Indholdsfortegnelse for September 2024 i Writing Magazine

Whatever we write needs us to use the right words for the right purpose. In the vast majority of cases this means the writing needs to resonate with its readers. Even if you’re writing step-by-step instructions on how to change a light bulb, they’ll be more effective if the voice and tone connect with the readers whose lights have gone out. And if you’re writing fiction that truly engages its readers. it’s imperative that it should make those readers feel something: excitement, suspense, rage, fear, hope, love, curiosity… This issue of Writing Magazine fully embraces the concept of generating emotional impact in your writing, with outstanding articles on developing characters over time (p6), writing high-concept romance (p9), the relationship between writing and grief (p12) and being published later in life…

‘High concept’ is one of those buzz words that gets thrown around a lot in the publishing world. You absolutely do not need a high concept premise to write a good story and get it published, but a lot of authors wonder what exactly high concept fiction is – how do they know if they are writing it? How to pitch it? How to know if the idea is any good? And at the moment, high concept love stories are all the rage. So we’ve asked four authors who fit in this genre, for their tips on writing a high concept love story… Cesca Major, author of If I Were You, published by Harper Collins (July 2024) I adore writing in this genre. My first novel Maybe Next Time played…

If I said night-words would you know what I meant? I’m talking about the words you need to arrive, and not the ones that come to us in the hours of the night. The latter often arrive when we’re too tired to make a written note of them. We think we’ll remember them in the morning but, like the darkness, they disappear. The night-words I mean are the ones you want to come to you. Let’s say you’re stuck on a problem with a story plot, or you don’t know what your main character is going to do next, or what to do with a minor character who has decided they want to be important. There are a couple of solutions to these dilemmas. One involves sleeping. The other doesn’t.…

Margo and Anne sat at the table1 and looked at the items. A small chest and a dusty old book on keys.2 ‘Its not haunted, is it Margo’?3 Anne’s sarcastic voice said breaking the silence.4 Margo had been left this chest in her aunts Will, with no backstory or reasoning.5 ‘I hope not, but you never knew what you were getting with my aunt’. Margo replied6 ‘Well let’s open it and get this demon out’7 Anne commented impatiently. The two women took a deep breath and Margo opened the chest.8 The chest9 was very heavy,10 the black chipped paint showed its age.11 It wasn’t sealed12 but inside sitting in a mahogany and walnut interior,13 was an old iron key, sitting there impatiently on a well-preserved red cushion.14 Anne looked at…

Every autumn we run the Writing Magazine Children’s Book Prize, with both picture book and chapter book categories. And the submission window is coming around again! This autumn we will be looking for brilliant picture books for young readers which entertain, inspire or move us – or perhaps all three! Previous winners have gone on to sign with agents or seen their winning entry become a published book (you can find out more here: www.storygodmother.co.uk/index.php/author-spotlight). Often, writers will consider the character, plot and theme of their picture book, but sometimes the tone and genre can be a little less clear. But having a solid understanding of genre and tone can enhance the reader’s experiences and make the story feel less generic and middle-of-the-road. Here are some tips about how to…

I have a huge admiration for authors who write books for children. I wrote one once. Once, being the operative word. Don’t get me wrong, I’m proud Hodder Childrens commissioned me to write Puppytalk: 50 Ways to Make Friends with Your Puppy. But there was so much toing and froing of the manuscript between me and my brilliant editor as we strove to choose the right words that I thought we’d never finish the project. The book was aimed at seven-toeleven-year-olds, and I soon learned how different an eleven-year-old’s vocabulary is to that of a reader aged seven. Thanks to the skill of my editor, we created a book that was not too difficult for the younger readers, but still engaging and entertaining for those slightly older. Of course, JK…

We all develop a toolkit as editors, a skillset that allows us to view a submission and swiftly understand which elements work and which need addressing. Core, of course, to this is what is the key concept that piques interest in the reader, that starts the heart of the book beating? Next comes the question: how is the pacing as this unfolds – is there too much too soon or is the reader twiddling their thumbs waiting for something to take place? As for the text, and the use of language, does is flow intuitively or is there a self-conscious element of overwriting that attracts attention to itself rather than assisting the build of tension? As agents and editors progress with experience, they’re able to react quickly to a submission…

The Paul Cave Prize for Literature 2024 The Paul Cave Prize for Literature is run by Tim Saunders Publications in honour of book and magazine publisher Paul Astley Cave-Brown-Cave, who died in 2010. The competition invites entries of poetry up to 30 lines, flash fiction up to 300 words, short stories up to 1,000 words and novellas up to 10,000 words. The prizes are £150 for best novella, £75 for best short story and £35 each for best poetry and flash fiction. Winners and all approved submissions will be included in The Paul Cave Prize for Literature 2024 anthology. The entry fees are £13 for one short story/£20 for two; £26/£42 novella; £10 for up to three poems or flash fictions/£20 up to eight. The closing date is 30 September.…

Words of the Wild 2024 The new competition for nature writing celebrates 60 years of the Scottish Woodland Trust. Entries of writing about personal encounters with Scottish wildlife are invited. Submissions may take the form of poetry, journalism, letters, lyrics or short fiction, and may be fiction or non-fiction. All entries must be connected to Scottish native wildlife. Enter writing up to 1,000 words. The winner of the adult category will receive a pair of Osprey binoculars, an environmental book subscription, a £200 NHBS voucher and a one-year subscription to the Scottish Woodland Trust or one of its wildlife adoptions. The junior (under 18s) winner will receive a trailcam starter bundle, NHBS voucher and Trust/wildlife adoption membership. The closing date is 31 August. Website: https://scottishwildlifetrust.org.uk/wordsofthewild/words-of-the-wild-competition/ The Anthology Travel Writing Award…

Mill Media By Gary Dalkin Mill Media, described by the Financial Times as, ‘one of the most interesting and impressive media startups of the last decade, and crucially one that’s doing really valuable and sustainable public service journalism,’ is expanding its network of freelance writers for their digital publications covering Manchester, London, Birmingham, Sheffield, Glasgow and Liverpool. The editorial team are looking for writers that can deliver narrative features, reported profiles, cultural essays, data pieces and groundbreaking investigations. It is important that stories feel completely different to anything else that has been published on a particular topic, and when they commission a story, they are wanting a strong narrative, often with a key character the piece is built around, and always with a sense of revealing something new. You are…

Searchlight Awards 2024 Best Novel Opening for Children or Young Adults To enter, send the first chapter up to 1,200 words of a novel manuscript for middle grade or young adult readers, plus a short pitch. The top ten entries will feature in a Pitch Book of winning stories, which is sent to an extensive list of literary agents and publishers who have requested it. The first prize winner will receive £1,000 and a one-to-one call with the agent judge. The second prize winner will receive an editorial review and an hour-long online meeting with Steve Voake. Winners will be chosen by Rachel Petty of The Blair Partnership. The entry fee is £16. The closing date is 1 September. Website: https://www.searchlightawards.co.uk/competitions/best-novel-opening-for-children-or-young-adults-2024/ Searchlight Awards Best Children’s Picture Book Text 2024 To…

Earlier this year the Authors’ Licencing and Collecting Society (ALCS) launched a ‘Manifesto for Writers and Creators’ as a basis to work constructively with any future government to ‘support the creative industries and the individual creators that sustain them’, writes Gary Dalkin. Now a new administration has been formed the ALCS will be working to implement the manifesto with the Labour government. Key areas of the manifesto are; fair renumeration for those writing for online platforms; AI and copyright; a proposed new office of ‘Freelance Commissioner’ to support the rights of freelancers; support for the Primary School Library Alliance; a proposed Smart Fund that would see a small levy on the cost of some technology devices to be paid out to creators as compensation for the use of their works…

When I began writing my novel about the Victorian era’s funniest lady detective, Violet Hamilton, I hit a wall. I wanted Violet to be bold, daring, ground-breaking and free, but it went against all I was reading about women’s real lives at the time. How do you give a woman glorious adventures when she would have been expected to stay at home and behave? Fiction gave me the answer, when I fell into the rich world of Victorian lady detectives. Victorian male detectives are well known in fiction, but female ones less so – even though they appeared in stories over twenty years before Sherlock Holmes. These intrepid fictional ladies had a freedom and a level of excitement real women must have longed for. Loveday Brooke, created by Catherine Louisa…

In the first parts of our examination of the Building Block of Character, we briefly looked at the fundamental aspects of the Main Character – who they are, what they want and why they are in this particular story. In Part Three, we will broaden our study to take a look at how to make our characters feel real. Our examination of the Building Block of Character is based on a short story I wrote several years ago, called ‘Sundays’. The short story can be found in the previous issue and also online at: https://bit.ly/IanAyrisSundays Recap Let us first reintroduce the characters in this story: Main Character: Unnamed Boy Antagonist/Nemesis Dad Secondary character Mum Secondary secondary characters Auntie Cheryl Uncle Pete The terminology I have used to describe the function…

HAPPY TEARS Not Without Me is my lockdown novel, started during those long and tedious days of not being able to go about our daily business, writes subscriber Maria Dean. I’m a pantser, always have been, no planning, no plotting; I prefer to delve right in and let the characters lead the way. And the novel started well, was writing itself, until it wasn’t, and I found myself mid-way through without an end in sight. So, it got shelved whilst I worked on other things. But then early last year, I decided that Cade and Lexie’s story could not remain unfinished, so, I knuckled down and set to work. It’s been a tough one to write for several reasons. The first being the emotional trauma suffered by the characters with…

Crowvus Christmas Ghost Story Competition 2024 The annual Christmas Ghost Story Competition from Scottish independent publisher Crowvus is inviting entries of original, unpublished short spooky fiction. Winning stories will be published for Christmas, in the tradition of telling chilling tales as seasonal fireside entertainment. The winner will receive £100 and there are second and third prizes of £75 and £50. Enter original, unpublished supernatural stories up to 4,000 words. Each author may enter up to two stories. The entry fee is £3 per story or £5 for two. The closing date is 30 September. Website: www.crowvus.com/competition Free Flash Fiction Competition Twenty-Three Entries should be original and unpublished flash fiction between 100 and 300 words, and may be on any theme. The winner will receive £150 and publication on the Free…

The Geoff Stevens Memorial Poetry Prize 2024 The Geoff Stevens Memorial Poetry Prize is for full-length poetry collections. Two winners’ collections will be published by award-winning independent press Indigo Dreams, and the winners will each receive 25 copies and royalties. To enter, submit 20 pages of poetry, with a maximum of 40 lines per page. Submitted poems may have been published online, in magazines and anthologies, but not as a complete collection. Winning collections will be up to 52 pages, and published in 2025. The entry fee is £20 for one block of poems, £36 for two and £48 for three. The closing date is 30 August. Website: https://indigodreamspublishing.com/geoff-stevens-poetry-competition Anthology Poetry Award 2024 The winner will receive €1,000 and have their work published in Anthology magazine The Anthology Poetry Award…

Galiot Press The editorial team at Galiot Press publish fiction, creative non-fiction, and memoir as well as collections of linked short stories, writes PDR Lindsay-Salmon. They like to publish work that does not fit neatly into existing categories. No genre fiction. Each week the editors issue query spots that writers can apply for at the website. Writers click to select a day and receive a private link for them to upload a one page query letter and the first 10 pages of the manuscript, which must be done the day after receiving the link. By Friday of the week if the editors wish to see more work they will provide a clear overview of how they work and and ask for the writer’s acceptance. After that the completed manuscript must…

Dreamers Creative Writing The editorial team seek short stories, poems, personal essays or excerpts from any genre. Give them well written work written from the heart. Payment is an honorarium of between CAD$20 and CAD$60. Website: www.dreamerswriting.com Ahoy Comics Ahoy Comics wants ‘smart, weird, funny articles or stories, which run between 500 and 1,500 words,’ preferred length around 650 words. A dash of humour is welcomed. Payment is US$200 per story. Website: http://comicsahoy.com WUSSY WUSSY is the website and zine of a proudly Queer media company. The bi-annual print magazine features ‘a vast array of international Queer artists, movers, and shakers’ people curating monthly events --drag shows, film screenings, art exhibitions, comedy events, poetry readings, open mics and more. There is a podcast with three weekly shows and the team…

One of the biggest concerns when it comes to writing memoir is that it’s impossible to avoid mentioning real people, and not always in the best light. Memoir writers risk causing hurt and offense, or even getting sued for defamation. Trying to disguise people by changing their names is not a protection. Anyone who is recognisable in your story, can reasonably raise a complaint. For example, you might call the boss who fired you from the factory by a different name, but because of the role they play in your story, they will still be recognisable, and obviously it would be impossible to disguise family members by simply giving them different names. I’ve read lots of memoirists talking about their craft and the best solution I have found comes from…

STAR LETTER BEING SEEN IN BOOKS Freddie Kölsch’s article (WM July) was truly inspirational and I’m pleased to see that Writing Magazine recognises the importance of telling authentic LGBTQ+ stories. Freddie talks about growing up in New England and the ‘bad things’ that happened to queer people in the US. Growing up at the same sort of time in England was just as bad. Also in the shadow of HIV/Aids, I grew up under section 28 – a law which prevented schools from ‘promoting’ homosexuality. That meant that the school library had no books with people like me in it. I couldn’t connect with characters who had the same feelings as me, who had the same experiences and who could show me that things do get better. Queer characters, especially…

Q If a registered paedophile moves into a new area, or returns to an old area, how are the police notified? Could he be there before they find out? Is there a police system for this? Sarah Francis via email A It would be a part of the offender’s conditions that she or he notify the police when they move from and to a new location. ViSOR (Violent and Sex Offender Register) is a database which allows the police, probation and prison service to share sensitive information about offenders in order to manage these individuals. It also assists with any risk assessments the police need to make to keep the public safe. An officer from the local police area would visit and monitor him/her at their new address. In reality,…

Chicken Soup Anthologies The editors of the Chicken Soup Anthologies are seeking stories for their next dog and cat anthologies as well as an anthology called Change your habits & attitudes/change your life. Find all the details for each anthology at the website but remember that ‘A Chicken Soup for the Soul story is an inspirational, true story about ordinary people having extraordinary experiences.’ The team want emotion: ‘a story that opens the heart and rekindles the spirit.’ The stories must be first person and filled with vivid images. The editors want heart and hope in fact not fiction. Deadlines are 31 August and 30 September. Payment is US$250 plus 10 copies. Website: www.chickensoup.com/story-submissions; submit online Knight Writing Press Knight Writing Press wants short stories for the new anthology, Mermaidens…

New Misters and Misses Two new characters are joining the Mr Men/Little Miss publishing world (Farshore, HarperCollins). The much loved children’s books, for the last 20 years written by Adam Hargreaves, son of the series creator, Roger Hargreaves, will introduce Little Miss Surprise and Mr Fib on 12 September. Adam Hargreaves said, ‘It’s always fun creating new characters to add to the series, although I’ve got a way to go to catch up with my dad. A Mr Fib has been rattling around in my imagination for a long while and Little Miss Surprise, of course, popped into my head right out of the blue.’ GD Did Albert Camus create a fake hand copied ‘first draft’ of his classic novel, L’Étranger, writes Gary Dalkin? That seems to be the most…

Black Cat Weekly Black Cat Weekly is one of two Moksha Press weekly magazines. It showcases original, modern, and classic mysteries and adventure stories. Submit original, unpublished solve-it-yourself mysteries, and classic mystery stories, 1,500 to 15,000 words. Stories must include a crime. The team like ‘traditionally plotted stories rather than experimental or literary fiction.’ No AI. Payment is US$15 to US$50, on publication. PDRLS Website: https://wildside.moksha.io Broken Antler Broken Antler is a literary magazine publishing dark, speculative, experimental, unsettling, and absurd work, writes PDR Lindsay-Salmon. There is an online version, Broken Antler Quarterly, and The Marrow is the blog and home of the LGBTQIA+ creator series. All need submissions of ‘creative and critical work … within the horror space. The team want work that is haunting and monstrous, strange and bizarre,…

Dithering Chaps Dithering Chaps is a Dorset-based non-profit poetry small press, writes Gary Dalkin. They recently published the Bournemouth Writing Festival’s debut anthology, Lines in the Sand, and are looking for new poets to add to their growing family of authors, with a submission period open to midnight on 31 August. The aim is to publish chapbooks of up to forty A5 pages of poems, though lead editor Gena Herring will consider slightly longer or shorter collections. The press is keen to publish thematically linked sequences of poems: works that riff on a core conceit, event or narrative voice. Cohesion is important, as is consistency of register and attention to form. However, they don’t want to be too rigid, as much of their favourite poetry is ‘shape-shifting and studded with…

Awards round-up The 2024 Indie Book Awards were announced as part of Independent Bookshop Week in June. The winners were, Fiction: Yellowface, Rebecca F. Kuang; Non-Fiction: The Golden Mole and Other Vanishing Treasure, Katherine Rundell, illustrated by Talya Baldwin; Children’s Fiction: Safiyyah’s War, Hiba Noor Khan; Picture Book: The Dress in the Window, Robert Tregoning, illustrated by Pippa Curnick. Notably, Kuang’s Babel was also nominated for best fiction, making it double the achievement that she didn’t split her support with the judging panel. The Locus Science Fiction Foundation announced the winners of the 2024 Locus Awards in June. The winners were, Best Science Fiction Novel, System Collapse, Martha Wells; Fantasy Novel, Witch King, Martha Wells; Horror Novel, A House with Good Bones, T. Kingfisher; Young Adult Novel, Promises Stronger Than…