Tag: fiction

Writing Competition Time

Featured ~ JacciGoodingAuthor

Don’t you just love January? Oh c’mon, it’s a great month! So much to look forward to. Do you notice the days getting a teensy bit longer? So it may be cold/wet/snowy/bright/sunny/windy/all of the above but it means the earth is tilting toward the sun again, at least here in the northern hemisphere. Daylight will be returning and before you know it the crocus and daffs will be out, such horticultural joy sending us all a tiny bit doolallie for a while.

And what better news than knowing the South Warwickshire Lit Fest’s writing competition opens for submissions on January 15th.  That’s next week! The categories are the same as last year – Fiction, Creative Non-Fiction and Poetry and the entry fee is a paltry £3.80 (actually £3.50 but there is a 30p booking fee) with a £50 prize in each category. Closing date is March 29th so there is Per-Len-Tee of time to create your masterpiece whether some cracking poetry, stunning creative non-fiction or gasp-out-loud fiction. We’ll be shouting about it all over the socials, FB, X, I, BS – is that an anagram I wonder? – and we’re very much looking forward to your entries. All the details on how to enter are on our website – basically pay your entry fee then email us your work plus your Ticketsource reference number, here South Warwickshire Literary Festival.

When I created SWLF it was not in the mix to have writing competitions but since we introduced them they have been a marvellous insight in to what people are currently writing.  Supporting the Warwickshire Young Poet Laureate, who for 23/24 is May Vaughan, is always a delight, and interesting to see what younger people are writing about – so important that these voices get heard.

So here’s to your entries dear reader. I’m not a judge, just curator, so although I get to read all your lovely words my opinion counts for jack – we’re leaving the judging to the experts -all of whom will be revealed in the fullness of time..

So what are you waiting for ? Stop reading this and get writing!!

And if you know a young person in Warwickshire, aged 13-17 who could be the next YPL…

Entries for Warwickshire’s Young Poet Laureate 2024/25 will open in June 2024 at warwickshire.gov.uk/youngpoetlaureate. For more information about the Young Poet Laureate scheme please email libraryevents@warwickshire.gov.uk or your local library service if reading this in the UK.

South Warwickshire Lit Fest 2023

~ JacciGoodingAuthor

Well what a giggle that was! Not that I was there in the end – face down on my pillow for 86 hours and a thick red ‘You’re Not Going Anywhere Sunshine’ line on my Covid test. Yep indeedy folks, a year of planning and writing stonkingly funny Tweets and I missed it! Thank the God of Writers (is there such a thing?) (I bet there is) friend and author Jenny Heap stepped in and did a marvellous job opening, compering and closing the day, whilst the other team members and friends Lynn Macwhinnie and Gwyneth Box held the rest of the day together, along with a lovely gathering of volunteers. But there’s a lesson in there chums – always have a plan B and C!

Great big thanks must absolutely go to all our authors, poets, and workshop leaders: Dr Claire Millington, Emily Hunt, Gabrielle Mullarkey, Celia Rees, Erin Green, Louise Boland (Fairlight Books), Fran Hill, Gwyneth Box, Melissa Addey, Creative Writing Events.

Here’s a quick snippet from our feedback forms and I have to say dear reader, all the feedback we were given was stupendous. Thank you everyone who came – we couldn’t do it without you.

I know; if I had one, I’d blow it.

So next year I hear you saying? Well, another writing competition is on the horizon for January, so keep tuned!

7 Tips for Clever Writing

~ JacciGoodingAuthor

A few blogs back I wrote about being inspired by art. Well, with that in mind, I painted this picture to give vent to my lack of artistic talent. Like it? Not bad is it. I like the way the lines all merge together in a conclusion of colour that burst from the screen.

Confession time.

It’s a photo. It’s a photo of the sky and some plants taken through a wibbly wobbly window but it looks ok doesn’t it! Think you’re looking at one thing, but really you’re looking at another. That’s the trick. Now turn that into clever writing.

What do I mean by clever writing? What even is that?! Do I even know?

I guess I mean presenting the reader at the beginning with what they think is one thing but by the time they get to the end realise it’s a different thing altogether – but in a good way. Isn’t that what they call a Twist? Or Plot? Or maybe even a Plot Twist?

So here’re a few tips for you, should be you interested. Just my thoughts and observations… nothing too taxing. Let me know if you agree…or not

  1. Do your research then write like you haven’t. Eh? Wha..? As in, make your story so natural that your readers are drawn in straight away, without any time to argue the toss or disagree with what you’ve written. Make sure you know what you’re writing about in terms of exposition, especially in historic fiction.
  2. Writing science fiction? Make your new world as relatable as this old one and your readers will be there from the get-go. With time and good pacing of chapters you can unfold your new world without anyone really noticing and then bam – they’re residents of your new world without even booking a removal van.
  3. Without doubt clever dialogue is the way forward. What is clever dialogue? Is it what you hear all around, every day? Or is it well structured, over-long and completely unlikely? Do we speak now as Mr Darcy spoke then? Be brief. Be bright. Be Clever. If in doubt, chuck it out.
  4. Nab yourself a clever idea which will grow into your story giving rise to a great plot. Clever idea huh? Well excuse me while I just pop down to the clever plot shop. Simple’s always best. Make it too complicated – too many brush strokes – and you’ll lose your reader. Say for example you’re writing a cli-fi, how about the seas suddenly freezing over rather than warming up? Oh Contraire I hear you gasp.  It’s a 180 to the current crisis, so why not?
  5. Characters always help in a story, don’t you think? Making them mad a genius or an astronaut lost in space s a bit too clever – you’d have to know a lot about geniuses or space to pull that one off effectively. Nah, go clever. Writing crime? Police procedure? Let’s have no more of the grizzled-nearly-sacked-maverick-cop with a penchant for late night whiskey, but something cleverer. A deaf detective? Could be interesting.
  6. Develop a good support cast. Could be a horse. Could be a kid. Could be an older gent or lady with a secret past. Make your support characters shine.
  7. Read. Read other authors; work out why you like what they write. Read authors you’ve never heard of in genres you’d never normally consider. Give it a go, and be clever about it. Obvs.

She Said, He Said…

~ JacciGoodingAuthor ~ 3 Comments

Overheard in a supermarket recently;

‘..so I told him straight, I wasn’t putting it anywhere near him…’

Fret not dear reader, I resisted the urge the hurl my trolley round the corner and follow the orator stealthily through the salad aisle in the hope of discovering what it was she wasn’t going to put anywhere near him, but I can tell you, the urge was incredibly strong. Instead, I distracted myself with the lack of cucumbers and pondered instead on what she could possibly have been talking about and how I could fit it into a short story. Was she reassuring him that she wasn’t putting the crocodile/the broken bottle/it anywhere near him, or was she refusing to put the crocodile/broken bottle/it anywhere near him? Alas it will always be a mystery to me as she disappeared down the cheese aisle still chatting on her phone and by the time I caught up with her in the bread aisle the call was complete. I had no way of knowing. Her poker face offered nothing. Brown or white bread seemed to be her only concern.  We parted ways in the rice and bean aisle and by the time I got to the wine aisle a story had formed.  The next hurdle was remembering it without writing it down.  Well you can imagine what the outcome of that was.

Needless to say I returned to my office later that day and set about dismembering my 500 word short story which has been slowly growing and transmogrifying into a completely different story to the one I originally started writing. Gone were two of the main characters and in their place was a soldier and a man who might turn into a milkman at any given moment. I think I may have lost the plot temporarily. I was keen, you see, to implant, somewhere, my newly over-heard dialogue. The fact that it didn’t fit in to any of the story didn’t faze me. It should have done of course as I wasted another two and half hours trying to insert a sentence into a story that had about as much right to be there as a spider in a fridge.

You can imagine how it all ended. The short story was re-written for the 110th time and the sentence only made it as far as this blog. Well, as a fan of recycling and reusing, I can’t see any problem with that. But even so, I wish I knew what she’d been talking about…

Poetry Prose and Other Things

~ JacciGoodingAuthor

As part of the on-going preparations for next year’s South Warwickshire Literary Festival, this Saturday I’m very much looking forward to hopping over to Rugby library to see and hear the contestants for next year’s Warwickshire Young Poet Laureate. It’s been a while since I attended the event due to you-know-what, so it’ll be good to get back in the audience and hear these excellent poets read their work. The event is being hosted by poet Steve Pottinger and it’ll be good to hear his work too.

On the subject of words, poets and writery things, in an email I received from from the Evesham Festival of Words Director Sue Abblet today, she shared this about the festival and how such events can be an inspiration:

“When the Festival first started we used to run a Junior Short Story Competition.  A regular winner was Iona Mandal who said that our Festival was a huge source of inspiration.  Huge congratulations to Iona who was recently selected as Birmingham Young Poet Laureate (2022 – 2024).” Isn’t that just fantastic? So keep those short story and poetry competitions going – they’re so important.

And not only but also, the Young Poets Network is an online platform for poets under the age of 25 and is packed full of contacts and ideas, and is a great confidence builder for those young poets just starting out. Does the world need more poets I hear you rhyme? Yeah, all the time. Hey – I’m not 24 any more, ok?! 

Going back to short story comps, the marvellous Banbury Writers’ Cafe are hosting a free to enter picture prompt comp which closes at the end of this month. If you zip over to their website you’ll find the four photos to stir your inspiration and all you have to do is tiptappitytip away on your keyboard and get an entry in. Poetry is also accepted. Yeah! I know! 1500 words or less. Guidelines are all on the website. Apparently they’re happy to chuck fifty quid at the winner, thirty at second place and a flat unbendy twenty for third place.  They’re a generous bunch.

Eyeing-Up The #Competition

~ JacciGoodingAuthor

And here we go again! Another year of ideas, of writing, editing, networking. From October last year I began entering all sorts of competitions; short story, flash, meet the agent, pitch your novel, win a basket of kittens etc etc.  In the week before Christmas I received a rejection a day, Monday through to Friday. A No Thanks. A Not Today. A what-some-like-to-call Rejection of my work every single day for a week. Fine. Have it your way I thought. But after a quick sulk and an hour on Twitter looking at large cats squashing themselves into small boxes and dogs pretending they hadn’t been caught emptying the kitchen bin I decided that my work hadn’t be rejected, but declined. That made me feel better. And it’s true isn’t it – one competition judge’s decline is another’s accept, so that’s what I’m going into the New Year with – positivity.
There are lots of competitions out there at the moment. Big ones, little ones, short ones, long ones, international and closer to home ones. So let’s get going! Tinsel and tat long gone, let’s get on with the business of boosting your writing and confidence by entering some. Here are my top tips:

1 – and I never thought I’d ever say this – get yourself a spreadsheet and list what you’ve sent, where you’ve sent it, when the results day is and what the process will be – ie winner notification, shortlisters posted on the competition website etc etc. Dull as it may sound, having a spreadsheet will help. Trust me. Seeing how many comps you’ve entered keeps you on track

2 Go for ones with good prizes, not just ‘and you’ll get published on our website’, good as they may be. Go for something really worth writing for, like a decent cash prize, a presentation (ie a chance to network) and possibly publication

3 Try to enter two or three a week

4 It can get expensive so look for some free to enter comps

5 Share the opportunities with others – FB, Twitter, in person. What goes around comes around my friend.

Here’s six of the juiciest I’ve found this week: (but there are loads and loads out there!)

1 The Chipping Norton Festival ChipLit Short Story Comp 2020 – closes 8thFeb

2 Retreat West – The Retreat West Novelette-in-Flash Prize 2020. Word count for this competition is 8000 words. The narrative arc should be made up of standalone flash fiction chapters of up to 500 words each. Deadline May 31st, £10 entry fee https://www.retreatwest.co.uk/novelette-in-flash-prize/

3 The Fiction Desk – Ghost Story (always a favourite) £3 entry fee, deadline 31 January 2020. Theme: Ghosts Across Borders
https://www.thefictiondesk.com/submissions/ghost-stories.php

4 Bath Flash Fiction Award Maximum length is 300 words excluding title https://bathflashfictionaward.com/ ClosesMidnight February 16th 2020

5 The 2020 Bristol Short Story Prize in association with Tangent Books, is open for entries from writers all around the world

6 And if you’re looking to stretch your writerly muscles, why not write for someone else? That no-nonsense gang of writers down west, Writers HQ, are looking for people to write their blog occasionally. Nothing ventured, nothing gained…
https://writershq.co.uk/write-for-us/