On the other hand -think Guillermo del Toro and Pan's Labyrynth rather than Ken Loach and The Wind that Shakes the Barley - I do like a bit of fantasy for a change, not to mention some, dare I say it, beautiful screen images.



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So, there I was, sitting in work, talking to someone on the phone but scribbling down words that were falling into my head. After that call I noted all the names on my call sheet (only first names - and some of them not real). By the end of the shift I had planned a novel! Yes, another one.

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I woke up this morning, back in Israel, with a heavy cold, and, inspired by a friend, said to the Universe: "Surprise and delight me!". And, what do you know? It did. I was utterly bowled over to discover that my flash story, Come Back Tomorrow, originally published in Dogzplot, has been selected by Darlin' Neal for Wigleaf's Top 50 Very Short Fictions of 2009 (stories under 1000 words published in 2008 in US-based journals are eligible).

I remember looking at their first Top 50 last year with great envy! What a nice thing to happen of a morning. I am in amazing company in the Top 50, and in the long shortlist of 200 from which the 50 was picked, including Sarah Hilary and Aimee Bender! This is not just an honour but these lists are a wonderful resource for flash writers, providing a wealth of literary journals to read and submit to. Do go and have a look.

On that note, here are some upcoming deadlines - always worth getting your entry in early (which I never manage to do but always aspire to!):

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The first thing you need to know about the Fair is that it isn’t really for writers; it’s for publishing, rights and distribution deals to be thrashed out. Once you’ve accepted that, it’s a great learning opportunity.

My badge states Writer – I’ll choose Author after my second publication is in a bookshop. Writer tells the world what I do, without hyperbole or modesty. I’m a vital part of this industry and everyone here is my equal. They want successful books and I want my books to be successful.

Large publishers will ignore you, quite blatantly. One had a sign saying ‘Please don’t distract us from our meetings’. In the giveaway Bookseller magazine, someone talked proudly of spending the day avoiding unagented writers. Some stands offer submission guidelines and a treasured few – smaller organisations usually – make time to discuss what they’re looking for. And that’s all perfectly okay; it’s the nature of the business we’re in.


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As some eagle-eyed readers of this blog may have spotted, I am to be found this week discussing how my book came to be published and what happened next over at Jane Smith's excellent How Publishing <span style="font-style: italic;">Really</span> Works blog. I have tried to give as honest an account as I could of the process to date. This is the second, I believe, in Jane's Trios series, where an author, a publisher and a bookseller discuss a book from their particular aspect. Jen Hamilton-Emery from Salt and Sara Crowley, short story champion at Waterstone's will be interviewed there shortly.

And... for all those of you who don't yet have it, I will be giving away a copy of The White Road and Other Stories to one lucky blog reader...What are you waiting for??

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So, tomorrow I'm hoping that I'll have had all the approvals on the proofs I sent the contributors to the photo book. This is good. This is exciting. This means we can get it to the printers and it means we'll be one step away from being able to have the book, to ship the book, to sell the book and to make money for The Alzheimer's Society. The hard work that Katherine and I have put in will be closer to changing into something physical. I am a bit nervous and very excited.

So let me thank some people. Let me thank Katherine for putting up with me and for working her socks off and for having such fab pictures people have been able to write to. And let me thank all who've written something and who've been so quick and so easy to work with.

Those people are:

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I read somewhere that our generation will probably the last to enjoy a long retirement. In future there'll be no time for wage-earners to shake off what Philip Larkin called 'the toad work' and flourish as individuals. It's sad to think of them grinding away into old age in the service of some faceless company, instead of sending metaphorical good wishes to their friends and neighbours in Penge .


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Happy birthday Samuel Johnson, Charles Darwin and Edgar Allen Poe. And here’s some cake for you too, Louis Braille and Arthur Conan Doyle.
This year is chockfull of literary anniversaries. They don’t mean a lot to most of us but they’ve got me thinking about the personal marking of time when it comes to writing. I haven’t wanted to admit, even to myself, how long I’ve been writing seriously without any visible sign of success. Actually, I’m not even sure what ‘writing seriously’ means. I’ve squeezed it in with having two children and some semblance of a career. But I’ve seriously wanted it, so I guess that counts. My youngest child just turned six and it has made me face up to the fact that I sent out my first manuscript when I was a few weeks from giving birth to him.
In those days I didn’t believe statistics about all the people out there trying to get published. This was clearly a lie designed to put off anyone who wasn’t serious. Having once dealt with reader letters on a newspaper, I also thought that the majority of manuscripts would be in green ink, with the occasional random capital letter in the middle of a sentence. They wouldn’t be as good as mine, no siree!

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The first thing that I noticed about Jackie was her necklace. It was spun from strands of fine beige yarn, three or four or more criss-crossing threads each strung with buttons and worn close to the neck choker style. Every button was a different colour from its neighbour – pale pinky pinks to sky vapour blues, soft sage greens to earth cool ochres – each round, and perhaps the size of a penny piece.

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Coming to the end of my very short trip to the UK, here is a quick round up and what I hope is interesting information from my experience of meeting two literary agents.

First, two of my flash stories were shortlisted for the FISH One Page short story competition, but alas once more it was not to be! Congratulations to the winners.

Second, it was my grandmother's 100th birthday yesterday (this is a pic of me and her a few years ago), and the party held in her nursing home, complete with cupcakes with her name on (!), felt like a truly historic event. There was the card from the Queen (no telegrams any more), and many family members, some I had never met. And my grandmother, Zara, beaming from her wheelchair. And this is book-related: My aunt and uncle had made Zara's dream come true by producing a beautiful, hardback book with extracts from the memoirs she has been working on almost as long as I've known her, complete with photos. Totally wonderful, I look forward to getting my copy - and was astonished to be summoned by some cousins and shown a photograph of my grandmother in 1927 which really did look like me. Genes, eh! When I get the book in digital format, I may post the photo here and see what you think. I don't really look strongly like either of my parents, so this was something quite lovely.

Agents. OK. Buoyed by the Orange Award commendation, which gave me the feeling that the world was open to me in a way that it hadn't been before, I had set up two meetings in London with agents who had been personally recommended to me. I was excited yet unsure: how would the meeting go? Who would speak first? What would I say?

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