Anyone’s Rift

  Fantastic Books Publishing, who published my debut novel (The Defiant Spark) ran a competition to write a piece of flash fiction, based on quotes from some of their books – I challenged myself to write something in a completely different world, based on a quote from my own book – and I placed third! […]

Fun Competition Win!

Back in September, I entered the Fall 2019 Three Cheers And A Tiger contest from Toasted Cheese. Entrants were given 48 hours to write a story based on the prompt: “Write a fantasy or science fiction story under 5000 words that opens with something needlessly dramatic, which becomes actual drama when…” Comedy science-fiction isn’t really in […]

Competition Shortlist!

This month’s Writing Magazine had me shortlisted in the Mid-Sentence Competition, which was a lovely surprise. I had hoped my story might do well, since I was very pleased with it, but it was quite bizarre and Writing Magazine are usually fairly mainstream in their choices for competition winners. So shortlisted is very satisfying and […]

Another Writing Magazine Success

I came back from holiday on Monday to find this month’s issue of Writing Magazine in our post box. On flicking through, I discovered I had been shortlisted in their Real Time Short Story Competition, which was a nice surprise. I’m particularly pleased because the story I submitted was science-fiction, which they don’t often reward, […]

Urban Flash – Competition Win!

The Photo Republic of London have launched a new project, called Urban Flash, which is taking place over the next year.  It involves text and photographic prompts, which members can respond to either by submitting a photograph or a piece of flash fiction. I entered the Warm-Up Prompt Competition, submitting a short piece based on […]

It Pays to Follow Up

Back in November, I entered a competition to have one of my stories recorded by a company called Soundwork.  I forgort all about it until this week, when I was tracking my outstanding submissions.  I spotted a note I’d left for myself, saying I would need to check their website for the results – and, […]

Just when you think you’re out of the running…

The very day I pretty much decided to abandon my novel as a ‘useful first experiment’, I got an email telling me I’ve been long-listed in the UK Novel Writing Competition! Out of 3,112, mine has been selected along with 249 others to go forwards to the next stage of the competition. So, yay!  I’ll […]