

Delighted four members of the Association of Christian Writers Flash Fiction Group including me will have stories broadcast on Hannah Kate’s Three Minute Santas show on North Manchester FM next Saturday, 14th December.

Am looking forward to hearing them all. I hope to be able to share a link later including in my last CFT post before Christmas (which will be on Friday 20th December).

Many thanks to Lynn Clement, author of The City of Stories which I had the privilege of editing, for the picture below.

Goodreads Author Blog – Favourite Book Moments

I’m sure we all have favourite book moments which “make” the whole story for us. I know I have far too many to list here though sometimes, with films, you get something which adds to the original tale.

One great example of this is the song Marley and Marley from The Muppet Christmas Carol. I still think that is the finest adaptation of Charles Dicken’s wonderful novella.

But what great films can do is add something special. This can only be done when you’ve got superb stories to work with in the first place, mind you! Am sure Dickens would be pleased and it is fabulous to think A Christmas Carol has never been out of print. I don’t think it ever will be.

WRITERS NARRATIVE SUBSCRIBER LINK

AMAZON AUTHOR CENTRAL – ALLISON SYMES

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liked Allison Symes's blog post: Favourite Book Moments https://t.co/xRLPfLQgnj via @goodreads I discuss how films like The Muppet Christmas Carol can add so much of value to the original story. Mind you, there does have to be excellent source material in the first place! pic.twitter.com/7bT1FzMLQq
— Allison Symes (@AllisonSymes1) December 7, 2024

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It’s Monday. It’s cold. It’s a Monday after Storm Darragh. Definitely time for a story. Hope you like my latest on YouTube – Reassurance.

It's always good to know someone has your back when you're in need of reassurance, regardless of who you are.https://t.co/7BM6Oin5lr
— Allison Symes (@AllisonSymes1) December 9, 2024

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Random Generators and Story Moods

October 24, 2023Leave a comment

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.

It is shaping up to be a good week in that I will be running the Flash Fiction Group meeting on Zoom for the Association of Christian Writers on Wednesday, which is always fun. The exchange of news is useful to us all too. No one writer can know it all which is why it is important to network, whether it is in person or online or both. I’ve been very grateful for lots of useful information I’ve picked up this way over the years.

Facebook – General

Looking forward to the Flash Fiction Group meeting (Association of Christian Writers) tomorrow. Always great fun. Will be looking at marketing flash fiction, always a handy topic. Also looking forward to chatting to Swanwick friends on Zoom at the weekend. That’s always great fun too. Ah, the joys of Zoom!

For non-fiction, what draws you in? For me, the topic has to grip immediately and my go-to here is history based. I then pick a book based on the period it is covering. If it is one of my favourite periods (World War Two, the Wars of the Roses, the Elizabethan era (the first one!), then I’ll check out the blurb and if I still like it, it gets bought. Most of my non-fiction books are on Kindle and there can be some great offers here.

For fiction, I turn to crime (make of that what you will!), historical fiction, fantasy and I like a mix of novels and short story and flash collections. I make a point of ensuring I enjoy 99.9% of what I read. Life’s too short to do otherwise!

When writing my own fiction, I focus on getting my characters right (as that, I find, also helps get the plot right) and I want there to be something intriguing about them that will make readers want to find out more.

Ideas for fiction can spark from non-fiction

Lady had a great start to her week as she got to play with her Rhodesian Ridgeback and Hungarian Vizler pals. Temperature is up and down at the moment. Have just got used to “layering up” as it had turned cold only to find the temperature has shot up again.

Writing Tip: Editing always takes longer than you think so try to allow for that. This is why I take time off any official competition deadline and set my own date by which I have to send something in. It means I have a safety net here should I need it.

My personal deadline date is set at least a week before the official one. I plan when I will have my first draft done by. I also then plan when I will edit said first draft so by the time I reach my deadline all editing is done and it is then a case of having a final check for typos, have I followed the rules to the letter and so on.

I use the good old fashioned A4 diaries you can get from the Post Office for my planning and it works for me. I have found in writing my plans down I am much more likely to get them done. I also journal a little bit in my diary too – makes things more interesting for me too.

Weather calmer today, even seeing some autumn sun. Seasons can usefully be indicated in stories simply by what you get your characters to wear. You can also bring in colour to describe the clothing. It is unlikely a story set in my part of the world would have a character wearing a thick orange jumper in the height of summer. (If they are, there will be a reason for it and that will be explained by the story).

This can be an excellent short cut for descriptive passages and you can take it further. If that orange jumper is coupled with, say, a purple pair of trousers, I would want to know why a character would wear such a combination. Are they doing it for a laugh? Are they just outgoing and they show it through their clothing? Only one way I can find out and that’s to read the story. I would also want to know if these items had any bearing on the outcome of the story. (Would you turn up for a blind date wearing that combo? I know I wouldn’t!).

If I had a character wearing shorts, I would assume automatically the story has to be set in the summer. I would need the story to show why that wasn’t the case. But again I would then want to know why the character has chosen to wear shorts in a colder time of year – there will be a reason for it.

Hope everyone is okay – weather ghastly.

Will be talking about Scene Setting for Chandler’s Ford Today next week. Many thanks for the comments on Facebook about my interview with Jennifer C Wilson re The Joy of Writing Groups and Workshops.

Author newsletter will be out again soon. To sign up for tips, news, story links etc., do head over to my landing page at https://allisonsymescollectedworks.com

Working out what to read next on my Kindle given I’ve finished Churchill’s Wizards. Sometimes you can have too much choice! It’s a nice dilemma to have though.

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Facebook – From Light to Dark and Back Again

Delighted to see some fabulous reviews coming in for The Best of CafeLit 12. My story, Jubilee, is in there. Do check out the reviews and the book at the link below.

It’s Monday. It’s getting darker earlier in the evenings and the UK hasn’t put the clocks back yet. Weather can’t make up its mind whether to be cold or mild. It’s still Monday. Time for a story then. My latest on YouTube is Away on Cloud Nine. Hope you enjoy it.

When I’m taking part in Open Prose Mic Nights and the like, I try to mix up the moods of the stories I’m reading. It’s a great way to showcase what flash can do and be. You usually have three to five minutes for your slot which is more than enough time to read a couple of stories.

I also practice what I’m going to read and good old Zoom helps me ensure I get my timings right. The record yourself and convert the file to an mp4 function is a great tool. Whenever I want to send something in which might be broadcast, I always use that facility. It’s the audio equivalent of not going over a set word count!

As you know, I sometimes use random generators to help trigger story ideas. A great use for the random question one is to get your character to answer the question. It will show you more about them.

What makes you cry? I generated this question for this post and thought there are a few ideas here.

1. Get the character to answer the question directly.

2. Think about whether the character resolutely will not cry, whatever the circumstances, and what led to that. There will be a significant story there.

3. If something makes you cry, but would not do so for your character, give some thought as to why this is the case.Not quite the same thing as 2 above given some folk just won’t cry for good reasons. It is not their way to “vent”.

Cruelty, for example, can easily make me cry but if my character isn’t moved by it, I want to know why and what would trigger them being upset instead. There has to be something that would trigger tears, surely? If so, what would that be and why aren’t they upset by an “obvious” thing?

It could well be the character is so used to cruelty they have become blinded to it (which is tragic in itself). It would change how they react and interact with other characters too.

4. What makes someone cry (or refuse to do so) will shed some light on what motivates them and this will be useful for you as the writer to know.

Goodreads Author Blog – Favourite Character Types

Stories are all about the characters for me. I like a good plot but if the characters don’t do anything for me, I won’t read on. I need to understand where the characters are coming from, even if I disagree with them. But if they don’t make me feel something, for me there is no point to the story.

Going on from that led me to think about favourite character types. I have some and these are:-

1. The underdog fighting back against the odds. Ranges from Cinderella to action heroes, this type!

2. Righters of wrongs. It’s why I am fond of crime novels. Favourite Poirot for me is Murder on the Orient Express. Favourite Marple for me is Nemesis. There is no question with either of these two that the murderer will get away with it. I like this a lot. I would also argue Elizabeth Bennet counts in this category when she puts down Lady Catherine de Bourgh!

3. The surprise character. This is where someone shows unexpected qualities or without whom the lead character could not succeed in their task. Sam Gamgee from The Lord of the Rings is a great example of this given he shows unexpected courage.

4. The rough diamond character. Sam Vimes from the Discworld series is a prime example of this kind. Despite being a Duke, he’s never going to speak politely, he will fight crime and win. He is the type you want on your side in a fight! Sam Vimes is a cross between a righter of wrong and a rough diamond. Many characters can be more than one type.

Whatever the character type though, I do know I have to be gripped by them and I have to understand them for that to be able to happen.

WRITERS NARRATIVE SUBSCRIBER LINK

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AMAZON AUTHOR CENTRAL – ALLISON SYMES

Do you use locations in your stories? What details do you share so readers picture your setting? I sometimes hint at a location – for example, I refer to a village green and then reveal a spacecraft landed on it. Easy to conjure up an image of that. pic.twitter.com/lpeh2nzJvK
— ACW (@ACW1971) October 21, 2023

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liked Allison Symes's blog post: Favourite Character Types https://t.co/16I4b38BHx via @goodreads I look at favourite characters types including the underdog, the surprise character, the righter of wrongs, and the rough diamond for Goodreads. Do you have a favourite type? pic.twitter.com/WyHfjwUawl
— Allison Symes (@AllisonSymes1) October 21, 2023

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One reason I outline is so I can work out what I need to know myself and from that what I need to share with readers. The two never marry up. I always need to know what drives my characters. What they look like is well down on my need to know list. pic.twitter.com/avGdzi3bk9
— ACW (@ACW1971) October 22, 2023

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Sometimes I use standard settings – for example, one of my characters is setting out tea things (so must be at home). I then show what items they’re sharing. This gives a good indication of character age/social status. I love telling details. They show so much about character. pic.twitter.com/nPq5hJO5dn
— ACW (@ACW1971) October 23, 2023

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It’s Monday. It’s getting darker earlier in the evenings and the UK hasn’t put the clocks back yet. Weather can’t decide whether to be cold or mild. It’s still Monday. Time for a story then. My latest on YouTube is Away on Cloud Nine. Hope you enjoy it.https://t.co/VgmqKTfftc
— Allison Symes (@AllisonSymes1) October 23, 2023

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Characters Who Surprise and Unexpected Reviews

July 11, 2023Leave a comment

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.

Fabulous weekend with the flash fiction workshop on the Friday and the Book Fair on the Saturday. More about the latter to come in my CFT post this week. Hope you have had a good weekend too. Lady has been busy catching up with her girlfriends so she has had a nice time too.

Facebook – General

Changeable weather today – managed to avoid the rain. I got wet instead thanks to a swim! Much more fun.

Reading wise, I’m now back on the non-fiction after reading a hugely enjoyable crime novel. (And there were good examples of both kinds of book at last weekend’s Book Fair too).

Writing Tip: Never expect perfection from a first draft. It’s not what the first draft is for. I is just where you get the story down. Then you can work on improving it. It will need improving. All stories do. But unless you get that draft down, you won’t see where to improve it. And take comfort from the thought that every fiction author is in the same position here!

Hope you have had a good day. Lady got to see her two favourite girlfriends today – good time had by all. Busy day after a lovely weekend but then Mondays are always like that.

Can you remember the first character (or an early one) that took you by surprise? Mine was The Little Mermaid from Hans Christen Andersen. (Definitely not the Disney version!). Why? It was news to me that fairytales did not always have a happy ending. Okay, be fair, I was a kid at the time but that was a useful lesson, even if you don’t realise it is one at the time.

Another story which captivated me early on was The Snow Queen. The girl is the hero in this one! I loved that (and still do). Bearing in mind I grew up a long time ago and that kind of thing was a novelty, trust me. (It’s why I always have had a soft spot for Lady Penelope from Thunderbirds as well).

To this day, I have an even softer spot for the feisty female lead in a story who knows her own mind and acts on it, whether she gets it right or not.

Met a fellow dog walker in the Recreation Ground today. No surprises there but she bought From Light to Dark and Back Again from me at the Book Fair yesterday. She came over and said, with a big grin on her face, she’d read the book this morning and she felt I had a “wicked sense of humour”! As I replied, that is a review! (Oh and guilty as charged here by the way. Not at all sorry!).

Looking forward to sharing a write up of how things went at the inaugural Book Fair here for Chandler’s Ford Today on Friday. Will be an especial pleasure to share that one!

Oh and a huge thanks for the great comments coming in on Flaky, my latest tale on Friday Flash Fiction. Much appreciated. If you didn’t get chance to spot this one, do check out the link (and check out the other stories too. You’ll be in for a good read).

screenshot-2023-07-07-at-10-01-25-flaky-by-allison-symes

Had a fantastic time at the book fair at The Hilt today. It was lovely to meet fellow authors, some I knew, others I didn’t, but we all got chatting to each other and to the many people who came. I’ll be writing more about this for my Chandler’s Ford Today post next Friday but it was a great event and I hope this does become a regular thing. Many thanks to the organisers, to those who kept the writers well supplied with tea and coffee etc., and to all who supported the event.

It was nice to finish my day with a meal out with family. Much appreciated. I never mind not having to cook!

Writing Tip: Never worry about your first draft being rubbish, They are kind of meant to be. It’s the editing which will polish the work and make it better. Do see the writing and the editing as two separate creative tasks. They each have their challenges and I find if far easier to keep the two tasks separate. I need to know what my story is and what really matters before I can do any editing work on it. (Oh and this ties up with the writing tip given above but I can’t stress this point enough. Write first, edit later. It really does pay.).

Facebook – From Light to Dark and Back Again

Many thanks for the lovely comments in on my post yesterday regarding Counting which is my latest tale on YouTube. Much appreciated. These videos are great fun to do and are another way of highlighting what flash fiction can be. Who says marketing can’t be fun?

Was at an interesting Zoom talk last night and it flagged up another source of research. For me, non-fiction has often sparked ideas for stories.

Why? Because you often come across intriguing characters and events in non-fiction. You can ask yourself what would your character do if they faced something similar. If in real life a personage did Action X, you could explore alternative history stories here by getting your character to do Y instead and work out what the consequences would be.

It’s Monday. The weather’s changeable. It’s still Monday. It’s time for a new story from me on YouTube. Counting is a result of a random number generator prompt where I generated three numbers in sequence. Thought I’d put them all into a tale and mix them up, apt for this story especially.

So nice to see authors I knew and those I met for the first time yesterday. Plenty of networking went on at the Book Fair (which is how it should be too).

One aspect to flash which might be overlooked is, if you’re not sure where to start with writing, the short form is a great place to begin.

Why? Well, for one thing, you’re not overwhelmed by the thought of having to come up with 80,000 to 1000,000 words for a novel. Also, with work, practice, and persistence, you can get stories submitted and hopefully build up publication credits which you could then list in a query letter to a publisher/agent when you are ready to submit a longer piece of work somewhere.

I mentioned a few times yesterday that writing flash has helped with my other forms of writing. You don’t just tighten up your editing in one form only here! The skills you learn writing the short form come in useful for the longer works too! Win-win.

It was a fantastic opportunity to spread the word about flash fiction at the book fair at The Hilt today. I was pleased to meet others who write flash too. Also great to see many authors who write a wide range of books here. More about this in my Chandler’s Ford Today post on Friday. So good doing live events like this though.

Glad to say the flash fiction workshop went well yesterday and it was lovely meeting everyone in the writing group online. It has been a lovely end to the week.

Goodreads Author Blog – Book Fairs and Events

I was at a Book Fair local to me recently and it was great fun. As well as celebrating books, it was fantastic to meet other authors and readers. There was a good range of books on offer too covering a wide range of tastes which is exactly what you want from an event like this. (The organisers also kept the writers well supplied with tea and coffee, which was also appreciated!).

Going to events like this is a fabulous way of supporting authors you know, as well as discovering writers new to you. It’s a way of bringing books to you, especially if your nearest bookshop is some distance away.

I hope the organisers of this event do it again. It would be lovely if it became a regular event.
If you get the chance to go to such things near you, do go. You may well be surprised at the range of books on offer. Every book event I’ve been to has been seriously impressive here.

Screenshot 2023-07-08 at 21-10-03 Book Fairs and Events

Screenshot 2023-06-13 at 17-05-35 BOOK FAIR - FREE ENTRY Facebook

AMAZON AUTHOR CENTRAL – ALLISON SYMES

From Light to Dark and Back Again - by night

liked Allison Symes's blog post: Book Fairs and Events https://t.co/Tvg99htkc4 via @goodreads I celebrate book fairs and other events of that ilk for this week's Goodreads post. pic.twitter.com/EILBRfvtHr
— Allison Symes (@AllisonSymes1) July 8, 2023

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It’s Monday. The weather’s changeable. It’s still Monday. It’s time for a new story on YouTube. Counting is a result of a random number generator prompt where I generated three numbers. Thought I’d put them all into a tale and mix them up, apt for this.https://t.co/SyJkw9HOnW
— Allison Symes (@AllisonSymes1) July 10, 2023

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Writing Pitfalls

January 13, 2023Leave a comment

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 week. Lady and I spent most of the week failing to duck the rain clouds but she did get to play with several of her friends. Am looking forward to running a workshop soon. Will be good to be out and about, writing wise, again.

Facebook – General and Chandler’s Ford Today

Glad to share my latest Chandler’s Ford Today post. This week I talk about Writing Pitfalls. I talk about rejections and con artists, writing, editing and stamina (all three things are crucial for writers), support networks, and competitions and trying again, amongst other items here. Hope you find the post useful.

Writing Pitfalls

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Questions make a great way into a story. For example, there is a great cartoon doing the rounds on Facebook at the moment where the punchline is a question – why are you here?

Now your story could be about a character who answers that question for themselves or for someone close to them. It could be an excellent title. I would want to know who the “you” is here and why this question would be asked of them in the first place. It could be a story about a character reacting badly to that question.

Maybe it is something which has haunted them and they decide to find their own place in the world to prove if only to themselves they have every right to be where they are. I hope to write something up on this question in due course myself but it’s a great open question to play with here, I think.

Lady had an excellent day today. Got to play with all of her girlfriends – it was a fab “puppy party”. We managed to avoid most of the wet weather today as well so consider that a win. Looking forward to sharing Writing Pitfalls, my Chandler’s Ford Today post this week. Link up on Friday. See above.

Also looking forward to seeing the Chameleon Theatre Group put on their new show – Pinocchio – later this month. Oh yes I am! (Can’t help but wonder what topical gags will end up in that though – will find out in due course!).

Writing Tip: Every so often look up some of your earlier writing pieces. I do this and I can see why I wrote the pieces in the way I did at the time. I can also see what I would do now to “tighten” those pieces up further. This is a good thing. It brings home how much you’ve learned over the intervening time and I find this encourages me to keep on going and to keep on learning.

Facebook – From Light to Dark and Back Again

It’s lovely to be back on Friday Flash Fiction. This time I share an acrostic story, Friends. Hope you enjoy it. (I find acrostics work best for shortish words).

I’ll be looking at Writing Pitfalls for Chandler’s Ford Today this week (an overview). Link up tomorrow. See further up.

Pitfalls about writing flash fiction? Well, one is when you swear you’ve got the perfect 100 word story for a competition and find your tale really does need to be at 300 words!

If you find your story would lose something (characterisation, a good telling detail etc) if you were to cut your story back further, then leave it as it is and write another 100 word story instead. Part of the art of flash fiction is in knowing when to leave well alone and in knowing what must be in your tale. When you’ve got to that point, your story is done. You worry about the word count later.

When I run flash workshops, I will often read a couple of my stories out and then break down how I wrote them. I’ve come across this technique in various author interviews I’ve read/listened to and always find it helpful. Having an outline (even if sometimes it is just a line or two) helps me to remember why I’m writing the story in the way I am and I find that useful too. It is too easy to go off at a tangent – have done this and where you’ve got a strict word count, you do have to focus.

Outlining makes me do that but it also gives me enough of a break down of my tale to be able to share when I want to share writing advice. And with flash stories, this can be done quickly. At events, I’m often asked what flash is and reading some out is a perfect demonstration. I often read stories out at home to ensure dialogue flows as well as I think it does etc. This is all useful “stuff”.

Fairytales With Bite – Openings

How can you make use of openings in your magical settings? Well other than the famous starting line Once upon a time… there are other ways of doing this.

Think about openings for the beings who populate your world. As well as training schools for magical beings, what job opportunities await them? How do they work their way up the ladder? If your world keeps itself to itself, can openings be found to initiate dialogue with neighbouring worlds? Who would see the usefulness of being able to do this and “break the mould”?

If your setting covers up part of its history, what would persuade it that it would be better to “open up” and face the fact no world is perfect? Also have changes come into your setting since that history and are these positive or negative?

Even where characters and/or the setting itself is prepared to open up, there will be those who oppose that. Who are these people, what can they do to prevent such opening up happening, and how are they dealt with by those who see the necessity to be more open?

Opening can represent changes and not everyone welcomes those, sometimes for good reasons, other times definitely not. So how could you make use of the theme of opening in your stories? There are ideas to be explored here.

This World and Others – Networking

When I was starting out as a writer, the thought of networking used to terrify me. It was only when I realised all it meant was talking about something I love (writing and books) with others who appreciated talking about such things I realised it wasn’t something to be worried about. Also when I realised writers have the perfect way into starting conversation (”what do you write?”), I lost my fear. I knew I had something to ask the person opposite me and it would get a chat going. And so it has proved!

How would networking occur in your fictional setting? Is it encouraged or not? Are there rules so you can only mix with certain groups? What kind of technology is available and how is that used for networking? Is networking only saved for, say, the creative arts sector?

What kind of colloborations occur as a result of networking? How does networking benefit your individual characters? Also think in terms of personal development as well s financial benefit here. Could a shy person, for example become less shy thanks to the right kind of networking for them?

Does your world network with neighbouring ones and how well does that work or otherwise? Does your setting have the equivalent of an “entente cordiale”?

Friends, by Allison Symes – Friday Flash Fiction https://t.co/tetbHiyOiV It’s lovely to be back on Friday Flash Fiction. This time I share an acrostic story, Friends. Hope you enjoy it. (I find acrostics work best for shortish words). pic.twitter.com/swJrAbRECd
— Allison Symes (@AllisonSymes1) January 13, 2023

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Writing Pitfalls https://t.co/BqBTrjW5Ha Glad to share my new CFT post – Writing Pitfalls. I talk about rejections and con artists, writing, editing and stamina (all three are crucial for writers), support networks, and competitions and trying again. Hope you find it useful.
— Allison Symes (@AllisonSymes1) January 13, 2023

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Swanwick Part 1

August 16, 20222 Comments

Image Credits-:

All images from Pixabay/Pexels unless otherwise stated. Many created in Book Brush using Pixabay images. Book cover images from Chapeltown Books and Bridge House Publishing. Photos of the Swanwick Writers’ Summer School and Val Penny were taken by me, Allison Symes. A huge thank you to Jennifer C Wilson for taking the photo of me at my Lift Up Your Pens session at Swanwick. Having a ball at Swanwick as usual. Hope to write a more detailed post for Chandler’s Ford Today in due course but meantime please see these as the edited highlights!

Facebook – General – Swanwick Week Part 1

It was easy to choose which course I was going to today – it was the one I led! I talked about Editing – Both Side of the Fence. Many thanks, everyone, for the support. Much appreciated.

I was torn about which workshop to go to after that – there were two specifically I wanted to do but in the end I went to Hit Submit! This was led by Ingrid Jendrzejewksi and was great fun. Managed to draft a story and jot down other ideas to work up later. (I managed to do this in the Lift Up Your Pens session I led on Sunday. I deliberately did not do the exercises I set until on the day itself. I love live writing like that).

Tuesday is a quieter day at Swanwick. You generally need it too so I walked around the lovely grounds and then came back to work on two of my long term projects before the evening dinner and speaker.

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The lakes are lovely and there are plenty of seats to take time out to reflect

I led the Lift Up Your Hearts session today. This is a short devotional time just before breakfast and I talked about favourite words of mine from the Bible. I also had a hymn to share one of my favourite lines. I love these quieter times ahead of a full day of workshops and courses. I know they do me good mentally, spiritually and physically.

I also try to take time out to walk around the grounds here at Swanwick. The exercise is helpful (they do look after you very well indeed here!) and the grounds are lovely.

As well as continuing with my specialist course, I also went to Promoting Your Work by Val Penny (who I will have the pleasure of interviewing again for this week’s Chandler’s Ford Today post).

Promoting is something all writers need to know more about – there is always plenty to learn here (and things you need to be reminded to do!).

Chandler's Ford Today post reminder picture(1)

I ran the pre-breakfast Lift Up Your Pens today. These sessions are to get the creative wheels turning and I used ideas from random generators for my session here. People seemed to enjoy it and I hope they go on to write up their stories and get them out into the big bad world somewhere.

For my specialist course which is run over a few days, I’ve opted for the Creative Non-Fiction one led by Simon Whaley. For the two part short course today, I’ve opted for the How to Write a How-To Book run by Bettina von Cossel. Both were fabulous and I learned a great deal from them.

Finally for today, I went to Social Media for Writers, the excellent one hour workshop run by Jennifer C Wilson. All good useful stuff and it pays writers to think about their social media options. Which are you going to focus on and why? I must admit I find the support from other writers on social media invaluable.

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It is so good to be back at the Swanwick Writers’ Summer School at The Hayes in Derbyshire once again. A huge thank you and shout to to the lovely #JuneWebber and her equally lovely husband,Mike, for being my chauffeurs today as I had to cancel my train tickets due to the strike.

I missed the train journey, as I do love travelling by train, but am just relieved to be here. And it was wonderful having a good chat on the way up! I can’t do that on the train! An equally big shout out to my lovely other half, Adrian, for being my chauffeur on Friday.

And what is there not to like when you arrive, go and unpack, drop off your books in the Book Room and then enjoy afternoon tea? That ticks a lot of writing boxes right there!

A fairly new addition to the Swanwick programme is what they call Birds of a Feather where writers in a genre can get together and chat. I can cover flash fiction, short stories, and blogging as my initial bases. So I will probably head off to that after the evening speaker. The lovely thing with Swanwick is you are made so welcome and you join in as and when you want to do so.

Facebook – From Light to Dark and Back Again

Hope you have had a good Tuesday. Beginning to cool a bit here at Swanwick. Nobody is sorry about that! Happily spreading the word about flash fiction where I can. Lovely to catch up with Linda Payne, a fellow Bridge House Publishing/CafeLit author here.

I’ve mentioned before I sometimes write the ending first. This works well for twist tales and funny ones. Occasionally I have ideas for what would make a great middle section of a tale. So I write them down. I don’t worry about necessarily writing in order. I can sort that out when editing.

Just get those ideas down – the nice thing with this thought is it applies to a 100 word tale every bit as much as a 100,000 word novel!

There is no such thing as the perfect first line. This is good news funnily enough. It means every writer has to work on their stories and it takes time to come out with the lines you want your readers to enjoy. This is another reason why I think it is better to write your story first, then worry about editing. I see these as two separate and different creative tasks.

I get my first line down and then look at ways to strengthen it later. Often ideas for this will come as I finish the rest of the draft (or a bit annoyingly if I am working on something else) bit I just keep a note of these and come back to them later. Taking the pressure off myself helps a lot here.

Telling details matter in any story but they take on a greater significance for flash fiction writers simply due to the lower word count we have to work with. So it pays to take time out to work out what the reader needs to know and what telling detail can stress that point.

In such a tight word count you are likely to be able to have one or two telling details but make them count! I always say about going for impact but sometimes that impact doesn’t have to be a dramatic one. A character changing their mind about what direction they go in because the name of a street has resonance for them can be a minor telling detail or it can change the whole course of the story – entirely up to you but there is a lot of fun to be had here!

Lovely to see From Light to Dark and Back Again and Tripping the Flash Fantastic back in the Book Room at the Swanwick Writers’ Summer School. Always a pleasure to wave the flag for flash fiction (writing and reading it) at events.

One of the joys of flash for me is having to invent characters all the time. Characters drive a story, I think, regardless of its length, and it is always characters who interest me the most in any story. Who are they? What do they want? Who is trying to stop them getting that and what are their motivations for doing this?

Practicing inventing characters will stand you in good stead whatever your preferred form of fiction writing is as it will show you that you can do this repeatedly (always a good defence against the dreaded Imposter Syndrome which strikes most writers at some point and often repeatedly).

Goodreads Author Blog – Writers and Books

When this post goes live I’ll be at the Swanwick Writers’ Summer School once again for a glorious week in the company of fellow writers and where we celebrate all things relating to writing. Books a plenty are in the Book Room and I am sure I’ll go home with additions to be To Be Read pile. (No writer worth their salt ever has a Be Be Read list. It has to be a pile – a huge one too! Don’t even ask about the electronic version of that pile!).

What draws writers into writing at all? Simply It is their own love of books and wanting to produce their own. We’re inspired by those authors we’ve read over the years and ideas will kick start from what we have enjoyed reading. Books and writers are inseparable then. The two things most writes are advised to do is to write regularly and to read widely and well. All of that is a complete joy to do.

What every writer I know would appreciate (and this goes for me too) are reviews of our books on sites like Goodreads. It helps more than you know. It is useful affirmation of our ability to write (ignoring the one star reviewers who are clearly just trying to knock the author down rather than give constructive criticism which might be useful).

For stories to be produced for entertainment there has to be the writers producing them. I can’t imagine a life without books. Neither do I wish to!

liked Allison Symes's blog post: Writers and Books https://t.co/VGI8XZ4K43 via @goodreads I chat about writers and books, the importance of reviews, and what draws writers into writing at all. Hope you enjoy. pic.twitter.com/BnqPDIleRB
— Allison Symes (@AllisonSymes1) August 13, 2022

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Good Writing Topics

October 22, 2021Leave a comment

Image Credit:-

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

Screenshots taken by me, Allison Symes. Book cover images from Chapeltown Books and Bridge House Publishing. A huge thank you to Fiona Park for taking the picture of me book signing at Swanwick.

Has been a busy few days but am pleased to share a new story (Friday Flash Fiction) which was inspired by my using a random time generator. Yes, there is such a thing. Now if I could only use it to help me be in two places at once when I could do with that facility!

Facebook – General – and Chandler’s Ford Today

Pleased to share Good Writing Topics, my latest post for Chandler’s Ford Today. I look at what makes for a good topic and apply this to fiction and non-fiction writing. I also suggest a few ways of picking good topics (so hopefully these ideas will give you a useful place to start). And I discuss some pointers for research too.

I mix up the way I approach my fiction writing because that keeps me on my toes, encourages me to think laterally and outside of the old box, and I do the same for non-fiction. Yes, there are certain tried and tested methods which are my favourites and which I use the most, but I make myself go another way every now and again precisely to trigger ideas and thoughts which would not occur if I stuck to my favourites all the time.

Good Writing Topics

A good writing topic is open enough for you to ask questions about it

Random question generators are useful for triggering ideas for topics

Use themes you love and see what YOU can do with them

Glad to say my story Clockwork is now up on Friday Flash Fiction. This one was inspired by a random time generator I found online. Hope you enjoy it.

Screenshot 2021-10-22 at 18-41-38 Clockwork, by Allison Symes

Brrr… it turned cold today. Not that Lady noticed as she had a “puppy party” with several of her pals over the park today. All went home tired and happy. Job done there then!

I was chatting about random generators as part of the ACW Flash Fiction Group meeting on Zoom last night. I use these a lot as they are excellent ways to trigger ideas for stories. The story I’ve submitted for #FridayFlashFiction was inspired by a time generator. Yes, there is such a thing. Yes, I too can “manipulate time” although only for the purposes of a story!

You set parameters (I used 9 am and 5 pm) and how many times you want to trigger between them. I went for five and yes my story made use of them all. Hope to share the link to it once it is, hopefully, up on the FFF site. Good fun to write and a great way to make use of time in your stories too. Link to story, aptly called Clockwork, shared below.

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Managed to get my flu jab today so well pleased with that. Lady wanted to come with me (well, after all I have to take her to the vet for her booster jabs!). Looking forward to the ACW Flash Fiction Group meeting this evening. Always good fun.

My topic for Chandler’s Ford Today this week is Good Writing Topics. I’ll be sharing some thoughts on what makes a good topic and developing ideas from them. Link up on Friday. See above. Ironically the topic itself is a good one as many threads can come from it (for example you could focus purely on fiction for this one or use it for non-fiction articles etc. Equally take a category you’re interested in such as history or fashion and think about how you could get stories or articles from that.

Prompts can trigger ideas you might not have thought of otherwise

Nobody writes a perfect first draft but that is okay

Facebook – From Light to Dark and Back Again

I was walking the dog with my better half earlier this afternoon when we overheard a wildlife squabble. You can’t mistake the noise. One of the parties was a jay, we didn’t get to see what the other annoyed creature was. All I could think of on hearing the racket was, if they were speaking in human languages, both of them would have been swearing profusely and calling the other all the names under the sun. There was just something about the tone of the noise which told me the bird language being used here was anything but polite!

So what has that to do with flash fiction? Simple.

You don’t need a lot of words to convey tone (and imply character attitude).

A few well chosen words will have depth to them. Telling someone where to go is vastly different between characters who are arguing and one character helpfully giving directions to another one because they’ve got lost!

So if you have two characters in an argument, think about what the reader needs to know. They won’t need to know all the ins and outs of how the argument started. You won’t have the room for that but you can drop hints in what the characters do say to each other and let your reader pick up the rest from context. And they will.

I love it when authors leave me enough that I can work something out for myself. It is a question of leaving the right clues so a reader can do that. I dislike it intensely when an author feels they have to spoon feed a reader and I am likely to stop reading.

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Hope you’ve had a good day. When I name a character it is for specific reasons.

I want the name to indicate likely age. I do this in my story Identity from Tripping the Flash Fantastic with my character, Walter. Highly unlikely to be a young person’s name.

I want the name to indicate class/likely social economic background. This can save a lot on the word count! But someone called Charles is likely to move in upper circles unlike someone who goes around known as Chas. I’ve used this for a conman story where my character takes advantage of having a posh sounding name to fleece the unwary.

I often write about characters caught up in unexpected magical events so their having ordinary names helps emphasize the unusual circumstances in which they find themselves.

Also because I do write flash pieces set on other worlds, I can use my character names to immediately flag up this being is not from our planet.

And you can use not just character names, but the names of things like the shops they go to as ways of indicating their background.

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Am off to the online Association of Christian Writers Flash Fiction group meeting tonight. Interesting chat, exercises to have a go at, markets to hear about – what’s not to like there?! Networking for writers can take many forms and Zoom has helped enormously here.

Best bit of all? You will find out info useful to you. You may well be able to give useful info out to others. Nobody knows it all and sharing knowledge and tips is the best way to develop as a writer. Networking can also help you avoid the scammers out there. And I’m all for that!

Fairytales with Bite – Charms and Spell

C = Character casting a charm but will be it be for good or ill?
H = Have a wish or three but respect the giver.
A = Always respect the wish granters or
R = Risk humiliation at best and probably worse.
M = Magical people don’t always look like they are.
S = Showing humility in a magical world is always a good idea.

A = Arrogance tends to be punished here.
N = Not unknown for animal transformations to be the result.
D = Do you really fancy that? Hmm… choice made. Your life is changing.

S = Spending your life as a wild beast is not fun.
P = Praying your one true love will turn up but now knowing if they will.
E = Eternity – you know a thing or two about what that feels like.
L = Living an animal life is far removed from what you’ve known
L = Love cannot come quickly enough to rescue you.

This World and Others – Interactions

How do your characters interact with each other? Is technology, as we know it, available in your created world or is it far in advance of what we know? If your characters can use telepathy, are there any rules on how they can use it? If not, what would happen if someone “pushes the bounds” of what is acceptable in your world? Not everyone is going to want their thoughts read and could react badly (or will find ways to disguise what they are really thinking and that may well frustrate the potential eavesdropper here so how would they react to that?).

How does your world interact with other planets near it? How do the countries in your world react with one another? What political systems exist in your created world? Does politics get in the way of more positive interactions between individual characters and/or countries?

Interactions are not single things. One interaction will trigger another. Someone has to respond to it but it will be how and why they respond as they do that will keep the reader’s interests. How can you ratchet the tensions up here? Conflicts have to be realistically based.

Readers need to be able to see why Character A wants what they do and why Character B is determined to prevent Character A getting what they want. Also think about what the trigger for the initial interaction will be – the classic one is someone wanting something desperately enough to do anything to get it. How could you use that? What could you bring to the mix to make it unique? What if other characters don’t understand your Character A’s desperate need for whatever the object or objective is and actively get in the way as they think it will be in Character A’s best interests not to get it?

Plenty going on with Twitter this time as I was on Twitter duty for the Association of Christian Writers over the past few days. I share useful writing tips on these so thought I would share again here.

What do your characters make of the fading light of autumn and darkness of winter? Do they fear them or welcome them? How could that impact on their actions? Do they overcome fears or need others to help them overcome those things? pic.twitter.com/vQAjUFKrg9
— ACW (@ACW1971) October 20, 2021

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People have different fears and triggers. So should our characters. So making your character face up to something they fear is a great way to increase drama in your story. Of course they can face up and overcome or run away. What they choose will show readers so much about them. pic.twitter.com/0Vu0E9RVcO
— ACW (@ACW1971) October 21, 2021

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Characters can bury their fears too, as indeed can we. What would it take for these fears to re-surface? Do your characters know what these would be and take steps to avoid any chance of this happening? Would this make them look odd to others? If so, how would they handle that? pic.twitter.com/LBNxHQHCtZ
— ACW (@ACW1971) October 22, 2021

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Clockwork, by Allison Symes – Friday Flash Fiction https://t.co/UhY3fZO0Ad My latest tale on FFF was inspired by a random time generator. Yes, there is such a thing! Hope you enjoy this one. pic.twitter.com/beoMY04qCy
— Allison Symes (@AllisonSymes1) October 22, 2021

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Good Writing Topics https://t.co/ur2jSpJYRH My latest CFT post looks at what makes a good writing topic and shares ideas on how to use these for fiction and non-fiction. I also share some thoughts on how to find good writing topics. Hope you find this useful. pic.twitter.com/DY2yqCx8oV
— Allison Symes (@AllisonSymes1) October 22, 2021

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Swanwick 2021

August 27, 20211 Comment

Image Credit:-

All images from Pixabay/Pexels unless otherwise stated.

Some images created in Book Brush using Pixabay photos.

Book cover images from Chapeltown Books and Bridge House Publishing.

Many thanks to Fiona Park for the picture of me signing Tripping the Flash Fantastic at Swanwick Writers’ Summer School – August 2021. Screenshots taken by me, Allison Symes.

It has been a busy week with Creativity Matters: Finding Your Passion for Writing coming out on pre-order in paperback and ebook. (Out on 1st September 2021 so not long to wait). Book cover image from Wendy H. Jones.

It has been a joy to look back at Swanwick though and I hope my CFT post shares something of why it is special for writers.

Facebook – General

27th August
It’s that time of the week again – time to share my latest Chandler’s Ford Today post. This week, I look back at Swanwick 2021. All of my CFT posts are a joy to write but some stand out as being really special and this one does as it brought back many happy memories of a wonderful week at Swanwick this year, and from previous ones I’d attended.

I look at a little of what the Swanwick Writers’ Summer School has to offer writers (and it can only be a little as otherwise the post would be far too long!). Can’t wait for the booking slot to be open again for Swanwick 2022!

And it was fabulous meeting up with another Bridge House Publishing/CafeLit/Chapeltown Books author for a good chat. #LindaWPayne, I hope to get to see you again at the next Bridge House event!

Swanwick 2021

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Hope you have had a good day. Just sent off some blurb and an author headshot for an event I will be taking part in later on in the year. Loved the Association of Christian Writers’ Flash Fiction Group meeting last night. Great fun – I have a story to work on as a result which is good. Nice talk about markets as well, always useful that.

Meetings like this are wonderful places to exchange information. You never know when something someone says then suddenly is of direct relevance to you. That’s happened to me a lot.

I was told about Chandler’s Ford Today – and now write for it.

I was told CafeLit were issuing a 100-word challenge (and look what has led to – two published flash fiction collections).

I was told about Mom’s Favorite Reads – and now write for it. So if you ever wondered if there was any point to networking with other authors, there’s your answer – yes, there is!

And it is great fun. The support and encouragement along the way is appreciated too – it especially helps with things are not going so well. We all get writing ebbs and flows.

Screenshot_2021-06-01 Mom’s Favorite Reads eMagazine June 2021

Networking will be online for the foreseeable future though good things have come from it

Screenshot_2021-06-01 Mom’s Favorite Reads eMagazine June 2021(1)

Learning so much in a year - how to present, how to use apps like Zoom etc and meeting up with other writers this way

Zoom has helped bridge the gap but can't beat actually being with friends and family

PART 2 - Networking with other writers brings on your social skills a lot

I hope what comes next will be some more examples of word play

Nice to see some sunshine today and Lady was besides herself with glee. She got to play with her best friend, the Rhodesian Ridgeback today, and her other best pal, a Hungarian Vizler. All three dogs went home tired and very happy.

Looking forward to sharing my Chandler’s Ford Today post on Friday. I look back at my week at the Swanwick Writers’ Summer School. What has going to that done for me? Well… (takes big intake of breath)…:-

1. Made lots of writing friends.
2. Had so much encouragement.
3. Learned so much from the courses and workshops.
4. Taken part in things I had not done prior to Swanwick, most notably the Open Prose Mic Night. Great fun.
5. Sold my books.
6. Bought even more books! It is one of my great joys to walk past my book shelf and see books by friends, signed by them naturally, on there.
7. Have a week just focused on writing and nothing else. Bliss!
8. Come out of my shell just a bit! Chatting with other authors helps you share what you do and they share with you about their work. You learn to speak about what you do much more naturally. I was a bundle of nerves when I first started doing this kind of thing.

Can’t wait for Swanwick 2022!

Facebook – From Light to Dark and Back Again

My latest drabble (aka 100-worder) on #FridayFlashFiction is called The Turn Around and I look at how my characters David and Mary spend their tenth wedding anniversary. Does it turn out as either expect? Hope you enjoy reading the story to find out (and a huge thanks for the great comments in on this already. The feedback from this website is encouraging and useful.).

Repetition can work in flash fiction, funnily enough. You might think it would be the first thing to avoid given the limited word count flash has. But it has been useful, not all the time, but for when I want to produce particular effects.

I’ve sometimes used repetition in titles (Enough is Enough is one example from Tripping The Flash Fantastic).

But what works better, especially if I am writing a “circle” story is have the last line mirror the first line but with a slight tweak to the words so they’re not exactly the same but 90% of the words, say, do match.

Another thing I’ve sometimes done is to start a couple of sentences with the same starting phrase. In my Good to Go, I have two consecutive paragraphs start with “He looked at”.

My The Wish List has all but one line start with the words “I wish”. You can get a rhythm in the prose using this kind of repetition. It can be so effective for emphasis.

It’s not the kind of thing I want to do all the time (I don’t want it to look gimmicky) but repetition, every now and again, can be distinctive and help create the impact you want your story to have on the reader.

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I’m going to be talking about the Swanwick Writers’ Summer School for my Chandler’s Ford Today post this week (link up on Friday). What has been so encouraging has been to see the development of flash fiction as a format over the many years I’ve been going to writing events. When I first started doing this, flash was not “on the radar” so to speak.

Now it is a recognizable form, with all sorts of competitions and markets catering for it. And the bigger established competitions such as The Bridport Prize have added it to their categories. I am sure the switch to more people reading on screens has helped fuel the growth in flash fiction as it is so easy to read on screen.

I would like to say onwards and upwards for flash fiction but it really should be onwards and watch the word count limit!

Allison Symes - Contribution to Creativity Matters

Creative Rewriting - via Pixabay under License CC0 Public Domain FAQ725811_640

Transformations. I have three stories in here. Image by BHP.

Fairytales with Bite – Writing from an Alternative Character’s Viewpoint

Writing from an alternative character’s viewpoint is great fun and it was how I found my way into print back in 2009. My story, A Helping Hand, was published in Alternative Renditions (Bridge House Publishing).

The idea was to take an alternative character from a fairytale and write their story up. I chose the youngest stepsister to Cinderella to write about. Great fun to do. I could make that character narky about Cinder’s success and so on. (And if you would like to check the book out you can do so here.

This kind of thing is a great writing exercise. It makes you think about the “bit part” players and explore their personalities. What stories do they have if they were allowed to take the starring role for once? Is there resentment against the well known one’s success or do they hope that some of that “luck” will rub off on them? Do they do anything to try to earn that “luck”?

Do they have success that surpasses the well known character’s new life? Are they reliant on magical help or do they make their own success? Could the well known character end up envying them? All great ideas to explore.

This World and Others – Where Magic Is Normal, What Isn’t?

It’s a fair question I think. So your created world has magic as a normal thing. What else is normal that wouldn’t be considered normal here? Is there a price to be paid for magical usage (such as it draining the user so they have to be careful how they use it and ensure they don’t waste their own energy)?

What would your magical creations consider unusual about life here on Earth? They would see the absence of magic as abnormal but what would they make of science, for example? What would they make of technology and medical developments? Would they see them as almost magical?

I’ve mentioned before it is important to set parameters for magic. If everyone can use it, where is the story? Where is the conflict? But have certain species only able to do this kind of magic, others able to do everything, and you can set the scene for clashes (and interesting stories). If your magical world wants to spread its magic to other places, how will it deal with another setting which is resolutely opposed to it but can fight back using non-magical weapons?

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Exciting News: Creativity Matters. Big news is the release (1st September) of Creativity Matters: Find Your Passion for Writing. Am excited to be in this AND it hit the No.1 Hot New Releases Amazon spot! I share a new video and look ahead to my CFT post. https://t.co/sF32UVKCYL
— Allison Symes (@AllisonSymes1) August 24, 2021

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Can you recall when you wrote seriously for publication? I’d been writing stories for a while before sending work out there. I guess I wanted to prove to myself I could write stories and keep on doing so before putting my head above the parapet. I do know persistence pays off. pic.twitter.com/9FrWNwD6iT
— ACW (@ACW1971) August 25, 2021

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One advantage of writing for a while before submitting was I built up a stock of stories. That stood me in good stead. I was writing more too. Whenever rejections came in, I'd put those stories aside and look at them later to work out what was wrong. I usually did spot something! pic.twitter.com/7gwuDOPYa0
— ACW (@ACW1971) August 26, 2021

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I learned, over time, to tailor my stories better for the markets I was approaching. That led to my first acceptances, which encouraged me further and I haven’t looked back since. But I do know I needed the rejections (and there were loads!) and the lessons I learned from those. pic.twitter.com/FU7DeNoU15
— ACW (@ACW1971) August 27, 2021

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The Turn Around by Allison Symes – Friday Flash Fiction https://t.co/BnZIqiBKYq See how David and Mary celebrate their 10th wedding anniversary. Do they get what they deserve? pic.twitter.com/uwfjXVqRHi
— Allison Symes (@AllisonSymes1) August 27, 2021

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Swanwick 2021 https://t.co/XGtoTQh2GB I look back at this year's Swanwick Writers' Summer School and share what it means to me and how it benefits writers. Can't wait to be back in 2022.
— Allison Symes (@AllisonSymes1) August 27, 2021

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Writing Joys, Podcast News, and Launches in Lockdown 2

January 29, 2021Leave a comment

Image Credit:-

All images from Pixabay/Pexels unless otherwise stated.

Book cover images from Chapeltown Books and Bridge House Publishing.

Thanks to #RichardHardie, #FrancescaTyer, and #TeresaBassett for supplying images used below too.

A huge thank you to #MaressaMortimer, #FranHill, and #WendyHJones for their images and book cover photos for my Chandler’s Ford Today Launches In Lockdown series this week.

And I am delighted to say I was on Wendy’s The Writing and Marketing Show earlier this week. Will share link further down. I talk about writing regular columns for online magazines.

Facebook – General – and Chandler’s Ford Today – Launches in Lockdown Part 2

What a busy day it has been as there are two posts on here from me tonight!

For this post, I want to say what a pleasure it has been to write the Launches in Lockdown series for Chandler’s Ford Today. I think if I can make a claim to write a zeitgeist series, this one is it!

Part 2 tonight shares wonderful insights from three authors from the Association of Christian Writers (I’m the Membership Secretary). #MaressaMortimer, #FranHill, and #WendyHJones have all had books out in the very recent past and have plenty of useful tips and thoughts to share in this week’s post.

Hope you enjoy it and find it useful.

Next week I’ll be chatting to writers from the Swanwick Writers’ Summer School.

Maressa Mortimer.

Maressa’s latest book.

Fran Hill

For me, Fran’s book wins the funniest book title of 2020.

Wendy H Jones, author and podcaster

One of Wendy’s latest books and always relevant to writers!

Launches in Lockdown Part 2

Facebook – General – and Association of Christian Writers

It is very much an Association of Christian Writers weekend for me as I am at an online Committee meeting tonight and tomorrow. Much will be said. Much will be done. All thanks to Zoom!

And it is my turn on the ACW More Than Writers blog too. This month, I use my spot to talk about Writing Joys. I can’t stress enough how important it is to love what you write. (Okay you won’t all the time, nobody does, but you should be looking forward to your writing sessions and what you’re working on most of the time. It is that love for the work which drives you and can help keep you going during the tougher writing times which happen to us all).

LOVE your writing! Pixabay

Never too old fashioned to use a pen to jot down those ideas. Pixabay

Well then…! Pixabay

I’ve yet to see the lightbulb appear above my head! Pixabay

Inventing characters and their dialogue are major writing joys for me. Pixabay

See things through the eyes of your characters. They may not see themselves as light or dark even though others will. Pixabay

Beautiful light here but is what lives here light in nature or dark? Pixabay

Delighted to say my interview with Richard Hardie recently on Chandler’s Ford Today is now up on the Authors Reach website (very much with my blessing!). Authors Reach is Richard’s publishing company and I was chatting to him about the challenges he has faced as an author and publisher during the pandemic. The AR link is https://www.authorsreach.co.uk/post/richard-hardie-authors-reach-and-lockdown – well worth another read!

And tomorrow sees Part 2 of my CFT series, Launches in Lockdown, go live. This week I’ll be chatting to three lovely writers from the Association of Christian Writers – #MaressaMortimer, #FranHill, and #WendyHJones. One of them has also come up with the funniest book title of 2020 in my view. You’ll have to wait for the post tomorrow to find out who the author is and whether you agree with me or not! (Trouble with doing a blog round up in reverse date order is you will already have spotted the answer to this one!!).

Teresa Bassett.

Francesca Tyer

Richard Hardie

Richard’s debut YA book

Richard’s second YA novel.

My two flash collections!

PODCAST NEWS –

WENDY H JONES CHATS TO ALLISON SYMES

Am thrilled to share the link to my interview by Wendy H Jones for her podcast, The Writing and Marketing Show. I talk about writing a regular column (for Chandler’s Ford Today), how I find ideas (and keep coming up with them) and the joys of an online magazine.

With more of us using technology to read (smartphones, I-pads etc), it makes a huge amount of sense to have intelligent, interesting, and entertaining content available for that technology. And online magazines do need writers to provide it. Hope you enjoy. And many thanks, Wendy, for hosting me again. It was such fun to do!

Podcast News: https://www.stitcher.com/show/the-writing-and-marketing-show/episode/writing-a-newspaper-column-81142120

Facebook – From Light to Dark and Back Again

A huge thanks to everyone for the great responses so far to my CFT series, Launches in Lockdown. Whether you’ve been launching flash fiction collections (as I have) or longer works, I think it is fair to say the last 12 months have been difficult. But social media and Zoom have helped.

And I think this all shows the importance of networking too. Thanks to networking over the last few years, I have a lovely wide range of people to approach for CFT interviews, but it does also mean that same pool can be invited to my launches.

Naturally this is two-way traffic. I get invited to theirs and I go to as many as I can. You learn from what other writers do and they learn from you too. I love the give and take of the writing world here.

I guess also writing flash is excellent practice for writing short, pithy pieces for your online book launches too!

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Am thrilled to see a great number of views for my recent story video, Dress Sense. The thought of Red Riding Hood giving the Big Bad Wolf fashion tips has obviously gone down well! Many thanks, everyone. (Oh and I think she’s right by the way – see the link and see what you think!).

Dress Sense Video Link: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pVs_GEWh5To

Tripping The Flash Fantastic is on offer in paperback on Amazon at the moment. Go on, pick up a bargain! See http://author.to/AllisonSymesAuthorCent for more.

F = Fun to write
L = Lively character(s)
A = Action immediately
S = Stories great for ending with a twist
H = Heroes/heroines are dropped right in it from the start

F = Finite story length but you do have some choice
I = Imagination intense to make an intense story work
C = Character(s) has/have to grip you immediately.
T = Tension, yes there’s plenty of that and not a lot of space to resolve it.
I = Intensity can vary. Reflective pieces can work well but the character has to be compelling to make that successful.
O = Oh my… what is your flash tale’s ‘oh my’ moment?
N = Narrative take? I often favour first person.

Thought I’d share another story video here – hope you enjoy.

Fairytales with Bite – Magical Reading

What kind of books would your magical characters read? Would they read about uses of magic or do they want to get away from all of that? Well, it would make sense if they did. I know when I read I want to escape the every day world and its cares. In a magical world, the magic is the everyday world and its cares! Same old, same old, and all that!

Having said that, maybe they would want to carry out research and use it to improve their skills.
Some suggestions for possible research reading material then though I accept the titles could do with some work (and abbreviating!):-

Fairies – 10001 Things To Do With Your Wand Not Involving Turning People Into Frogs

Witches – How to Sabotage Fairy Spells So They Produce Useless Things Like Glass Slippers – A Beginner’s Guide.

Wizards – How to Produce the Perfect Smoke Ring Without Appearing to Use Magic To Do It

Elves – How To Be A Right Cobbler (see the story of The Elves and the Shoemaker here).

Dwarves – Gold and How To Find It (always of interest)

Dragons – Wing Technique for the Bigger Flying Animal and How To Get It Right and Surprise Your Prey (and I am assuming dragons are very intelligent creatures who can read, so there!).

And talking of dragons, let’s hear another story from their viewpoint.

This World and Others – Education, Education…..Er…. What Does Your Fictional World Consider to be Education?

So what would your created world consider to be a good standard of education? Is it just the ability to read and write? Would there be topics like history, geography, any of the sciences etc? And is the education open to all but only a few?

In an uneducated world (judging by our standards only), how would news be communicated to those who cannot read? Does the lack of an education hold people back or have they not known anything else? Is there any sense of people wanting to improve their situation here?

And if so, what or whom is stopping them and for what purposes? (Usually it is a question of being able to control people who don’t enough to question things but what if the ruler has genuine reasons for fearing what education could do? Are they right? What are those fears? How can those fears be misproved and the ruler shown a good standard of education would be beneficial?).

If there are schools, colleges etc., do they resemble what we have here? What are the differences?

And if education has always been around, how has it progressed or is it progressing during the course of your story?

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Many thanks to @WendyHJones for interviewing me on her podcast, The Writing and Marketing Show. The topic was writing a regular column as I do for Chandler’s Ford Today. I shared how I keep coming up with ideas for my column. Great fun! Hope you enjoy. https://t.co/rQthJJdoLG pic.twitter.com/M76jl202uf
— Allison Symes (@AllisonSymes1) January 27, 2021

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Crucial Characterisation and a Charity Cookbook

December 7, 2018Leave a comment

Facebook – General – and Chandler’s Ford Today

My latest CFT post shares news of a very special cookbook written by Barbara Large MBE. Barbara was the founder of the Winchester Writers’ Festival (as it is now known) and her book is raising funds for the Nick Jonas Ward at the Royal County Hospital, Winchester.

Barbara shares her thoughts on the joys and challenges of writing this book, as does Anne Wan, who through imprint North Oak Press, published the book. There is also a delicious recipe to try!

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Barbara Large and Anne Wan at the launch of Anne’s book. Image kindly supplied by Anne Wan

Anne Wan and Allison Symes at Bay Leaves Larder

Anne Wan and I enjoying a cup of tea as I interview her for Chandler’s Ford Today a while ago. Image taken on Anne’s phone by the cafe staff!

When Writing Magazine comes in, I flick through and see if I know anyone who has written in to the letters page or the Members’ News section. I’m glad to say there usually is someone I know in either section in most editions!

Going to writing courses, conferences etc., is the best way I know of for networking with other writers and connections build up over time. Though a week at Swanwick Writers’ Summer School speeds that process up a LOT!

Talking of connections, how do your characters build up their relationships with other characters? What kind of networking exists in the world you’ve created? Often it is a case of showing Character A has this relationship (of whatever nature) with Character B but can you hint at how it all kicked off? Is there a solid basis to how your characters interact with each other? There should be…!

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My CFT post this week will share news of a charity cookbook called Scrumptious Recipes Shared with a Pampered Patient, written by Barbara Large, MBE, who founded the Winchester Writers’ Festival (formerly the Winchester Writing Conference). More details and the link on Friday.

I look forward to sharing thoughts on the recent Bridge House/Chapeltown/Cafelit celebrations the week after. As ever, can hardly believe how the year has raced by. Many thanks to Dawn Kentish Knox for the pic of me reading some of my more recent stories from Cafelit and also from From Light to Dark and Back Again.

So true. Pixabay image.

Set goals for the short, medium and long terms. Pixabay image

Playing with words. Pixabay image.

The lack of height can sometimes be a right pain! Image by Dawn Kentish Knox

What will this be for your writing journey? Pixabay image

Photo by Pixabay on Pexels.com

I draw out the winning ticket for a very special book, one I’ve reviewed. Image by Dawn Kentish Knox

I read a few of my flash fiction stories and am pleased they go down well - image by Dawn Kentish Knox

Whenever and whatever you read, enjoy. Image via Pixabay.

Changing from one state to the other with your writing goals! Pixabay image

The writing journey can be a long one so setting goals along the way makes sense. Pixabay image

Facebook – From Light to Dark and Back Again

Have fun mixing up the settings you use for your stories too. Some of mine are set in a magical or fantasy world but others are very much here on Earth.

My Time for Tea is set with the opening showing an old man arranging the tea things as he is expecting his adult children to visit. But this is no ordinary tea party.

And I guess that is the point of this post. The setting may be ordinary but it is what you do with it that will turn your story into something special.

Pens. Image via Pexels

Books invite you into their world. Go! Image via Pixabay.

Editing – the crucial part to getting a story right. Image via Pixabay.

Books have their own sense of time and space. Image via Pixabay.

Generating the writing ideas. Image via Pixabay.

Books are fabulous, whatever the format. Image via Pixabay.

Online writing -v- on a line writing! Image via Pixabay

Beautiful pens. Pexels image.

A clean sheet can lead to some fascinating characters and stories. Image via Pixabay

Ebooks and print – both have their own frustrations when it comes to publishing. Image via Pixabay

My latest CFT post. Image via Pixabay.

Signing books for a friend. Image by Adrian Symes

Let those ideas flow! Image via Pixabay,

A random word generator can be fun to play around with sometimes. Having a look at one tonight, and having set the first and last letters I wanted, my haul was “bloody”, “biography”, “biology”, and “beneficiary”. Hmm… definite possibilities there.

DANGEROUS WORDS
The biography of my long dead great-aunt whom I cared for, well it was well over a decade in the end, was a revelation, a bloody one at that. No wonder she didn’t want this coming out during her lifetime and I’m heartily wishing I hadn’t been sent this book. Someone wanted me to have it but who and why? And why send it now?

Frankly, I’m not sure what I want to do with this. The logical thing would be to burn the wretched book but how many copies were produced? How could I find out without revealing what I know? And whoever sent this to me is expecting some sort of reaction I guess. There’s nothing to stop them sending me other copies either is there? Have they gone to the police? Well let them… I’ve done nothing wrong except be a beneficiary to a sick old lady whose family abandoned her. Except I now know why they dumped her. Has one of them finally decided I ought to know? Or are they going to try to take my inheritance from me?

What did I find out? That my aunt knew quite a bit about biology as it turns out and where exactly to stick the knife. She wasn’t always crippled with arthritis! Said knife ended up right in the backs of anyone to whom she was a beneficiary. Collected quite a sum in the end – well over £500 K. People have been killed for less than that. What I can’t figure is how she got away with it. All I know is I’m keeping that money and I am getting out of here NOW.

Ends.

Allison Symes – 6th December 2018

See a random word generator as another way to conjure up ideas for you to play with. You don’t have to use all the words that come up – a lot will depend on how much of a challenge you feel up to tackling! But have fun with this and hopefully you’ll get some stories down as a result.

Books make wonderful gifts. Image via Pixabay.

Books are wonderful – whether in print or electronic, whether as audio stories or told by a storyteller. Image via Pixabay.

Use personal reviews to help you generate character and story outlines. Image via Pixabay.

Well, let’s do so by writing lots of stories! Image via Pixabay.

Notes about your characters can help you portray them more accurately. Not every note has to make it into the story itself. Pixabay image.

Shakespeare had his quill, modern writers have their laptops. Image via Pixabay.

Such a familiar look. Image via Pixabay.

Stories reflect all sorts of moods. There is a story to suit everyone out there! Image via Pixabay.

The to be read pile! Image via Pixabay

Side view of my book stand. Image by Allison Symes

Write your piece, leave it for a while before editing. Pixabay image.

Some of the strongest ideas have a simple theme. See A Christmas Carol as a classic example. Image via Pixabay.

Never in my fiction. Image via Pixabay.

Ideas for flash fiction stories can come from many sources (and I’ve used advertising slogans, scenes from films, well known phrases, and sometimes puns – e.g. my Raising the Stakes. Yes it IS a vampire story but told from the viewpoint of…. well no spoilers here!).

Mix up your sources of ideas from time to time. Never use just one source. You want to have a nice wide “net” to scour for story ideas. Don’t forget pictures either. They can be a great starting point for a story. What could you do with the images below for instance?

Above all have fun with your writing. It does show through!

Blogging via diaries and tablets – ancient and modern technology! Image via Pixabay.

A typical stationery collection. Image via Pexels.

The world’s most beautiful library perhaps? Image via Pixabay. But lots of lovely stories to read which may well spark off ideas for other stories. Only problem? Where to start!

Creating great characters does mean hard work. Image via Pexels.

Stories (and indeed most books of any kind) are magical. Image via Pixabay.

Says it all really and applies to non-fiction equally as fiction. Image via Pixabay.

Writing the first drafts! Image via Pixabay.

What most writers connect to! Image via Pexels

The old way of writing a story! Image via Pixabay

What ever writer needs. Image via Pixabay

Let your writing sparkle. Image via Pexels.

Fairytales With Bite – Editing Your Story

Some of the ways I edit a story are:-

1. To put it aside for a while. Sounds odd I know but you need to put some distance between you as the writer of the piece before you can become you, the editor of that piece. You are too close to the work to be objective about it just after you’ve written it. You’re either going to think it is the best or worst thing ever written (there seems to be no happy medium here!) so remind yourself, you will look at the piece when it will seem like new to you again. Then and only then can you judge it properly. Assuming you have done that:-

2. Read work out loud. This is great for literally hearing whether your dialogue works as well as you think it does. If you stumble over words or phrases, so will your reader. I’ve sometimes recorded a story (using Audacity) and played it back. You get to listen to it as a listener would then.

3. Do a basic edit first. I start by getting rid of my known wasted words, repetitions, and go through for spelling and grammatical errors. You will need to do this again at least once more once you’ve got a final draft but I have found it useful to use this to get me into “editor mode” and to get started on the whole business!

4. Look at whether the structure makes sense. Are there gaps the reader can’t follow? Where you have hinted at something happening in the story, did you follow through on it later?

5. Do all of your characters have a vital role in the story? If not, can you get rid of some or amalgamate them into one person?

6. Do all of the plot lines tie up and make sense? Have you shown a point of change in the characters? Have you ensured the story reaches a logical conclusion (which doesn’t need to be a happy one)?

Good luck!

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This World and Others – Crucial Characterisation

Characterisation is always crucial, of course, but pointers I have found really useful include:-

1. Ensure there is something about your characters that your readers can identify with. They don’t necessarily have to agree with your characters but should be able to see why your characters are acting as they are. Part of the challenge of a story is to get your readers to wonder whether they would have done the same as your characters and, if not, why not and what would they have done!

2. The goal should be an understandable one. From the character’s viewpoint, naturally, it has to be a life or death matter. It should be something they are prepared to risk all for. It should be something they can’t refuse to do.

3. Characters should be memorable. Doesn’t matter if they’re heroes or villains, the crucial point is your characters should stay in the minds of your readers long after they’ve finished your story.

From Lairg looking down at Loch Shin. Image by Allison Symes

If you see this in your mirror, you are in big trouble and the wrong time zone. Pixabay image

Reflections at Swanwick earlier this year. Image by Allison Symes

This was just down the road from where I was staying. Love the light here. Image by Allison Symes

The view opposite the Scottish holiday cottage I stayed in. Image by Allison Symes

Always time for a laugh with writer friends! Many thanks to Cheryl Holland for taking this with my phone.

Golspie Beach in June – look at the crowds! Image by Allison Symes

Too much to do, too little time perhaps? Pixabay image.

The medieval scrivener’s wares. Image by Allison Symes

A beautiful woodland walk. Pixabay image

Is travelling in time a good idea? Where would you go if you could? Pixabay image

Your blog, your topic, your theme – just be sensible on copyright and libel issues. Image via Pixabay.

A VERY familiar sight, alas! Pixabay image.

Fill that blank sheet with ideas from non-fiction as well as other fiction works - image via Pixabay

The moon rising. Pixabay image.

Without the darkness, we would not see the stars. Pixabay image.

Fairytales may or may not be set in a fantastic world but they can shed light on human motives and actions - Pixabay

Diary keeping as I recall it but I skipped the gingham! Image via Pixabay

Wormhole. Pixabay image.

What wonderful colours. Pixabay image.

A good photo shows light at its best. Pixabay image.

The fantastical world should still be grounded in reality - Pixabay image

Stand Alones, Flash Fiction and Fairytales

October 19, 2018Leave a comment

Facebook – General – and Chandler’s Ford Today

Many thanks again to Jennifer C Wilson, Val Penny, #AnneWan, Wendy Jones, and Richard Hardie for their further insights into the joys and challenges of writing series fiction. Amongst tonight’s topics is how to ensure each book in a series works as a stand-alone, given our series writers can never know which book a reader will actually start with. It isn’t necessarily book 1!

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What five things do I like to see in a character? Ideally they have all of the traits I list below but as long as a character has the majority of them, I’m likely to enjoy spending time in the company of that character as I read their story.

1. Courage.
2. Sense of Humour.
3. Loyalty.
4. They, at the very least, respect books; at best they have their own library!
5. Kindness.

Does that rule out the villains? No! Even villains can be kind to their pet cat, have a decent library etc.

Looking at that list, it’s what I like to see in myself and, before you ask, I’m working on the personal library bit! (It’s nowhere near as grand as the one in the pictures below though!).

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One of the things I love about going to writing conferences is that I always learn something pertinent to what I write. And it is not always an obvious link.

I’m off to the Association of Christian Writers’ Day on Saturday, the topic is Writing for Children and Young Adults, which is not directly what I do, but I just know I will pick up useful tips that I can apply directly.

And you never know – looking at what other writers do can help you re-examine whether you are working in the best way you can. It may also inspire a new direction of writing too! What I do know is it will be fun finding out if it does or not and what useful tips I’ll bring home with me.

The great thing with writing is you never stop learning how to improve what you do and that is so good for your brain!

(And networking is always fun!).

Plugging in for new ideas? Pixabay image

What writing triggers will help you create your new worlds? Image via Pixabay

Edit, edit, edit! Pixabay image.

Fiction is strengthened when backed by fact. Image via Pixabay

The wonderful world of writing should include non-fiction, which benefits from creative techniques too. Image via Pixabay.

Let one creative idea spark another. Pixabay image.

It always is! Reflecting first helps a lot! Pixabay image

Walking into the words maybe. Pixabay image

Let those ideas flow! Image via Pixabay,

Puns can be visual. Pixabay image.

Fiction can take you anywhere. Image via Pixabay.

Always get contracts checked out – see Society of Authors as one place to go here. Pixabay image.

Facebook – From Light to Dark and Back Again

A = Alliteration. Can be useful for titles in flash fiction (though I don’t use it much) but as with any story, it can grab the attention and help set the mood. Best not overused I think. You want each title to set the tone for what it is to come and a variety of methods for doing that is best. Keeps it fresh for you as the writer too.

B = Backstory. Not a lot of room for that in flash fiction! Best to hint at it through one or two vital details the reader has to know and leave it at that.

C = Character. The kingpin of fiction I think. Get the character right and the plot will come from them. Know your character inside and out – I find it useful to know their chief trait (and I piece together a mental picture of what they are like from there). Find the appropriate starting point for you but it is worth taking the time to know your character well before you start. Your writing will flow better because you write with that knowledge. It does come through in what you write.

How is your world governed? Is it done well? Pixabay image.

Outlining your characters, perhaps. Image via Pexel

Your blog, your topic, your theme – just be sensible on copyright and libel issues. Image via Pixabay.

Is this light the way into a new world? Pixabay image.

The tools of the scrivener’s trade. We’ve come on a bit since then! Image via Pixabay

Aids research whether it is tea, coffee, hot chocolate etc! Image via Pixabay

A great new idea makes me smile, as does this image. Pixabay image.

Time flies when reading or writing. Image via Pixabay

Picking up wriitng tips will help you improve your work. Pixabay image.

As ever, am planning to write flash fiction on the train journey to and from London on Saturday as I head off to a writing day run by the Association of Christian Writers. It’s amazing what you can get done on a smartphone with no interruptions! (Daren’t do this on the Tube though. Always worried I’ll miss my stop! I do think the Tube is a wonderful invention and you never get cold down there either…).

I also sometimes draft non-fiction articles and future blog posts when out and about. I just need a long enough train journey to draft a novel now. 😉😁Hmm….

So true. Pixabay image.

Whenever and whatever you read, enjoy. Image via Pixabay.

Creating great characters does mean hard work. Image via Pexels.

The scrivener’s tools – image by Allison Symes

Good advice. Image via Pixabay.

Always time for a laugh with writer friends! Many thanks to Cheryl Holland for taking this with my phone.

Always good advice this. Image via Pexels

Is it Time for a Change for the dragon in my story on Cafelit? Image via Pixabay

When planning your story (you do, yes?), I find it useful to work out what the obvious ideas might be from a title I’ve thought of, and then work out what could come from those. I don’t plump for the first ideas that come to me. I try to make myself dig that bit deeper to come up with something that fits the theme, makes sense, but is also different precisely because I haven’t gone for the obvious ideas!

Spider diagrams or flowcharts can be useful here. I find I must have a title to kick start the process with, even if I do end up changing it for something better later. It is always a tad annoying that a better title idea crops up when you are writing the story and NOT before you get started, but that is one of those quirks of writing!

Picture of me reading was taken by the lovely #DawnKentishKnox at last year’s Bridge House event. Am very much looking forward to this year’s one too!

Set goals for the short, medium and long term. Pixabay image.

It isn’t always clear which route you should take. Pixabay image

Characters no matter what their world should resonate with readers. Image via Pixabay

Social media has made the world a smaller place. Image via Pixabay.

Notebook to hand ready for those story ideas. Image via Pexels.

What journeys are your characters going on? Image via Pixabay

If your story grips you, all sense of time will go! Image via Pixabay.

Always good advice. Image via Pixabay.

What wonderful worlds we can creat! Image via Pixabay.

Aiming for more “magic” from my stories this year! Image via Pixabay.

Escape with a good book. Image via Pixabay.

Gill talks with Dawn and I at the BH event, image taken by Paula Readman

Gill James talks with Dawn Knox and I at a networking event held by Bridge House Publishing last December. Am glad to report Dawn will also be in the Waterloo Festival Anthology. Image from Paula Readman and thanks to her for permission to use it.

Paula Readman, Dawn Kentish Knox and Allison Symes and books - with kind permission from Paula Readman - Copy

Paula Readman, Dawn Knox and I at the recent Bridge House celebration event. Many thanks to Paula for the image. Also Paula is another winning entry for the Waterloo Festival.

Dawn Kentish Knox, fellow flash fiction writer, reads some work from her excellent book, The Great War. Image by Allison Symes

Lovely having an appreciative audience, pic taken by Dawn Kentish Knox

I read three stories from From Light to Dark and Back Again. Many thanks to Dawn Kentish Knox for the picture!

Book Buying News!

From Light to Dark and Back Again is available from The Book Depository. Delivery time on the paperback is 1 to 3 business days. As ever, reviews are always welcome in the usual places. The great thing is reviews do not need to be long but they all help the writer, even the indifferent ones!

Fairytales with Bite – Flash Fiction and Fairytales

Flash fiction is an ideal vehicle for fairytales. Why? Because the best fairytales set up their world quickly, have a definite conclusion, and often pack a powerful punch. Flash fiction does this too so to my mind flash and fairytales are a match made in writing heaven.

Flash fiction has to be character led due to its limited word count but you can set that character wherever and whenever you wish. A few telling details can set up a magical world quickly. For example from my George Changes His Mind (in From Light to Dark and Back Again), I set up a magical world with the opening line “He refused to kill the dragon.” The telling detail there is in one word – dragon! The story goes on to show what happens and that is the important bit of the story after all. I don’t need to use thousands of words setting up the magical world in which this is set. This is not crucial to this story. What matters is it IS in a magical world and what George goes on to do or not do.

A lot of my stories are either reflections of a fairytale world or set in it and they are great fun to write but I always focus on what the lead character is like. That is the crucial point of any story I think but in flash where every word must work hard to earn its place to stay there, it is even more so.

The Heavens Declare the Glory of God - image via Pixabay

Love the sunshine through the trees. Pixabay image.

Fiction should show you new ways of looking at the world. Image via Pixabay.

Books are fabulous, whatever the format. Image via Pixabay.

Fiction can take you anywhere. Image via Pixabay.

A beautiful woodland walk. Pixabay image

Glorious autumn. Time to take stock briefly and then move on. Pixabay image.

Just how fantastic is your setting? Pixabay image.

What world will you conjure up for us in your stories? Pixabay image.

Books have their own sense of time and space. Image via Pixabay.

Lovely place to sit and contemplate. Image by Allison Symes

Reflections at Swanwick earlier this year. Image by Allison Symes

Dramatic contrasts between land and water. What contrasts are in your stories? Pixabay image

How does gravity and time work in your settings? Pixabay image.

This World and Others – Stand Alone

Part 2 of my CFT mini series on The Joys and Challenges of Writing Series Novels looks at, amongst other topics, how to ensure a book stands alone given no series novelist can know at which point a reader will discover their writing. It is highly unlikely to be book 1. Indeed I’ve discovered series at the mid point! Many thanks again to my marvellous panellists – Jennifer C Wilson, Val Penny, Anne Wan, Wendy H Jones, and Richard Hardie – for some great insights. Very happy to recommend their books to you too. Great reads one and all albeit for different audiences!

It is true that every writer stands alone, even those that collaborate as they have to go off to write “their bits” before coming back and swapping notes with the other one(s) in the project. We have to judge whether our work is strong enough to submit and, if there is a choice of places to submit to, which is the best one. We have to judge whether we have edited a piece enough or if it still needs work. The call is with us and we are going to get it wrong. The joy, of course, is when we get it right and a piece is published.

This is where meeting other writers, whether at conferences, online, at courses etc., is invaluable. There is nobody like another writer to know exactly how it feels when you’re struggling to get the words out or who knows the joy of the words pouring out and work going well. You do have to share this sometimes for the sake of your own sanity!

I learned a long time ago no writer is a competitor to me. I write as I write. I cannot write as you would. We all bring our unique perspectives to what we write – and that is the great thing about it!

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