This week (17th-23rd November) is National Short Story Week

The aims of which include:

to get more people reading and listening to short stories

and

to get more people writing short stories


I recently enjoyed reading Zoe Gilbert’s post addressing the question ‘Are writers the only - or the best- readers of short stories?’

and loved this analogy:

'all really good short stories, even ascetic, simple, realist ones, should be treated like rich desserts, to be pondered over and definitely not followed by every other pudding on the menu. Otherwise, all those complex flavours are lost.'

Her conclusion was that:

'You don’t have to be a writer to enjoy great short stories. I think you just have to understand what they are. '


I will definitely read some short stories this week. Looking at my bookshelves, I only have a few contemporary short story collections. These can be seen on my Pinterest (pathstothepast) board ‘Short story collections - read’


So I just need to decide whether to go back to those stories I’m familiar with, or try some classic short stories instead. Maybe by F. Scott Fitzgerald (hence the image of the dustjacket for ‘Tales of the Jazz Age’ at the top of this post) or Anthony Trollope or Thomas Hardy….


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I am currently writing a great TV series and am looking for new and experienced writers to get involved. I will soon upload a synopsis of the first season. If your you're looking for something brilliant to get your writing skills involved in, whether you're experiencing a writers' block or looking for a golden opportunity to show what you you've got then I believe I have the remedy...

Thanks
J.N

This was my first HNS conference and I was unsure of what to expect and as a newbie was rather nervous about meeting people. I needn’t have worried.

Highlights included Conn Iggulden’s keynote address and Lindsey Davis in conversation with Jerome de Groot.

A key part of the Society’s remit is to encourage writers of historical fiction, and two awards were given during the conference.

Elizabeth Chadwick presented the inaugural HNS Indie Award to Linda Proud for
A Gift for the Magus.

The HNS Short Story Award for 2014 was presented by Ian Skillicorn (founder of Short Story Week) to Lorna Fergusson for Salt

I’m hoping that an ebook of the 2014 shortlisted stories will be published, like the 2012 entries were as The Beggar at the Gate & Other Stories.


The panel sessions were in turn informative:
(Selling Historical Fiction: the challenges and triumphs with Matt Bates, Carole Blake (CHAIR), Katie Bond, Nick Sayers, Simon Taylor, Susan Watt) - how important the book cover is.

fun: (‘My Era is Better than Yours’ with Angus Donald (Medieval), Suzannah Dunn (Tudor), Antonia Hodgson (Georgian), Giles Kristian (Viking & Civil War), Harry Sidebottom (Ancient Rome), Philip Stevens (CHAIR)) - Vikings had big axes.

thought provoking: (Freedom, Independence & Equality: Tackling the big issues with Emma Darwin, Elizabeth Fremantle, Margaret George, Douglas Jackson (CHAIR), Andrew Taylor, Robyn Young) - Margaret George refers to her novels about famous women in history as ‘psycho biographies.’

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With Alzheimer’s research in the news again lately, I thought I’d better knuckle down to my much foreshadowed post on literary dementia. For readers and writers who are wary of fictional old age, the spectre of dementia might seem a definite no-no. Yet there’s so much potential in the condition for creative exploration and expression: the poignancy of loss; the enigma of memory and identity; the frustrations experienced by family and other carers; even, for those who can achieve the right tone without denigration, humour. So it’s heartening to discover young women writers who are addressing these themes in their debut novels: Emma Healey in the UK with Elizabeth Is Missing, and Fiona McFarlane in Australia with The Night Guest. I thought I’d draw on those novels, along with two less recent novels from more established writers, Getting Away With It by Julie Cohen and Scar Tissue by Michael Ignatieff, to explore fictional representations of dementia.

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Before all Liverpool fans hit the delete button let me explain that I am from the blue three-quarters of Manchester and share your antipathy towards the club from Salford (hereinafter called the CFS).

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It is no coincidence that in Italy priorities for the good of the nation are undermined through a variety of local or collective identities.

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Historical fiction - a list of 50
Next week, between 5 and 7 September, I’ll be attending the Historical Novel Society’s conference in London.

So, for this post, I thought I’d take a look at a list of historical fiction books, from Abe Books.

In her introduction to 50 Essential Historical novels, Lily King admits that ‘The books listed below include examples of historical fiction by the strictest of definitions, as well as those that fudge the rules a bit - or a lot.’

Of the list of 50, I’ve only read three:

‘I Claudius’ by Robert Graves

‘The Name of the Rose’ by Umberto Eco

‘A Tale of Two Cities’ by Charles Dickens

Although I haven’t read the following on the list ‘Waverley’, ‘The Night Watch’, ‘The Other Boleyn Girl’ and ‘Bring Up the Bodies’, I have read other historical novels by their respective authors, Sir Walter Scott, Sarah Waters, Philippa Gregory and Hilary Mantel.

Those on the list which do appeal to me, and will be added to my ever expanding ‘to read’ list are:

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What do you understand by the term “a good child”? Does it imply a particular proficiency in getting up to mischief and other childish things? Or does it mean, as for the Saddeq children growing up in Lahore in the new nation of Pakistan, suppressing their own inclinations and desires in favour of their mother’s strict demands. In a divide-a-rule regime reminiscent of the British Raj, the boys, Sully and Jakie, are destined to be doctors, their learning beaten into them by a tutor they nickname, appropriately, Basher, while the girls, Mae and little Lana, hug their mother’s shadow, dressed up like dolls in scratchy frilly dresses unsuitable for the suffocating heat. Until the day they can escape their manipulative mother through marriage for the girls and education abroad for the boys, they have no choice but to comply.

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Agent A

An agent on mobile walking through Athletico international airport.

'Eh...what? Yah, yah...I'll be at The Vascov around 10.30ish...yah..erm well Marcia said she'll keep tabs on that one...yap...ten installations have sold but we need to start the marketing campaign for Aimii Slite...yap...well say something along the lines of liminal spaces, the domestic, duality, tacit and all that shite - she's a photographer...her father...yap...he's chief exec at Zennels Corps...ha ha...she's lovely - just finished at Novia Art College but is moving to Pointeso...it's a no brainer...look, I'll be on the 8.30 plane so will meet you at Kane's bar at Pointeso airport...no shit? Ok...include networking and mentoring and don't forget to mention 'The rural' that always looks good on the evaluation...'

The voice fades as the figure moves through the crowd towards gate 195.


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Get on down to outer Pointeso this weekend for the latest opening at the Maitvale Workspace.

Hala Koinstraad continues her gathering of post sonic deviations comprising of a new collection detailing radio waves gleaned from the municipal city of Bayerns over the last twenty years.
Every new artist based at Maitvale is paired with a mentor who they meet with up to six times during their tenure. They have continuous access to specialist support from Maitvale staff and the selected programme facilitator during the year.

Maitvale Workspace director Polly Sylvester: 'We position ourselves in an 'exclusive inclusive' bracket so to speak. Whilst recognising that the Pointeso Art Scene is highly competitive, we offer our artists a bespoke package fusing cognitive science with cutting edge resources and strict emphasis on long game career development.'


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