Tag: What Am I Reading – radio slot

Back on the Radio and Blog Appearance

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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 are all okay. Weather has suddenly warmed up considerably. Feels more like summer than the summer did. Glad to say I was back on Hannah Kate’s radio show over the weekend – details below. And I am a guest on Gill James’ blog too again see below.

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Facebook – General

Am pleased to now be able to share the Mixcloud link from Hannah Kate’s radio show, Hannah’s Bookshelf, which went out on Saturday. This show is what Hannah calls a pick and mix (I remember Woolworths too) and there is an author interview here, the What Am I Reading slot I took part in, and much more besides. Do check it out if you love books in any way whatsoever! Further down are links to the two halves of the show so you have a choice of how to listen!

Much as I love reading books, I also enjoy listening to them so having a radio show all about books makes a great deal of sense to me! One of my favourite book radio reads is The Daughter of Time by Josephine Tey. This was done on Radio 4 Extra (and I suspect will be broadcast again at some point). If you are a fan of Richard III, this is worth checking out (the book itself and the radio read of it).

 

Many thanks to Gill James for inviting me on to her blog to discuss The Best of CafeLit 12. It was great fun to do this and I share what was behind my story, Jubilee, which is in this anthology. I also share why I love short stories and flash fiction. It isn’t just because I am published in both, honestly. Find out more via the link.

Screenshot 2023-09-04 at 14-49-31 Allison Symes talks to us about being invovled with The Best of CafeLit 12

Hope you have had a lovely weekend. Great to see some late summer/early autumn sunshine.
Will be looking at The Benefits of Creativity for Chandler’s Ford Today next week. There are many benefits and I believe everyone has some creativity. It is a question I think of finding what yours is and enjoying it, playing to its strengths if you like. More on Friday when the post goes up.

What do you like about stories the most? Yes, I know, tough question time and on a restful Sunday too, what am I thinking of? I ask because my favourite moment is when the story has been resolved but I know the characters have brought that resolution about by their own attitudes and actions. I like to think the characters have earned their good ending.

 

It was a joy to be back on North Manchester FM with Hannah Kate on her Hannah’s Bookshelf show. I was taking part in her What Am I Reading? slot and that was a joy to do. I come in at about the 28 minutes mark on Part 2 of the show but do check out both halves. Links to both below.

This is a fabulous show which celebrates books and writing. What is there not to love about that? I review books by Stephen Clark (history), Jennifer C Wilson (historical fiction, romance, collection), Val Penny (crime), and Ruth Leigh (women’s fiction, Christian fiction, humour).

I’ve mentioned before I like to mix up my reading – and why not? I’m not going to be confined to one genre! Mind you, that is one thing I love about flash fiction writing. As it has to be character led, I can set my characters in any setting, time period etc. It is a joy to do that.

Part 1 – https://podcast.canstream.co.uk/manchesterfm/index.php?id=49679

Part 2 – https://podcast.canstream.co.uk/manchesterfm/index.php?id=49680

Screenshot 2023-08-31 at 19-56-24 North Manchester FM Hannah's Bookshelf Saturday 2 September 2-4pm - Hannah Kate

Facebook – From Light to Dark and Back Again

Hope you have had a good day. Another scorcher today. Lady has kept cool. On this, she is a remarkably sensible dog. On almost everything else, she’s anything but (being lovable helps her cause a lot!).

I often end a flash piece with a punchline (especially if it is a humorous tale) but sometimes I finish with a line of dialogue which acts as the punchline. I did this for George Changes His Mind in From Light to Dark and Back Again. There was nothing to add after that final comment from my character. So I left it there!

Writing flash over time helps you develop a good sense of where the story should stop. This is another good reason to practice writing flash as learning what makes a good ending and leaving it there can apply to other forms of writing too.

Flash with Amazon and Barnes and Noble

It’s Monday. It has suddenly become very warm. On the plus side I know it is not me having a hot flush. It is still Monday. Definitely time for a story. Hope you enjoy Therapy, my latest on my YouTube channel.

 

How do I decide which word count to write to for my flash fiction? For competitions and websites like Friday Flash Fiction, the word count is usually set. (I could write longer stories for FFF now I have two of my 100-worders on there but it has been a joy to rediscover the joy of writing the 100 word stories/drabbles again so am happily sticking to that for them).

When a word count isn’t set, I get my first draft down first (having a rough outline as what I want this story to be). It is then a question of working out what I can do to tighten up the writing and sharpen the piece overall. There is always something!

I then look at what word count I have reached. If, for example, I am just over 300 or 500 words (two common categories in competitions) I see if I could legitimately get my story down to those word counts or just under them. Sometimes I can. Sometimes I can’t.

If it is a question I can’t reduce it without losing something valuable, I would enter that story for the next category up. So my possible 300-worder coming in at 350 would stay that way and I would put this in for a 500 words or under competition instead.

The crucial factor is how well the story works at a given word count. If it is working fine, I leave it alone. If I can see ways to improve it (which often does bring the word count down), then I will improve it.

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Many of my flash stories focus on one character. Given I don’t usually ask my characters to talk to themselves, I do use thoughts (in italics) as the best way of communicating to the reader. After all we think so our characters would think.

Fiction reflects our reality even if the setting is fantastical. The joy with reading a story though is being able to read the character’s thoughts! And I like to use those thoughts to show something of my character’s state of mind and attitudes.

When I have a longer flash piece with more than one character, thoughts can show the reader the character may be thinking one thing but saying quite another to the other character. Hopefully the reader is then hooked into wanting to find out how things pan out.

For one thing, I’d want to know if there is a good reason for the thinking one thing but saying another – the character could be trying to protect the other from something. Equally they could be lying. And then I’d want to know why. Only one way to find out – I keep reading.

Character Flaws

Goodreads Author Blog – Promoting Books

As a writer as well as reader, I have a vested interest in promoting books. Obviously I would like to promote my own but I like to promote books by other writers I’ve loved reading too. Why? Because I have an even bigger vested interest in sharing the joys of reading with others. Why?

Well, it is the way to encourage book reading, book buying, use of the libraries and so on – all good things. Reading is good for us. It entertains, it informs, it helps us escape for a while. It deepens our vocabulary. It helps us puzzle things out.

Don’t you try to guess the ending for a crime story ahead of reading that ending? I do all the time. Sometimes I do guess the killer correctly, sometimes I don’t but I have had a fabulous time in guessing and I always like it when an author manages to wrong foot me too. I go back through the book then to try and spot the clues I missed first go around.

Every writer’s most difficult task is in getting that initial spark of interest in their work. We need to encourage people to read, to see the point of reading, whether they then go on to read our work or others. Ideally they’d do both of course!

And I am conscious there are other forms of entertainment. We have to make the case for books, I think, as being a fabulous use of anyone’s time.

Screenshot 2023-09-02 at 20-08-38 Promoting Books

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Autumnal Joys

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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, as were some of the photos in my CFT post.
It has been a right mixed bag weather wise this week. Autumn definitely coming in a bit early but that makes my Chandler’s Ford Today post timely. I’m sharing about Autumnal Joys this time.

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Facebook – General and Chandler’s Ford Today

Author newsletter out today. Getting these ready monthly is a great way to discover how quickly the year is going! Many thanks and a huge welcome to those who signed up at The Writers’ Summer School, Swanwick. Good to have you aboard. A big hello to all of my longer term subscribers too and many thanks for your continued support. Much appreciated.

Am pleased to share Autumnal Joys, my latest post for Chandler’s Ford Today. I share an autumnal story in this too which I hope you enjoy. I chat about the joys of the season and have a brief look ahead to writing “things” coming up over the next couple of months or so. Hope you enjoy the post.

Autumnal Joys

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Glad to say I’ll be running a workshop on editing later in the year. Am looking forward to doing that. Flash fiction has helped me so much with editing as I have learned to spot my wasted words and cut them out. That in turn helps with other forms of writing I do.

Am chatting about Autumnal Joys for Chandler’s Ford Today this week – link up tomorrow. See above.
Author newsletter is also out again tomorrow.

Pleased to see reviews coming in for The Best of CafeLit 12. Book reviews do help authors so please consider leaving one. They don’t have to be long either. Other than buying the books themselves, leaving reviews is one of the best things you can do to support writers.

Hope you have had a good day. I was delighted The Lord of the Rings soundtrack did make it to the number one spot on the Classic FM chart on Bank Holiday Monday. Love the book(s) – I have the trilogy in one huge paperback so I guess that counts as one for me! Love the films, love the music, fantastic casting.

Writing Tip: Give some thought as to what makes your character a hero. What makes them care about the outcome of a situation? Is it a life or death one or do they simply not want evil to prosper, even if they could stay out of the situation? What beliefs drive them? How did they develop these?

I’ve long thought Sam Gamgee is a classic modest, understated hero in The Lord of the Rings. He has a strong sense of right and wrong. His friendship with Frodo drives him on. But you can see all of that in the portrayal and we want our characters’ positive attributes to be clear to a reader without spelling everything out.

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Facebook – From Light to Dark and Back Again

Two lovely bits of news to share. Firstly, I will be on the Hannah Kate show on North Manchester FM tomorrow (2nd September 2023). I’m taking part in her What Am I Reading slot and share some thoughts on books I’ve recently read. Fun thing to do!

The link below enables you to listen online regardless of where you are. Will be handy for me as I often have to listen later than the scheduled time but that’s fine (and it is so useful being able to do that).

North Manchester FM: Hannah’s Bookshelf, Saturday 2 September, 2-4pm

 

Secondly, I’m back on Friday Flash Fiction with my tale A New Leaf. Hope you like it. Am so pleased it has been made Editor‘s Choice this week too. Lovely way to end the working week.

I’ve chatted before about reading your work out loud because it is a great way to pick up on things that look good written down but which do not necessarily “read well”. This technique is something I’ve developed due to taking part in Open Prose Mic Nights. Naturally I want to rehearse what I plan to read and I have picked up things to improve in those rehearsals.

Another reason I’ve developed this is because sometimes I submit stories for broadcast so I need to know how long they are in terms of time. I read them out and record them on Zoom to give me the time but in playing that recording back, again I get to hear what works and what may need a rewrite because it didn’t flow as well as I thought originally.

371858468_723117366494794_1995778043819982131_nDon’t forget that, despite the September date on the cover, that issue of Writers’ Narrative is now out. Written by writers for writers, it is a great read. Do check it out. Given this issue is about marketing, it will benefit you, no matter what you write.

I must admit flash fiction is an asset to marketing. How? Because it is easy for me to share a story (often via my YouTube channel) which acts as a marker for what else I do. It also advertises flash in general and I hope gives readers/viewers an entertaining short tale. Win-win there.

 

Fairytales with Bite – Magical History

In your magical world setting, what role does history play in how your characters interact with each other or what the ruling government allows in terms of magic or not? Are witches strictly forbidden from trying to stick kids in an oven, for example?

Also, does your world have the same fairytale knowledge we h ave or are their tales different? What would these be if so and is there any similarity with the tales we know here? I believe there are various versions of Cinderella, for example, across different cultures and histories here so something like that could be the case in your setting.

What lessons have been learned from history in your setting? Have people learned the hard way what you could do with magic which you really should not have found out? What were the consequences? Has it affected the physical geography of your setting? (Am thinking along the lines of climate change here. Has there been a magical equivalent in your world?).

Are your characters trying to learn from history and, if so, are they successful? Are they better at what they do than their forebears would have been precisely because they have learned from prior mistakes? Are there lessons they should have learned but have not and what are the consequences there? Plenty of story thoughts here.

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This World and Others – Settings

One of the things I love most about fantasy is the setting. The Lord of the Rings, to my mind, can’t be beaten here. I so wanted to live in Rivendell!

The advantage of the films is you could see a re-creation of that. The advantage of the books is you get to picture it for yourself (and yes I think the films got it right).

What I also love about the books is the descriptions came in at the right time and broke up the drama. I found I did need something to break up the pace and of course the setting description literally set the scene for the next drama. Neither did the description go on for too long. There’s much to learn from that.

The other thing to note is not having everything all at once. Information is drip fed into the story. We didn’t need to know about Rivendell until the hobbits got there.

So think about what a reader would need to know about your setting. What makes it stand out? What do your characters love about it? What would they change if they could and why? I love outlines. Even for my shortest flash fiction tales (100 words usually, sometimes 50), I jot down a line or two about what I think I need to know about the character and where they are likely to be to make the story work.

For longer pieces, it would pay to work out how your setting will work. You don’t want to box yourself in later when you find you said characters rely on machines for transport in a world where machines are not known. That’s an extreme example but I have come across oddities where characteristics, even names change, when I’ve judged stories. It’s even easier to do that with a setting if you forget a pertinent detail.

I find an outline helps me approach my first draft with more confidence too because I know roughly where I am going. Having a setting outline means you know your world. That will help you to picture it and your characters in it more effectively.

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AMAZON AUTHOR CENTRAL – ALLISON SYMES

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