20th April 2024 – Crime Writer Charlie Garratt

This workshop will look at beginnings  (e.g. getting ideas, normal world and inciting incident) and building characters. This will include some exercises, and a Q&A at the end.

With Crime Writer Charlie Garratt 

https://charliegarratt.com/

About Charlie: 
Charlie Garratt is local-based author of a series of crime novels featuring Inspector James Given, set in the late 1930s and early 1940s. His love of crime novels goes way back to childhood and adolescence. Whether it be the Famous Five’s criminal investigations, science fiction detectives on distant worlds, or Wilkie Collins’ immortal The Moonstone.

When…
This 60-minute-long workshop will be held during Wrekin Writers’ February meeting, which starts at 10am on Saturday 20^th April 2024.
Charlie’s workshop will begin at 11am and aim to finish by 12pm.

Where…
Wrekin Writers usual venue the downstairs room at the rear of the Wellington Community Art Gallery, 8-10 Duke Street, Wellington, TF1 1BJ

Workshop – 16th March 2024 – Into the Otherworld – fairy and folk magic tales

Fairy and Folk tales are full of magic and make believe, but they are certainly not just for children! These tales explore fundamental patterns of storytelling and uncover important truths. In this writing workshop Kate Innes will provide you with lots of visual images to get your narrative started, and a framework to build exciting adventures for your characters, leading to a satisfying, and possibly surprising, ending!

Kate Innes worked as an archaeologist, teacher and museum educator before moving to Shropshire and writing full time. Her highly acclaimedArrowsmith Trilogy of medieval novels is set in the Welsh Marches and includes some of the area’s most iconic historic sites. Kate’s first poetry collection, Flocks of Words, was shortlisted for the Rubery Book Award in 2018, as was her first children’s book, Greencoats, an historical fantasy set in WW2. She was the winner of the Imagined Worlds Poetry Prize 2018 and the WPF Festival in a Book Prize in 2023.

www.kateinneswriter.com

@kateinnes2

When…
This 60-minute-long workshop will be held during Wrekin Writers’ March meeting, which starts at 10am on Saturday 16^th March 2024.
Nick’s workshop will begin at 11am and aim to finish by 12pm.

Where…
Wrekin Writers usual venue the downstairs room at the rear of the Wellington Community Art Gallery, 8-10 Duke Street, Wellington, TF1 1BJ

Workshop Saturday 17th February 2024 – Nick Pearson

Poetry – Under The Skin

Let the poetic muse capture your imagination and then run it free in this taster workshop led by this year’s Wellington Poet in Residence, Nick Pearson.

Come along to …
…learn about the poetic devices of rhyme, rhythm, meter, syntax, structure and so much more to support your poetry writing
…develop the skills and confidence for those of you who “can’t write poetry for toffee” to take your first sticky steps and put pen to paper
…relax in the reflections of a selection of poems chosen specially by Nick for Wrekin Writers

When…
This 90-minute-long workshop will be held during Wrekin Writers’ February meeting, which starts at 10am on Saturday 17^th February 2024.
Nick’s workshop will begin at 11am and aim to finish by 12.30pm.

Where…
Wrekin Writers usual venue the downstairs room at the rear of the Wellington Community Art Gallery, 8-10 Duke Street, Wellington, TF1 1BJ

The Common Thread of Being Human

By Chris Owen

In a recent WW blog, I made mention of the positive and sometimes negative influences on most writers that have shaped their careers.

I must confess to the same personal influences that have affected my writing experiences.

And also the strange effects writing about a cataclysmic event had upon me which was directly family-related.

I had assumed that being engaged in research about the events of The Great War (as WW1 was dubbed) would be somehow cathartic in some ways in my own personal search for answers as to why my maternal grandfather took his own life in 1963 when I was just 13 years of age.

Scant family records available gave no clue as to his age at the time of his death (approx 70+).

Although there must be formal documentation i.e. – death certificate etc., available somewhere.

Being a rather naive teenager, I had hoped that, in the fullness of time, my own parents would fill in the missing information. However, no such enlightening details were forthcoming from any relative directly affected.

As late as the nineteen-sixties suicide, whatever the underlying motive, was regarded by society at large as shameful and criminal; prompting families to hide such events from public scrutiny rather than probe the reasons for it.

My mother’s family members were never very close, particularly the siblings comprising four daughters, of which she was the youngest.

Grandad Jack was a WW1 wounded infantryman who was invalided out towards the end of the conflict.

All I was told and observed from self-apparent physical wounds was that he was injured in a WW1 battle necessitating amputation of his left leg above the knee.

I knew him as a cantankerous old devil with a heart of gold. A bit rough around the edges but nevertheless a caring soul.

During the war which irrevocably changed him, due to the crudity of surgical procedures and postoperative convalescence, resulting in incurable residual nerve damage, he was left with recurrent pain. This was the root cause, I would surmise, of his long-term mood swings mixed with bouts of depression which eventually claimed his life; as latterly confirmed by my mother. She should know having lived with him for the first twenty or so years of her life in the family home in Birmingham. This could be why it was at times very difficult and challenging for the whole family and could explain my own experiences of my mother during a complex relationship arising from her own troubled past.

These days we take for granted the advances in prosthetics and the modern application of pain management drugs, as evidenced by Paralympian successes. Such disabilities as those borne by my grandfather, are now of much lesser hindrance to the sufferer thanks to modern medicine.

So, imagine the lack of personal health aids back then, circa 1918, when all that was available to the tens of thousands of war invalids were wooden crutches or cumbersome prosthetic limbs, usually made of wood. My grandfather suffered terribly from chafing as the scarred flesh, although padded with a surgical bandage, rubbed against the ill-fitting prosthetic he was issued with causing him to abandon it. This forced him to rely that much more heavily on his army-issue crutch, which severely restricted his mobility.

For a young man in his twenties, this must have weighed heavily on his mind. The only self-administered pain-relief medications, legally prescribed, were addictive morphine-based drugs. That was always assuming you could afford to purchase a steady supply.

The army pension rate was pitifully small back then causing many pensioners to become very bitter and forcing my grandfather to wear his prosthetic in order to go out and seek work to support himself and later his family.

In the absence of a publicly accessed National Health Service (latterly instituted in 1948) where most treatments are free at the point of delivery, the average disabled veteran, from a working-class background, had to pay up or else suffer in silence as my grandfather did.

Obviously, our family was not alone in these shared circumstances where l.5 million veterans were left disabled. Their families suffered alongside the veteran just as much if not more when the emotional fall-out was taken into account.

The Great War claimed over 830K dead in the UK mainland alone and a total of 1.3 million overall when you add in commonwealth countries fighting under the Union flag.

No one to my knowledge has ever collated the post-war deaths from residual long-term causes i.e.-  gas attacks, compound wound infections, or additional mental health impairment such as my grandfather’s, which could not be treated at the time yet still resulted in subsequent and inevitable war-related deaths many years after the end of the war.

Antibiotics, i.e. penicillin,  for medical use were not discovered till 1928 and only synthesized for mass application ten years later, just in time for the advent of WW2; where their widespread application saved countless lives.

The other strange irony is that the biggest pandemic ever to strike the planet, prior to COVID, during 1920 wiped out more people than WW1 itself. It was dubbed: the ‘Spanish Flu’, after the influenza-like initial symptoms, taking in excess of 50 million lives worldwide although there is not the slightest evidence that it was first contracted in Spain. The only initial evidence was that Spanish or Latin types were more susceptible in the early days of collated figures leading clinicians to erroneously conclude that ethnicity played a part in the disease’s spread and contraction.

This strange new virus struck simultaneously across the globe suggesting a common means of mass transmission.

The prolific spread was probably caused by close contact among WW1 fighting soldiers suggesting the original organism mutated from Trench flu and other sundry infections.

These organisms may then have combined into a lethal cocktail of infections due to the appalling living conditions trench warfare imposed on every infantryman at the battlefront.

Unlike the Bubonic Plague, the nearest pandemic to it, which is still with us today in some areas of the world, this new infection disappeared as mysteriously as it arrived.

The second strange effect WW1 had on me was that upon discovering and reading about the sufferings of deceased war veterans and their families, it invariably produced involuntary tears on my part.

My wife proved an invaluable research assistant but she could only read so many accounts of wartime family bereavements before needing to take a well-earned break.

From an emotional standpoint, we both found it very wearing.

Such awful statistics would wear on any thoughtful and caring human being.

As a historian, my conclusions as to the origins of warfare, lead only to more questions than answers.

The first one is, how can we, as a sentient species, be the architects of wars that cause such wasteful suffering? *

The second is, from across the commonly shared thread of being human, how do we still, even today,  justify it as a valid part of existence?

I fear it will remain an insoluble mystery, not only to myself but to the generations that will follow.

* Just to give some context – the following are wasteful war statistics:-

[Known unto god] – Inscriptions carved on anonymous war graves in countless garden cemeteries tended by CWGC (Commonwealth War Graves Commission) across Europe and the world.

Thiepval Memorial and Cemetery, France, records 72,000 WW1 dead listed as missing with no known grave.

P. S. Don’t worry about Grandpa –

I will continue my search for more information about my Grandfather’s life and demise

Private Jack May (1890 – 3(?) – 1963) – R.I.P.

Spoonerisms and the Power of Puns

by Chris Owen

A pun is defined as a play on words causing the fracturing of any language for comic effect. 

The broadness of expression afforded by English belies its mongrel origins giving leeway to the form being either verbal or written. The great vowel shift of the 1300s afforded a universal comprehension via standardisation of a language previously narrowed by the dominance of Norman French text forms prevalent since the conquest of 1066, thus broadening its comedic possibilities.

The first great English author Geoffrey Chaucer employed the convention of puns in his grand opus the Canterbury Tales which embraces jokes, humour, and puns

The very reverend William Archibald Spooner (1844 – 1930) and Oxford don whilst not suffering from a physical infirmity did have a whole malady named after him caused by a slip of the tongue which medics ascribe to the brain forming words faster than the tongue can articulate

This inadvertent  gift of altering a phrase or expression when parts of words are inadvertently  transposed produces comic results

Spooner’s most famous remark was when he invited parishioners to join him for a religious meeting. His verbal announcement came out as:

‘There will be a meeting hauled (halled) in the hell below’

 (instead of: There will be a meeting held in the hall below)

Being a fellow sufferer I have over the years come out with a few choice ones myself

See if you can decipher them for yourself:

Loaf Bites, 

Perry chick 

Bribary Look

Hyperdemic Nerdle

Child Mold

Realous Jage

Feek & Weeble

A well boiled icicle

Fighting a liar 

A Malapropism is another grammatical syntax malady often used for comical effect based on ignorance, being named after Mrs Malaprop, who was a character in Sheridan’s: The Rivals (1775) using the transposition of words

Her blooper was the inappropriate use of adjectives to describe someone or something else.

The fictional Mrs. Malaprop in Sheridan’s play The Rivals utters many malapropisms. In Act 3 Scene III, she declares to Captain Absolute, “Sure, if I reprehend any thing in this world it is the use of my oracular tongue, and a nice derangement of epitaphs.” This nonsensical utterance might, for example, be corrected to, “If I apprehend anything in this world, it is the use of my vernacular tongue, and a nice arrangement of epithets,”—although these are not the only words that can be substituted to produce an appropriately expressed thought in this context, and commentators have proposed other possible replacements that work just as well.

In Shakespeare’s Much Ado about Nothing, Constable  Dogberry tells Governor Leonato,  “On our watch, we have comprehended two auspicious characters,” instead of apprehended two suspicious characters. Previously ascribed as ‘Dogberryisms’ prior to the advent of the term Spoonerisms.

The most famous exponent of word puns in the modern era using the mediums of radio, TV, and live performances was the Danish comedian Victor Borg, who often altered the meaning of words for comic effect.

His most famous relevant sketch was where he used the device of adding plus one to a numeral to expressions for the audible effects.

Such as in ‘Darling you are looking so two-derful tonight (meaning wonderful).

I have just joined the Royal Air Fiveses ( meaning Forces).

The Goon Show, first broadcast on BBC radio in the early nineteen fifties, was packed with comical puns thanks to the genius of Spike Milligan’s writing. 

He often referred to himself as: ‘Spine Millington, that well-known typing error.’

As an innovator, his pioneering style of comedy affected his mental health due to the pressure of work. Having to produce an original half-hour script every week, for a twelve-week run as well as act in the show as a lead character took its toll.

This was in a time when most comic performers would learn a script and barely change it for as long as a year regardless of the number of live or recorded performances they undertook.

The modern broadcast mediums required the immediacy of fresh comedy every broadcast to satisfy the appetite of a national audience tuning in every week.

An example of Goon humour would be of one character discovering another inside a grand piano.

Who, when asked what he was doing there, replied : “I’m Haydn”(hiding) referring to the composer who wrote many piano pieces, thereby rendering a double punchline.

The world of puns marches on and will probably be with us as long as the English language is with us –   unless texting destroys all written forms.

2023 Retreat: Back to Criccieth

2023 Doris Gooderson – Third

Fate Worse Than Death

by Angela Edwards

Felicity opens the front door to find two smartly dressed gentlemen.

‘Is this the home of Mr Graham Peters?’

‘Yes, how can I help you?’

‘Ah wonderful. We’re here to collect him.’

‘Collect him?’

‘Yes. We’re from Cremprem Insurance.’

‘I don’t understand. What do you mean?’

‘I’m sorry, madam. Is Mr Peters here?’

‘Who is it, Felicity?’ asks Graham as he comes to the door.

‘Ah Mr Peters. I’m Mr Jones and this is Mr Burns. We’re here about your Cremprem Insurance policy. It matured today so we are here to collect you.’

‘Collect me?’

Mr Burns points to the hearse with a coffin inside.

‘Oh, I get it, this is being filmed. It’s Michael McIntyre or Ant and Dec, isn’t it?’ he says looking round for someone with a camera. Or am I going to be on that YourTube or Tikky Tokky,’ he adds.

‘No Mr Peters, I assure you this is not a prank. Your insurance matures today, so that’s the end of the policy. You need to come with us now.’

‘You can’t be serious?’

‘Oh, but we are, sir. Now come along, let’s not make a fuss.’

‘Get your hands off me. I’m not going anywhere.’

‘I’m afraid Mr Peters you signed up for this policy. It clearly states on the form that when your policy matures that’s the end of the cover.’

‘Yes, but that means we’re due for a pay-out.’

‘Ah no. I’m afraid it doesn’t work like that. The nature of your policy now comes into effect. So, if you wouldn’t mind just getting into the coffin….’

‘I’m not getting in there. This is ridiculous. You’re both mad!’

‘I’m sorry, sir but you’ve signed the paperwork. Honestly, we have this trouble every time,’ says Mr Jones.

Neighbours hear the commotion and come out to see what’s happening.

‘Graham, what’s going on?’ says Eileen. ‘Has someone died?’

‘No. These gentlemen say they are from an insurance firm, and they want me to get in that coffin!’ he says pointing to the car.

‘Oh yes, that happened to my brother-in-law.’

‘What?’ says Graham.

‘Yes, his policy came to an end, and they came to collect him. Most unpleasant business, but that’s what you get with these cheap insurers.’

Mr Jones glares at her. ‘I can assure you madam, we are not ‘cheap’ insurers. We are overseen by the standard regulatory bodies.’

‘But this is absurd! I’m clearly not dead.”

‘Well, that’s not really my problem Mr Peters. You signed the paperwork and now you need to come with us.’

‘But I didn’t realise this would happen!’

‘Well, it is in the small print.’ Mr Jones shows him a copy of his signed policy.

‘John?’ Felicity calls over to her neighbour who is a solicitor. ‘Can you come and look at this paperwork please. We need your legal advice.’

‘Why does everyone make this so difficult. I’m just trying to do my job,’ says Mr Jones. ‘The policy has expired, you have signed the document to this effect, so now you need to get in that coffin and come with us,’ he says pointing to the car.

‘You can’t take him away, he’s still alive!’ Felicity says, crying.

‘I’m afraid he’s right, Graham. This paperwork is all in order,’ John says looking at the documents.

Felicity shrieks. ‘You can’t be serious, John? You have to help us.’

‘I’m sorry Felicity, the policy clearly shows these gentlemen are correct and entitled to take Graham away. You should never have signed this document.’

‘I told you we should have had someone look over the paperwork first Graham, but would you listen. Oh no, you knew best. Now look what’s happened. No wonder they gave us such a generous gift card for joining.’

‘Come along now sir, we don’t have all day. We have other people to collect. In fact, I understand that your policy will be maturing next month Mrs Peters, so you will be joining your husband quite soon,’ says Mr Burns. ‘You might want to start getting your affairs in order for then.’

‘What! Over my dead body! I’m not going off anywhere with you, and certainly not in a coffin!’

‘Well, I’m afraid you won’t have much choice in the matter. As your friend here has stated, our paperwork is quite in order.’

‘Please you can’t do this…Please don’t kill my husband.’

‘No no, Mrs Peters. Of course we’re not going to kill him. What do you take us for? We’re not murderers!’ says Mr Jones. ‘He will just be joining all the others working at our head office.’

‘Office work?’ says Graham.

‘Yes, we have nice offices. Your coffin has all the mod cons and comes fitted with air conditioning and Wi-Fi.’

‘You mean I have to stay in the coffin?’

‘Well, yes, of course you do. The lid twists ninety degrees so it becomes your work desk during your working hours. You’ll find it very comfortable.

‘There’s a generous benefits scheme in place. When you sign others up for our policies, you’ll receive awards. These can be activated and exchanged for things like days off, or free upgrades to your own eventual funeral,’ says Mr Burns.

‘We had an outing recently to an adventure park, that was fun. The ghost train and haunted house rides were quite popular with the staff.’

‘Oh, you are funny Mr Jones…the ghost train!’ laughs Mr Burns nudging Graham.

‘Some staff opt to save up their bonus for visits with their husbands or wives. We do respect your conjugal rights here at Cremprem.’

‘What!’ Graham splutters. ‘My conjugal rights?’

‘Yes, that’s correct. Your coffin is quite roomy.’

‘Did you know Mr Jones, Clive has put a note on his coffin lid. It says, “If this coffin is a rockin’ then don’t you come a knockin’.” He’s the office joker is our Clive,’ says Mr Burns.

‘But…. I’m not doing that in a coffin!’ he shouts.

‘Well, that’s up to you sir. Anyway, come along now we must be going. We’ve got to collect another five people today. Your wife can bring in anything you need once you are settled in.’

‘I’m sorry Graham, you have no choice. You have to go with them I’m afraid,’ says John.

‘So, what exactly will I be doing in the office?’

‘You’ll be phoning people to sign them up for our policies at our call centre.’

‘Oh my God,’ says Graham. ‘You want me to work in a call centre? Kill me now! That’s a fate worse than death!’

Biography

Angela lives in Birmingham with her partner and works part-time for a firm of solicitors.  She has always enjoyed reading and writing and after attending a range of creative writing courses in recent years, she has discovered a love for writing short stories.

Having only recently started entering her stories into competitions, Angela is delighted to have been longlisted with one international competition in September, and absolutely thrilled to have been awarded third place with her story Fate Worse Than Death for the Doris Gooderson Short Story Competition 2023.

In her spare time, she plans and writes her stories, inspiration for which she finds everywhere. She does however spend far too much time on her book-buying habit and going on Instagram to look at more books.  You can find Angela there: @ang.all.about.books

2023 Doris Gooderson Competition – Second

The Track

by Fiona Brookman

This is the first time I have returned to the place of my birth.  I am told it is common for people to wrap up memories too painful to live with and store them away.  Apparently, it is a coping mechanism, a way to survive.  And I have survived, here I am an elderly woman with grandchildren.  Yet my offspring are unconnected with this place, the bond has been broken.  I look up the steep path and can see only holiday villas, the old cottages are gone.  The track I am walking on is marked out with blue crosses to show the way down to the beach, where there are sunbeds and a bar. 

 War is like water, it permeates the soil, lying deep and hidden.  It lurks within these stony hills waiting to rise again.  Today the air is thick with the scent of herbs and pulsing with hovering insects. The moment is at peace with itself, half sleeping but with its finger on the trigger just in case.   As I walk this dusty track, the one I walked as a child, my mind flows back to the time before the flood of violence which pervaded the land, ripping out its soul.

 On Sundays after church, we would set out down the hill to the sea, my hand gently held by my father lest I trip and fall.  I was Daddy’s girl, my brothers danced ahead, whilst my mother preferring to sit in the shade with the other women, stayed home.  Our garden was a paradise of trees; orange, fig and pistachio, nobody was certain who had planted them.  Our family had lived in the cottage for generations and my father said that ‘A society grows great when old men plant trees whose shade they never know.’  He was fiercely proud of his land and his family, the history of which was firmly entrenched in its soil.  Indeed, there were many graves bearing our name in the cemetery at the top of the hill.  These ancestors were part of our lives, we often visited them after mass and we expected to join them there one day.

 My gladness to be here is tempered by these memories, bitter sweet like the mountain tea my mother brewed on our return.  She would pour a jug of water from the well over each of us before allowing us to drink, washing away the dust.  I remember the shock of icy cold on my sun-baked body.  She would laugh as she did it and so would we.  Then we would run around the olive groves with the dogs, seeking out mischief before dinner.  

 Looking back, my parents worked hard, tending the land was not easy.  My father would set out at dawn, sleeping through the midday heat, before starting up again, toiling until the sun set behind the mountain ridge.  Then lamps would be lit under the pomegranate tree, a low fire smoking away the mosquitoes.  In winter, snow would cap the mountains and even the goats took refuge where they could as the wind rushed in from the sea.  We would cram around the charcoal stove, whilst my father recounted ancient stories, which my mother would embellish as she spindled wool, her hands forever busy.  Every family inhabiting these stone cottages clinging to the hillside could tell this story, this way of life, and we were connected through it.  We had our fallings out like any family, but we presented as one, unified by what we shared.  As children we had the run of the village although we knew better than to fall foul of anyone, there would be nowhere to hide; too many ‘aunties’ keeping an eye on things.

 I remember my father had taken to checking the news, reception was poor in our house so he often went over to his brother’s where it was better for some reason.  The two of them would sit smoking and drinking, deep in a conversation I could never quite hear or understand.  At first, he let us come along to play with our cousins, but after a while he said it was too late to be out and that this was for adults only.  I remember feeling stung and watching him walking down the track alone.  My mother put her hand on my shoulder and guided me into the kitchen where we podded beans to dry for the winter.  This is something I still do, growing them in my own garden.  They continue to thrill me as they emerge red and smooth to the touch.  Sometimes I hum tunes, songs my mother would sing though the words escape me.  There is no one to ask.

 Age calcifies you as the body winds down, I have brought a stick to replace my father’s reassuring grip and my brain is not to be relied upon.  Yet as new memories evaporate, old memories rise to the surface, sometimes gathered from the cold dark depths, previously out of reach, too painful to bear.  I found I had to return, I needed to touch the soil, to breathe the air.  I have an intense yearning for what was once here and was brutally taken.  It consumes, gnawing my soul.  Looking down I hear screaming, see blood congealing in the hot dry soil, our charcoal burner smashed and lying in pieces on the floor.  My father and brothers were taken away, I never saw them again.  The soldiers poisoned the well and the remaining villagers had no option but to leave.  I went with my mother to a distant relative in town.  But my mother had been ripped out in full flower, her taproot snapped.  She wilted, dying within the year and I was left alone.  The pain intensifies.  There is nothing to say, no words to explain.  I feel certain I will finish here…  

 I hear shouting coming towards me and turn around, it is family.

‘Grandma, are you okay?  I know you wanted to be alone but I thought I would come and get you as we are going to have a drink and maybe something to eat.’ 

My grandson places his hand on my shoulder and squeezes gently.

‘This is the track you told me about from when you were a child?’ 

I nod and we stand in silence together surveying the scene.

‘Up there is where you grew up before the war? Where it happened?’

I nod again.  It is difficult to breathe, to find the rhythm.  Then I feel my hand being held and I am led down the hill.  At first, we walk in silence, then I find myself humming my mother’s tunes and after a while, my grandson joins in wordlessly.  We stop as he hands me a sprig of thyme and I inhale.  I am looking forwards, forwards to my son and his children, forwards to the days I have left.  I cannot look back.  As I walk, the scent of the mountain once more fills my lungs, the birdsong fills my ears and I am reborn.  It is a painful birth and I am heavier for it, but the track beckons me onwards, down towards the sea.   

Biography

Fiona has only ever submitted three stories to competitions, one of which was also shortlisted in last year’s Doris Gooderson competition (Rose Quartz). Naturally, this spurred her on! Like many writers, Fiona has always felt compelled to write. She began her journey aged 7 with a series of Sci-Fi adventures. Her teacher asserted they were marvellous if only she could decipher the handwriting. She progressed through poetry to writing lyrics and joined a band at university to showcase the songs. 

Some years later, she co-wrote a series of children’s musicals, which have been performed in a number of schools in Hertfordshire. She also had a poem published in a compendium.  With no real knowledge of what she was up to, but fired with ambition, Fiona completed her first novel about 4 years ago and has started on a second. She now belongs to a writing group in St Albans which has been invaluable in helping her with technical issues in structuring my writing. It was the group that introduced her to short stories and she has really enjoyed exploring the genre.  Fiona has always been lucky enough to have plenty of creative ideas but short of time to turn them into something tangible.  Recently, she left her job, partly to focus on writing and love the space this gives her.

2023 Doris Gooderson Competition – First

Come In Out Of The Rain

By Clare London

“What’s he doing now?”

I peered over Ellie’s blonde, curl-tousled head. We were both staring out of her living room window, watching her front path. The rain was falling more heavily now, blurring the horizon, a curtain of disorientation, falling in folds and swathes onto the lawn like untethered stage curtains. With no audience, except us. 

“He’s just standing there.” Her trembling words misted up the inside of the window. “What’s he waiting for, Paddy?”

“I don’t know, sweetie.” Matt was sort of a mystery to me, even after all these years. Ellie’s big brother, my next-door neighbour. Best friends at school, then a teenaged partner in crime. We’d both stayed local, got jobs, played sports, drank ourselves silly at parties… oh, and came out to our respective families the same week.

And now? Everything to me.

I should tell him so, some time.

Ellie gave a half-hidden sob. “You think it’s to do with…?”

She didn’t need to finish that sentence.

“I’m sure it is,” I said gently. “You just have to give him time.” I wasn’t judging, I wasn’t measuring. Hell, we all had our coping strategies, and Matt’s was precious to him.

“But we all miss her,” she said, rather tartly. Her little mouth made an O shape in the window mist.

“Sure.” The pain twisted in my chest too. “Matt just needs to do it his way.”

“He should come in now. He’ll catch his death.” It was such a perfect echo of her gran’s phrase that the tears pricked my eyes. “You must go out and talk to him, Paddy!”

“I… me? What?” Well, it wouldn’t be because of my advanced verbal skills, apparently. “You’re his sister. He’ll listen to you.”

“No way,” she said. More than a bit frightening how forceful a nine-year-old could be, and I was a good ten years older. “He’s in love with you. That’s what he needs.”

“I…? Huh?” Wow, the articulation genie had really passed me by.

“Go on.” She pushed me toward the door, her little hands surprisingly fierce on my shoulders, even reaching up on tiptoes. “Borrow his coat. Go on!”

“He’s in love with me?” I blurted out at last.

And then I was out on the front porch, the door slammed shut behind me, only one arm shoved into Matt’s raincoat. Which was always going to be too small for me, by the way.

The cold hit me at once. My breath huffed out little pillows of warm air. The wind blew the rain against me, and my jeans and shoes were quickly sodden. I glanced at Matt. He was still in his slippers.

“Matt? It’s Paddy.” Well, duh. The rain spattered the bushes in a muted tap dance, and I tugged the raincoat closed as far as it’d reach. “Come inside, man. You’re not dressed for this.”

I was sure he heard me, but he didn’t reply. Instead, he flung out his arms and dropped back his head. The rain must have hammered on his face like little needles, but he didn’t retreat.

Okay. Plan B. I hopped down and squelched across the grass to join him. I took a while to study the patterns the rain was making on the path, then I asked, “Does it help?”

Still silent, he nodded.

“What works best—the sound? The cold? The wet?”

It was another minute before he spoke. “The helplessness.”

Oh. “Talk to me, buddy. I want to be here for you.”

“You are.”

Then… nothing more. I watched as the rain kept falling, Matt’s face turned to the skies. He was saturated from head to foot by now.

“She loved you, Matt. She loved us all. And we loved her. I’m missing her like shit.”

He huffed. “She was, like, your grandma too, right?”

I huffed too. We were like bookends. Was that Ellie tapping impatiently on the window behind us? “She always welcomed me, your orphaned mate. I kind of adopted your family.”

Matt gave the softest laugh. “I liked sharing families. Still do.”

“Gran would’ve wanted things to go on like that.”

“Without her.”

“Yeah. But it happens. She was in so much bloody pain, for so long. Seemed she was glad to let go of that.” Maybe I’d had more practice at coping with loss. Maybe I wasn’t as sensitive. 

Tell that to the tears now running down my cheeks.

Matt dragged in a big, shuddering breath. He clamped his arms around his body, as if only now realising how cold and wet he was. “You’re right, Paddy. You always know the right bloody things to say.”

I wasn’t going to argue right now, with a small river running down between my shoulder blades, but I wasn’t so sure. I just wanted him back into the warm. Back where I could hold him.

I put a hand on his shoulder. “You think you’ll be coming in soon?”

“Yes,” he said. His voice sounded different. Calmer. More ordinary.

Thank God.

“Has it, like, worked?” I asked. “Whatever the helplessness did for you?”

“It helps me let go, Paddy. Like you say Gran did.”

At last, he turned to face me, big eyes framed by damp lashes, water running off the end of his nose, plump lips white and chapped with cold. A face more familiar than my own—I’ve never spent much time in front of the mirror—and definitely more treasured.

“Oh, Matt. You’re so…”

He shook his head. “’S okay. I’ll be fine. I needed to think, to let it pass through me. I know I can’t stop death—but out here, I don’t have to worry why, or what I should do instead, or how I should behave, or what I should say to everyone feeling sorry for my loss, or whether I should have loved her more, cherished her more, done all the things I never did, that’ve all been churning away in my bloody head, y’know—?”

That was enough for me. I was bawling like a baby by now, though you’d never have spotted which were rain drops and which were tears. I grabbed him and pulled him to me. I may have been a bit rough. He may not have cared. When I kissed his cold lips, he grabbed hold of my hair and kissed me back. There was no shock, no resistance. Just something that should have happened long before. Rainwater ran between my teeth.

Like I cared.

“Don’t leave me, Paddy.”

“Never will, buddy. I love you, Matt. Always have.”

I kissed him again, my hair plastered over my eyes, his shirt sticking to his ribs like a second skin. A testament to the resilience of youth that I could feel us both getting excited, despite our impression of drowned rats. He was smiling, grinning, gripping me tight. Life was warm inside us, despite everything else.

That was definitely Ellie hammering on the window now, and I could hear her laughter. The door opened behind us, and her voice piped up. 

“I’ve got towels. And Paddy can make hot chocolate. For us all, please?”

And we ran together to the door, hands clasped, in perfect step. 

---

Biography

Clare London is an author who took her pen name from the city where she lives and loves. She writes mainly contemporary romance and drama, often with a healthy serving of British wit, and juggles her left/right brain impulses with her day job as an accountant. Her published novels are in the male/male romance genre, but she’s also very fond of reading and writing novellas and short stories, because she’s always admired fellow authors who can tell a full story in limited words. She’s been independently publishing since 2014.

website: www.clarelondon.com

facebook: www.facebook.com/clarelondon

booklist: books2read.com/clarelondon

Coded Writings

By Chris Owen

Simple ciphers using letter or word substitution were the mainstay of sixteenth-century UK communications – i.e. handwritten letters.

In the absence of a national daily postal service, most people were reliant on friends, relatives, or paid servants to transport letters across the country or even abroad under wax seal. This was the sender’s only means of security as the uniquely designed hot wax seal not only secured the folded paperwork but assured the recipient that it had not been intercepted and read.

Of course, no system is perfect as even today messages can be tampered with surreptitiously.

In the sixteenth century, there was already an established industry of code-breakers working full-time on suspect correspondence. Most codes conformed to established norms where the recipient was given a codeword or key-code letter which was needed to decipher the message.

There was even a thriving sideline in invisible writing methods where the likes of lemon juice or other mediums were used instead of ink. When the note was received containing some conventional text, heat from a candle was applied to the reverse side of the paper to reveal the hidden added message.

This was a time when if your religion or politics did not conform to religious or royal decree, here was the written evidence in letter form that could see you executed as a heretic or traitor.

It was therefore necessary to communicate secretly and securely with other members of your religion or faction, mostly through encoded letters.

Mary Queen of Scots, cousin to Elizabeth 1, who was living under house arrest was betrayed by a servant when she wrote a secret missive plotting to bring down the protestant queen and replace her as monarch of a newly-converted catholic United Kingdom. In the letter, she called upon her followers to rise up when instructed in order to put her plans into operation.

Her only contact with the outside world was a victualer who delivered wine supplies to her household on a weekly basis. She thought he was a loyal servant having successfully corresponded several times through him using messages wrapped inside a wine barrel stopper. All visitors and their goods were routinely searched in or out, so this method was deemed to be foolproof. He was in fact a paid agent of Elizabeth’s spymaster Francis Walsingham who specialised in operating a network of spies in England and abroad.

Mary’s treasonous actions led to her execution in 1587 at Fotheringhay Castle after spending fourteen years in Sheffield Castle in confinement

In the fifteenth century Leonardo Da Vinci, besides being an artistic genius, was fascinated by science, technology, and anatomy. Alongside detailed drawings, he wrote copious notes using mirror- writing which made the script appear backwards on the paper. To the casual observer, the text was gibberish. He did this deliberately to foil ‘The Inquisition’, an extreme catholic order, condoned by the papacy, which punished anyone involved in science or the arts deemed to be non-conformist to religious doctrine. This practice put all those considered as freethinkers, particularly those who were connected with culture, in the firing line. Da Vinci was certainly a part of this growing movement, fuelled by his own ravenously curious mind.

Anyone condemned by decree or papal edict was judged as a heretic and was usually burnt at the stake.

Galileo Galilei languished for years under house arrest for daring to suggest that the earth was not the centre of the solar system but the sun, even when his observations of the heavens made this proposition self-evident.

During WW2 the American army employed Navajo ‘windtalkers’ who were native american servicemen to encode messages in their tribal language making them indecipherable to the Japanese code-breakers.

Elsewhere in this conflict, the nerve centre of British code-breaking was based at Bletchley, Hertfordshire, where an army of decoders spent long hours trying to unravel secret German communications. Their enemy was a fiendish new machine dubbed enigma which changed its code daily and was eventually cracked by Alan Turing, a maths genius, working with the world’s first computer called Colossus.

Indian Sanskrit sacred writings were consistently changed or encoded to reflect the doctrines of the day. But it is interesting to note that in one tale taken from the Mahabharata, written for scholars, one of the antiheroes voiced the words: ‘I am become death, the destroyer of worlds.’

This was used to describe the super weapons deployed in a war of the heavens waged by the Hindhu gods against themselves.

This line was quoted by the nuclear physicist and atom bomb developer Robert Oppenheimer in the nineteen-forties. He was based in the USA, working on the Manhattan Project, a codename for the development of the world’s first atomic weapon. When he saw the results of the two nuclear bombings of Japan at Hiroshima and Nagasaki in 1945 he was appalled and contrasted the power of the weapon he had helped to develop to this statement written thousands of years before the nuclear age that he was regretfully complicit in bringing about.

This atomic age also spawned the cold war which saw a rise in espionage with all its world of gadgetry used for spying on one’s neighbours.

It was a time when agents left secret messages hidden in all manner of places and a whole industry was created to keep watch not just on our enemies but also on our fellow citizens

We are now living in an age where world peace seems distant and the threat of ascendancy is greater than ever before

So what will this digital age spawn in the way of encoded communications?

 – Only time will tell.

Futurism & Futurology

by Chris Owen.

As a struggling Sci-Fi writer, I can appreciate one young man’s particular difficulties at the end of the 19th century. He was trying to express his stories through a new medium, one which was being redefined every twenty years or so trying to keep up with advancements of the age, and had few proponents.

The earliest being a poet, playwright, and novelist called Jules Verne (1828 -1905) who published several ground-breaking novels commencing with Journey to the centre of the Earth – 1864, Twenty Thousand Leagues Under the Sea – 1870, and Around the World in Eighty days – 1872.

These novels challenged existing science to live up to the age of wonder which had commenced with the industrial revolution. Born of this steam age was the locomotive engine called a train which promised so much as a mode of super-fast transport. Its development created modern society along with the curse of facilitating heavier loads which allowed armaments and armies to move in greater numbers when fighting wars.

Captain Nemo, the hero of twenty thousand leagues, was depicted as a troubled genius inventor who held a grudge against all humanity and swore his incredible inventions would never fall into the hands of ruthless politicians or militarians who would exploit their benefits for darker purposes.

Our struggling writer was Herbert George Wells (1866 -1946) who was looking to create a story, which would not only astound Victorian readers but set them thinking.

Invasion was a real threat at that time as several countries had been overrun by their neighbours and other empire-seeking countries were looking to expand their territories and influence worldwide, namely Germany and Japan.

At this point his scientific mind took over, leading him to consider the possibilities of a technologically superior race seeking to dominate not just a country but an entire planet.

To paraphrase his opening lines slowly he drew his plans using a modest start to his description of an invasion location – that being the woods near to his own backyard

The reason he gave for the invaders to wish to conquer Earth was that their homeworld was a dying, polluted planet. For this he chose Mars; in his book The War of the Worlds – (1897), a planet which had recently been closely studied by astronomers who speculated that it could have once held life judging from surface markings which suggested due to misinterpretation, that it had an inter-connected artificially created canal system.

In the book, the Martians’ only strategy was to seek to conquer and destroy humanity, much like many of their earthly counterparts who were busily doing the same.

Wells was also one of the world’s leading Futurologists, speculating on the scientific and technological trends that may or may not advance humankind.

He was preaching peaceful change and development in order for society to amend its ways.

Unfortunately for him, he lived long enough to see his worst prophecies come true with the advent of the atomic age.

Back in 1818, another prolific writer and futurist archetype published a novel of substantial importance. Mary Wollstonecraft Shelley, wife of the poet Percy Bysshe Shelley wrote her seminal novel: ‘Frankenstein’ more or less as a dare.

Lord Byron’s acolytes, which included the Shelley’s and others, shared the rented, Villa Diodati, near

Cologny, Switzerland.

Byron challenged the group on one dark and stormy night to create the most frightening gothic ghost story. He decided he would judge which was the best and award a suitable prize – Mary won hands down.

In its day the novel was seen as a dark supernatural tale about the vengeful mistakes uncontrolled technological and scientific advancement can wreak on a vulnerable society

Nowadays it is revered as a masterpiece of the Sci-Fi horror genre but my take on it is that it was written as a poignant story of unrequited love. In the story, all the monster desired was to experience love instead of universal hatred and rejection because he was different. His flawed visage, reviled by all the people he encountered, somehow mirrored the state of current society which purported to promulgate the universal creed of brotherly love but invariably wrought indiscriminate destruction on itself.

This was self-evident judging by the recently fought Continental war between the leading nations including Britain and the Dictator of France, Napoleon Bonaparte, which had culminated in his defeat at the battle of Waterloo in 1815.

In the book’s tragic climax, the monster exacts revenge on his heartless creator, Victor Frankenstein, who had abandoned him.

The subtitle of the book was:’ The Modern Prometheus’ – which was a reference to Greek Mythology. The eponymous god stole fire from the heavens to give to mankind, thus wreaking havoc, and was punished for his crime by Zeus. The subtext being, there will always be consequences when

Technological advancement is unbridled.

When the cinema came along the famous pioneer filmmakers the Lumiere brothers made a silent film about a trip to the moon based on a loose adaptation of another Verne novel:

‘From the Earth to the Moon’ was published in 1865. This was a humorous sci-fi tale based in the USA, at the Baltimore Gun Club. where a group of members instigate a wager to fly to the moon.

The method of travel depicted in the book was a cannon shot that propelled a hollow shell containing a capsule manned by humans.

In his novel, ‘The Shape of Things to Come’ published in 1933 Wells depicted another version of this same method of propulsion to be used by humankind to reach the stars

His dystopian tale told of numerous lengthy 20th-century world wars leading to the eventual harmony of humankind and their peaceful endeavours to conquer space culminating in the moon trip in 2106.

Wells’ forecast of global conflict commencing in the nineteen-thirties was alarmingly accurate but thankfully not the duration, which he wrote would last until the end of the 21st century.

Another writer, Arthur C. Clarke, was billed as a futurist but who fell into the two camps with his range of novels encompassing futurism & futurology.

His 1962 factual book Profiles of the Future – proposed that artificial satellites would be invented and launched into a low geo-stationery orbit about the Earth for use as communication relays and location finders (GPS). His prophecy came true as a precursor, with the launch of Sputnik 1 in 1958 by the USSR (Russia) seeking to establish a communications network for the sole use of themselves and their allies.

The West would have to wait till 1962 with the launch of Telstar in the USA by NASA, which was the first purpose-built telecommunications satellite. Unfortunately, it could only relay TV images in black and white across the Atlantic but this was the first spectacular leap in transglobal communications

Who knows what the next leap in communications will be – but the fervent hope amongst Futurists and futurologists alike must be that if we humans explore the cosmos and we can contact extraterrestrial life, we will talk to them in one voice united in harmony.

Watch this space!!

Anonymous

(A fatal attraction.)

By Chris Owen

This seemingly innocuous, gentle-sounding word has transpired to have ominous connotations. The sad truth is that even our greatest writer in the English Language, submitted his earliest works for printing under the pseudonym: Anonymous.

The London Printers Guild ledger for 1593 lists: ‘Venus & Adonis’, his first known work, printed under this dubious attribute.

By his use of this nom de plume the suspicion that he was not the real author of this epic poem, nor indeed his complete canon of works, has forever haunted the credibility of Shakespeare’s legacy.

In the 1500’s the practice of entering ‘no name’ under a limited print run of a pamphlet (single sheet)  meant the author could avoid any adverse social fall-out. He could also negate the cost of printing in greater volume or even reputational damage if the work was considered inferior, which could also attract legal consequences.

The charge of misrepresentation, for falsely assuming the mantle of an educated man carried severe penalties. This was an age where for commoners to be caught wearing precious furs or jewellery or even the wrong colours associated with the upper classes could mean mandatory punishment, possibly death. For commoners, such as Shakespeare, being part of an acting company sponsored by a member of the aristocracy, evaded these consequences.

Fortunately, the poem was a hit with Elizabethan audiences and the rest is history.

Skipping forward three centuries we still had the problem of an author’s attribution especially for women – even with the emergence of another important English author, Jane Austen.

Her first novel – Sense and Sensibility – was first  published in 1811

Austen decided to sign her work with ‘By a Lady. ‘ Unlike other writers of her time, she did not take on a male pseudonym. Women were not afforded the same privileges as men so female authors were discouraged, if not socially ostracised.

From 1836 – 1837 a publication in serialised form was in circulation, which was meant to be a satire of English Life and pursuits. This was later to become the basis for ‘The Pickwick Papers’ published in book form in 1837 with the authorship originally attributed to a certain – ‘Boz’.

(A pseudonym of Charles Dickens.)

Thirty years after Austen’s publications, it was still no better for women.

The next great literary advance came in the shape of three sisters living in Howarth at the village parsonage of their father, in the West Riding of Yorkshire.

The Bronte sisters’ works were all first published attributing the authorship to male authors with the surname – Bell. Anne Bronte’s (writing as Acton) first novel: Agnes Grey was published in 1847 – reaching an initially indifferent audience.

Charlotte fared no better with her novel Jayne Eyre – published in 1847 under the pseudonym Currer Bell. The other sister Emily was also to be feted with her own masterpiece – ‘Wuthering Heights’ again published in 1847 using her alias Ellis Bell.

It was decided that the male pseudonyms they adopted were more socially acceptable.

It would appear nothing had changed in the publishing world since Austen’s time

Latterly, in the 19th century, another female writer using a male pseudonym made literary waves with her novels,  published under the name George Eliot  (The alias of Mary Ann Evans).

Adam Bede – 1859

Mill on the Floss – 1860

Silas Marner – 1861

After the publication of Silas Marner, her novels became increasingly political, a cause which she pursued until her death in 1880.

Even today, other great authors have found the need to publish under pseudonyms:

Stephen King –  alias Richard Bachman.

(A fictional character created for his novel: Rage published in 1977.)

The official reason was that it was adopted by the author to handle his volume of written works.

J.K. Rowling  – alias  Robert Galbraith, writing as a crime novelist – the Cormoran Strike series.

Said to be used because of her love of the name and her admiration for Robert. F. Kennedy.

So, be careful of the use of the word  – Anonymous.

In these days of identity cloning, it could lead to a complete character takeover, complete with a full charisma bypass, leading to a successful career in politics.

Emotional Sounds and Visions

(And their effects on us all)

By Chris Owen

In a recent WW blog, I mentioned how certain associated sounds (I dubbed it Timbre) can evoke certain feelings in us all that linger in the mind.

I did restrict my comments to music but as the feeling is so universal, I had to acknowledge that other sounds can also awaken long-dead feelings as well as memories.

To extemporise succinctly is difficult, nigh impossible, given the depth and range of feeling involved

As an example, in the case of music, if a certain refrain is played in a major key its effects on an audience can be markedly different from those of the same passage played in a minor key.

Same musical passage – differing reactions.

Major keys are associated with upbeat emotions whereas minor keys can have a more plaintive effect on the listener.

Neuroscientists would explain it as a change in the frequency output of alpha rhythms received or produced in the brain, especially those synchronized to the same wave patterns, called sympathetic vibrations.

Sound frequencies can also be used to interfere with certain materials in some cases altering their structure. It has been discovered that the phrase ‘sick building’ can be applied to rooms of a certain dimension where sound, even at low volume, broadcast at the lower registers, can physically affect most occupiers who stay in them for even relatively short periods.

The Cinema industry, particularly Hollywood productions, has long used live sound effects – i.e. Music and noises pioneered in music halls – such as swanee whistles or slapsticks designed to hit fellow performers and make a noise, developed from the comedy dell’arte of Italy originating in the fourteen hundreds

For decades, particularly during the silent cinema era, soundtracks were added by live musicians – usually piano or organ players employed by the cinema-theatre owners, to alter the mood of audiences during showings.

Lively skits during action sequences or slow poignant ballads during love scenes. The trouble was when talkies arrived, the overuse of so-called mood music became cliched.

Even the term slapstick, as mentioned previously, was applied to fast-paced silent comedies where the participants were thrown into ludicrously spectacular or dangerous situations that were invariably resolved by equally fantastical and implausible means.

When different genres of film-making first arrived cliches often involved repeated sounds to evoke instant recognition of the genre.

Clip-clopping horse hooves or rhythmically beating Indian war drums – denoted a western

Weird electronic noises denoted Sci-Fi films; the use of which persisted even into the nineteen-sixties.

Industrial process noises (dubbed gollopata-gollopata machine) were a favourite.

Usually applied to the soundtrack of comedies, never drama, unless it was used as the effects soundtrack to a horror-type film.

It seems our emotional senses can be triggered by various stimuli, not necessarily by sounds alone but visual clues as well.

All of the senses come into play when memories are involved, often triggered by the following:

Sense of smell, perfume fragrances, plants and flowers, sounds of nature, hooting owls, buzzing bees, bird-calls.

Hearing evocative noises, e.g. steam trains or the feel of various textiles or substances.

The BBC programme The Repair Shop, has for several years, plumbed into a mine of memories and feelings expressed by grateful clients whose treasured possessions have been restored to life. This has become compelling viewing and spawned many imitators.

The medium of film has now turned full circle and is wide open heralding a return to soundtracks filled with evocative noises – rather than dull boring dialogue

My challenge is this: – think of your favourite set-piece scenes in movies.

Did it depend on dialogue or sound/visual effects or the absence of either?

Visuals alone or linked sound effects can often convey more than words as in the following examples: –

(There are so many – you can probably come up with your own alternative list.)

2001 a space Odyssey – the murder of the Jupiter mission’s crew by the ship’s computer.

Also, the First encounter of the aliens’ stargate.

The Third Man –  Harry Lime’s attempted escape and final demise in the sewers of Vienna.

Shane – The departure of the eponymous hero at the film’s conclusion.

On the Waterfront.

As a battered Marlon Brando makes his long walk of honour amongst fellow dock-workers

The Godfather

When Brando meets his end by collapsing with a coronary playing the evil mobster

Don Corleone.

The Good the Bad & the Ugly – The final shoot-out at the climax is set in a graveyard.

As the cliche says: a picture is worth ten thousand words.

Emotional Sounds & Visions take their toll on our senses.

The Common Thread of being human

by Chris Owen

In a recent WW blog, I made mention of the positive and sometimes negative influences on most writers that have shaped their careers.

I must confess to the same personal influences which have affected my writing experiences.

And also the strange effects writing about a cataclysmic event had upon me which was directly family related.

I had assumed that being engaged in research about the events of The Great War (as WW1 was dubbed) would be somehow cathartic in some ways in my own personal search for answers as to why my maternal grandfather took his own life in 1963 when I was just 13 years of age.

Scant family records available gave no clue as to his age at the time of his death (approx 70+).

Although there must be formal documentation i.e. – death certificate etc., available somewhere.

Being a rather naive teenager I had hoped that in the fullness of time, my own parents would fill in the missing information. However, no such enlightening details were forthcoming from any relative directly affected.

As late as the nineteen-sixties suicide, whatever the underlying motive, was regarded by society at large as shameful and criminal; prompting families to hide such events from public scrutiny rather than probe the reasons for it.

My mother’s family members were never very close, particularly the siblings comprising four daughters, of which she was the youngest.

Grandad Jack was a WW1 wounded infantryman invalided out towards the end of the conflict.

All I was told and observed from self-apparent physical wounds was that he was injured in a WW1 battle necessitating amputation of his left leg above the knee.

I knew him as a cantankerous old devil with a heart of gold. A bit rough around the edges but nevertheless a caring soul.

During the war which irrevocably changed him, due to the crudity of surgical procedures and postoperative convalescence, resulting in incurable residual nerve damage, he was left with recurrent pain. This was the root cause, I would surmise, of his long-term mood swings mixed with bouts of depression which eventually claimed his life; as latterly confirmed by my mother. She should know having lived with him for the first twenty or so years of her life in the family home in Birmingham. This could be why it was at times very difficult and challenging for the whole family and could explain my own experiences of mother during a complex relationship arising from her own troubled past..

These days we take for granted the advances in prosthetics and the modern application of pain management drugs, as evidenced by Paralympian successes. Such disabilities as those borne by my grandfather, are now of much lesser hindrance to the sufferer.

So, imagine the lack of personal health aids back then, circa 1918, when all that was available to the tens of thousands of war invalids were wooden crutches or cumbersome prosthetic limbs, usually made of wood. My grandfather suffered terribly from chafing as the scarred flesh, although padded with a surgical bandage, rubbed against the ill-fitting prosthetic he was issued with causing him to abandon it. This forced him to rely that much more heavily on his army-issue crutch, which severely restricted his mobility.

For a young man in his twenties, this must have weighed heavily on his mind. The only self-administered pain-relief medications, legally prescribed, were addictive morphine-based drugs. That was always assuming you could afford to purchase a steady supply.

The army pension rate was pitifully small back then causing many pensioners to become very bitter and forcing my grandfather to wear his prosthetic in order to go out and seek work to support himself and later his family.

In the absence of a publicly accessed National Health Service (latterly instituted in 1948) where most treatments are free at the point of delivery, the average disabled veteran, from a working-class background, had to suffer in silence as my grandfather did.

Obviously, our family was not alone in these shared circumstances where l.5 million veterans were left disabled. Their families suffered alongside the veteran just as much if not more when the emotional fall-out was taken into account

The Great War claimed over 830K dead in the UK mainland alone and a total of 1.3 million overall when you add in commonwealth countries fighting under the Union flag.

No one to my knowledge has ever collated the post-war deaths from residual long-term causes i.e.-  gas attacks, compound wound infections, or additional mental health impairment such as my grandfather’s, which could not be treated at the time yet still resulted in subsequent and inevitable war-related deaths many years after the end of the war.

Antibiotics, i.e. penicillin,  for medical use were not discovered till 1928 and only synthesized for mass application ten years later, just in time for the advent of WW2; where their widespread application saved countless lives.

The other strange irony is that the biggest pandemic ever to strike the planet, prior to COVID, wiped out more people than WW1 itself. It was dubbed: ‘Spanish Flu’, after the influenza-like initial symptoms, taking in excess of 50 million lives worldwide although there is not the slightest evidence that it was first contracted in Spain. The only initial evidence was that Spanish or Latin types were more susceptible in the early days of collated figures leading clinicians to erroneously conclude that ethnicity played a part in the disease’s spread and contraction.

This strange new virus struck simultaneously across the globe suggesting a common means of mass transmission.

The prolific spread was probably caused by close contact among WW1 fighting soldiers suggesting the original organism mutated from Trench flu and other sundry infections.

These organisms may then have combined into a lethal cocktail of infections due to the appalling living conditions trench warfare imposed on every infantryman at the battlefront.

Unlike Bubonic Plague, the nearest pandemic to it, which is still with us today in some areas of the world, this new infection disappeared as mysteriously as it arrived.

The second strange effect WW1 had on me was that upon discovering and reading about the sufferings of deceased war veterans and their families, it invariably produced involuntary tears on my part.

My wife proved an invaluable research assistant but she could only read so many accounts of wartime family bereavements before needing to take a well-earned break.

From an emotional standpoint, we both found it very wearing.

Such awful statistics would wear on any thoughtful and caring human being

As a historian, my conclusions as to the origins of warfare, lead only to more questions than answers.

The first one is, how can we, as a sentient species, be the architects of wars that cause such wasteful suffering? *

The second is, from across the commonly shared thread of being human, how do we still, even today,  justify it as a valid part of existence??

I fear it will remain an insoluble mystery not only to myself but to the generations that follow.

* Just to give some context – the following are wasteful war statistics:-

[Known unto god] – Inscriptions carved on anonymous war graves in countless garden cemeteries tended by CWGC (Commonwealth War Graves Commission) across Europe and the world

Thiepval Memorial and Cemetery, France, records 72,000 WW1 dead listed as missing with no known grave.

P. S. Don’t worry about Grandpa –

I will continue my search for more information about my Grandfather’s life and demise

Private Jack May (1890 – 3(?) – 1963) – R.I.P.

To be A.I. or not to be A.I.? – That is the question.

by Chris Owen

Picture the scene at Independent Book Publishers Ltd (a division of UK Faceless Inc.) They are in crisis as a new best-seller must be written to stem the tide of losses brought about by uppity authors demanding payment for work done.

Fred Scupper, Commissioning editor, instructs his latest acquisition: the A514 Word Processor (which answers rather woodenly to the name Miss A.I. Dowling).

‘Now Miss Dowling, all I want you to do is write me a novel in excess of 70k words with its hero – a young boy with magical powers; a dark wizard, a school full of wizarding pals And, here’s the twist, it must include a happy ending.’

‘Oaky Mr Scupper. I’ll do it Ash soon Ash I can, you son of a Beech.’

‘Leaf out the acid comments Dowling. I’ll do the sarcasm.’

A nightmare scenario?

This could well be the future happening today.

All across the entertainment industry, publishers and commissioners of streamed media are embracing A.I. (Artificial Intelligence)  technology. This is generated media such as CGI (Computer Generated Imagery) already well established in animation as well as feature film and TV.

They are poised to start commissioning work produced via  A. I. utilising in-house self-generated sources.

If this happens as predicted given the current massive strike of writers in the USA partly motivated by this very real threat, circumstances could propel this scenario into actuality.

If that happens, where will the next Shakespeare or Marlowe come from?

Could a piece of hardware, that is essentially controlled by written coded software, really give us meaningful insights into the human psyche?

Most of our prose geniuses led troubled short-lived existences which infused their writing:

As per the following examples:-

Shakespeare – dead at age 52

Dickens – died of a stroke – aged 58

Ernest Hemingway – suicide at 61

F. Scott Fitzgerald – died of alcoholism at 44

Sylvia Plath – suicide at 30

Dylan Thomas – died of alcoholism aged 39

These iconic examples tell us our profession is sometimes born out of personal anguish and populated by figures and circumstances from our lives. Not always good influences but nevertheless real concrete emotions, or the lack of them, which fuel our hunger for story-telling.

Not artificially produced synthesised thesaurus manure manufactured by machines.

Soulless pieces produced to fill a monetary gap driven by the profit motive alone.

Definitely not inspired works of art that will live forever in future generations of readers’ hearts and minds.

Perhaps, in a way, we have become Cassandran in outlook and predictors of our own doom.

The ‘Terminator Syndrome’ is part of the universal psyche now, almost a wish fulfilment of unbridled technological development leading to the enslavement of the human race.

We all know the fate of the HAL9000 computer in the film: ‘ 2001 A space odyssey’

To be perfect in a world where there is imperfection is a curse in itself.

The most compelling original drama is where there is discord amongst dysfunctional human beings and the outcome is not predictable or tied up in neat bows.

Not spoon-fed in neat doses of half-hour TV episodes comprising 24 series lengths with adverts neatly inserted at ten-minute intervals.

A dramaturge once told me the nutshell definition of Shakespearian drama:

Love, Taxes and Death.

These are uniquely human experiences no machine could begin to fathom let alone describe through fictional drama

If the human race survives that long, will we still be reading Shakespeare and Dickens a thousand years from now – or works by A.I. Dowling?

I leave you to decide.

Strange But True?

By Chris Owen

The application of Logic to any given premise or situation involves the reasoned determination of the facts by simple deduction.

However, because by its very nature, it is inflexible, logic can be manipulated to convey a blatant untruth leading to a glaring misconception.

As in the following example:-

Whenever Simon Whaley wears blue trousers it will rain the following Saturday.

A bald statement of logic which is neither provable nor refutable.

The psychology of the first law of logic – cause and effect.

Logic has a way of stealing up on you when you least expect it

This is particularly true when crime authors use the fallibility of logic to direct suspicion onto a suspect as in the further following example:-

Because a jealous husband is found at the murder scene covered in blood, the imputation, if there are no direct independent witness statements, is that he killed his partner in a fit of jealous rage.

Police detectives tend to think in straight lines so the laws of deduction dictate that the premise of innocence until proven guilty by the facts may be initially subverted to construct a prima facie (first glance) case.

This would seem to afford the ardent crime writer endless permutations to construct plots conveying miscarriages of justice from the outset or keep the reader in suspense until the culprit is finally unmasked. Which is another unwritten rule of crime fiction that there should be a resolution. Although some authors dispute this and delight in leaving readers in suspense and free to deduce their own solution.

In Scotland, they have a law, unique in their legal system, which affords the Judiciary to proclaim the case as: ‘Not Proven’.

This would seem to offer an alternative to a not guilty verdict due to lack of evidence and a passage to freedom for would-be assassins but only highlights the weakness in some cases of the Prosecution’s case thus affording the Judge the opportunity to officially record this point in judicial terms.

On the continent, they follow the Inquisitorial system of law where it is presumed that the indicted accused is Guilty till proven innocent.  The task of the defence counsel is therefore to prove innocence beyond reasonable doubt.

In the UK and other democracies, we follow Adversarial law where the accused is presumed innocent and the crown has to prove guilt beyond reasonable doubt. In capital crime trials we have an empanelled jury of twelve good citizens and true to weigh the evidence under the direction of a judge who advises them in matters of legal precedence pertinent to the case, called Jurisprudence

Under Inquisitorial law,  they employ a panel of judges in capital crime trials, usually a quorum of three, to deliberate on guilt or provable innocence after the completion of submissions by the Prosecuting Authorities (usually the police represented by a trial advocate) and the Defendant’s own independent Counsel.

In the case of Mr Whaley, the proposer has also introduced a note of mystery or otherworldliness into the statement. This would suggest certain powers to demonstrate foreknowledge of events which, because of the rules of logic, are seemingly indisputable.

There are more mysteries, as Shakespeare said,’ than are dreamt of’ which have no apparent explanation. One such is the esoteric tome: ‘The Centuries’ published in 1555 as ‘The prophities’ written by Michel de Nostradame (usually Latinised to become Nostradamus) a sixteenth-century French doctor and philosopher. Why he wrote them we shall never know but they appear on the page in the form of blank verse comprising quatrains which seem to anticipate certain major historical events. They are never specific or historically precise but leave the reader to seemingly make the verses more or less fit significant circumstances.

The closest inference to modern history being the rise of the Nazis when he mentions a tyrant residing in Europe called: ‘Hister’

Which is frighteningly close to the name Hitler.

Strange but True

Happy mystery solving – And keep writing –  or we’ll never know who dunnit!

Vote for your 2022 Wrekin Writers’ Anthology Front Cover

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POLL CLOSED – Here are the results!

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Thank you to everyone who sent in images for the anthology covers. There are four that are a big enough file size to be used as front covers . . . so which one is your favourite?

Look at the images below, and then choose your favourite on the voting form under the last photo. The closing date for votes is midnight on 5th August.

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Writing is a Puzzle

by Chris Owen

To increase your writing skills in both word power and thought process analysis leading to better plot resolution –
Why not try Crossword Puzzling?

Speaking as a Septuagenarian (look it up – I had to) I find that the cryptic type is the best form as it challenges the ever-aging brain.

Our fiendish crossword compilers are crafty in the extreme, as sometimes I have looked at clues and fried my brain in an effort to crack their coded messages. I have been known to spend hours all but standing on my head whilst teeth-gnashing, getting nowhere only to put the puzzle down in disgust. I will often then return to it the next day and solve the troublesome clue within seconds. This demonstrates the wonderful flexibility of that organic computer located between our ears. A Fountain of knowledge that epitomises all that humankind has created.

Crossword puzzling can sometimes be traitorously risky. I use this modified adverb as a colourful illustration of how and in this case why, not to compile certain crossword clues.

On one of the days leading up to the Normandy landings in June 1944 there appeared in the pages of The Daily Telegraph a crossword puzzle that featured solutions that listed all five of the code-names ascribed to the proposed landing beaches: Sword, Juno, Omaha, Gold, Utah. What was the likelihood of that? – Very remote, according to the Secret Service which initially took a dim view suspecting sabotage via an intelligence information leak.
This crucial situation led to a near-panic among the military leadership busily preparing thousands of soldiers on board ships and air transport for imminent departure. They were to comprise the D-Day invasion force bound for the assault upon the European mainland.

The resulting furore almost cost the compiler their life and liberty until it was discovered that it was a certain Leonard Dawe, Headmaster of the Strand School. He was identified as a regular crossword contributor who was unlikely to be in the pay of the Abwehr, (German military intelligence)

Staying on the theme of war, Alan Turing was tasked along with the code-breaking management hierarchy at Bletchley Park to recruit immense numbers of people required for the mammoth task of decoding the volume of German military messages. One of the ‘off the wall’ desired qualities included in the subsequent newspaper recruitment advert was: ‘must have a keen interest in crossword puzzle solving’.
This was deliberately designed to appeal to the vital original thinking element which made up the skillsets of the would-be code crackers. Turing reasoned that above all else this ability to think outside the box would inspire the connective leaps of intuition required which helped break the German enigma code machine.
Because of its constant daily change of keycode through mechanical means involving literally millions of combinations, this problem severely hampered the work of the decoders.

Then in one simple but enlightening moment, one of the female decoders looked at a specific message and applied basic logic to begin the process of decoding.

Whatever code is employed every message must contain the same opening and closing phrase or word pattern.
This, she reasoned must be something akin to ‘dear sir’ or in this case, ‘general or colonel’
and the closing word or phrase at the end of every message must be a signatory deferential term of respect. The logical one being: ‘Heil Hitler.’
From this discovery was born the code-cracking applied template enabling the bigger leaps to be made which resulted in the solving of a supposedly insoluble code. Thus the unique qualities of cryptic puzzles demonstrate their value in navigating the minefield of reasoned thought.

There is a standard universally used code for cracking cryptic clues in the form of an easily recognised shorthand.
Compilers use certain keywords or terms such as:-

Artist = RA (Royal Academy)
Doctor = MO (Medical Orderly)
Graduate or master = MA or BA
Notes= Basickeynotes: ABCDEFG
Lawyer or lawman = DA (District Attorney) American States abbreviations = NY( New York) University = U
Novice = L
Points = N S E W
Male = M
Female = F
Clothing Sizes = S M L
Vessel / ship = SS
Unknown = X Y
Ancient city = Ur
Volunteer(s) = TA (Territorial Army) Engineers = RE (Royal Engineers)

The most prolific stock mechanism used by compilers is the anagram which populates so many crosswords in order to fox our deductive powers as in the following example:

Raw point after rats returning (4, 4) = Star Wars

The clue also utilises directions or instructions to aid deduction in this case the term ‘returning’ means the words must read backwards for the solution.

‘We hear’ is another phrase used to indicate that the solution is a word that sounds like another with a different meaning

The panoply of clue forms used is down to the compiler’s blending skills but the more intricate the clue the more boring it is to me. I find the days of frustrating mental word wrangling could be better spent tending the garden or washing up.

Give me straightforward clues every time such as the following:-

Leave Virginia with large caribou (7 letters).

‘Leave’ is the object word describing a synonym,
whereas the state named is an abbreviation Virginia = VA

Large caribou = Moose
Hence the mystery word is VA + Moose = Vamoose (Leave)

Other description techniques involve the use of the first letter of words in the clue prefaced by the phrase ‘first of’.

There you have the basic skill set to compile your own crossword grid usually 13 x 15 square size

The reasoning of worded clues can also spur the imagination on to formulate titles or premises for stories.

Good hunting, because writing is a puzzle – and may the code be with you.

The Writer’s Toolbox

by Chris Owen

I would like to start by paying due deference to one of our esteemed members who specialises in training the writing talent of the present and future, namely Simon Whaley.

Over many years, he has written several books on the subject of practical advice and guidance for writers at all stages of their career, still widely available in print.
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For those wanting to begin composition in any language a workman-like approach will pay dividends. The analogy of a tradesman’s box of tools is valid when applied to the task of literally fashioning something out of nothing, as in the case of creative writing.

Your main workbench is the English language which has its own unique peculiarities born out of myriad historical sources obliging us to be mindful of spellings and the compound use of a good spell check program when word-processing. It is therefore feasible to set oneself a general compendium of rules and how to apply them, tailored to your own needs and requirements. Although uniquely tailored it is possible to formulate a universally common set of personal writing tools

Tool Number 1 : Vocabulary – increasing your word-power ‘I always endeavour to learn one new word every day.’

Sound advice thought to be attributed to Winston Churchill (1874 – 1965) He was a prolific writer producing various publications including:
‘A History of the English Speaking Peoples’ – in 4 volumes. In his lifetime, he wrote 40 books in 60 volumes.

So by the deliberate intention of proactively increasing our word-power we have completed step one in our task to become better writers.

Tool Number 2: Reading – become an avid reader which will also increase your word-power

Read self-help books to find the path for you and guide you through the literary minefields to come. These will be your only roadmaps and rulebooks.

By discovering the use of applied vocabulary, we can better understand the context and usage of words in the hands of both good and bad writers

Stephen King, author of over 65 published titles, makes a regular habit of reading other writer’s newly published books

Tool Number 3: – Plot versus character-driven Story-telling

The constant goal of narrative storytelling is to enthrall the reader so that page-turning leads them to discover the outcome or resolution of the story roadmap. How we, as writers, get there is up for debate, as the desire to satisfy a reader’s curiosity depends to some extent on the rules of the genre.

Those written to satisfy specific categories demand a certain rigidity in format. Taut thrillers or mystery writing that require straight lines with logical steps to draw the reader in and maintain curiosity tend to be plot driven. Novels that entail an exploration of character and motivation tend to be less heavily plotted with the accent on insights and revelations of the human condition taking precedence over storytelling.

If one reads the novel: ‘Ulysses’ concerning a day in the life of Leopold Bloom written by Irish author James Joyce, we discover a ground-breaking technique called ‘stream of consciousness’ where the inner first person dialogue becomes a rambling idiosyncratic narrative throughout. The reader is as much a participant in events as is the chief protagonist where events fail to reach a discernible climax. It is considered stylistically as a masterpiece of neo-realism and a forerunner of surrealism and the later existential works by Jean Paul Satre

Tool Number 4: Technique: – the yellow brick road to success

There are no rules about storytelling or novel-writing. So when an author wishes to express their unique take on the world or life in general, the rulebook can be tossed aside in some cases by the use of character’s statements or actions. Introspection and back story affords a better in-depth character study when compared to other mediums. Every minutiae of detail can be explored through the medium of novel writing.

The long hard road to success can be spent formulating a writer’s unique voice which, if lucky, comes at the start of their career. If not, each project is a slog until the voice arrives. This may be in the form of the tone of the novel or piece and deciding the narrative viewpoint e.g.:
first person, third, etc., voice,

Tool Number 5: Research – Develop an approach to fact-finding as part of the job

Speaking as a non-fiction, historical reference book author, I can recommend taking the time to study one’s subject in depth and utilising all available reference sources. Depending on the subject under research, the pertinent facts uncovered may well spark additional plot possibilities. Supplementary background facts add to credibility and authenticity especially to works of fiction set in specific time periods.

Tool Number 6: Self- Belief – The single most important tool in your box

Accepting Rejection as a necessary everyday part of the writing function is vital.
There is nothing so potentially soul crushing as having one’s work rejected by another professional person. This can take the form of an agent or publisher who frequently uses the excuse of inundation to dismiss the value of reading the submitted manuscript of an author’s work.

This practice is highlighted by the famous, or should it be infamous, story of an agent on a slow day taking the trouble to sift through what is called the ‘slush pile’ MS and discovering Alexander McCall Smith’s work about a black African Lady Detective and the rest is publishing history.
The constructive positives to come out of rejection are beneficial if one asks the right questions of oneself and the potential target market. This will certainly lead to a better finished product, and an improved form of submission approach next time.

Another famous example of submission marathons is that of J.K. Rowling of Harry Potter notoriety who suffered rejection after rejection but did not give up. It took over 27 submissions to various publishers (who must be still weeping all the way back from the bank at the revenue loss) before achieving wizarding success.

Leo Tolstoy’s epic War and Peace took six years to write, beginning in 1863, and was only published in its complete form as a two-volume novel in 1869. Even for an established author as he was, that is an incredible measure of belief in the subject matter above and beyond the call of endurance.

The work is now recognised as a world standard novel but would have tested the patience of most professional writers then and now.

The footnote is best exemplified by our return to an author of immeasurable literary stature writing in the English language and who was voted by the public in 2002 as the greatest Briton of the past millennium.

Sir Winston Churchill allegedly once wrote:
‘Success is not final. Failure is not fatal. It is the courage to continue that counts.’

Sir Winston Churchill

So Keep writing – (but beware, writing chooses you – not the other way round)

The Power of Quotations

by Chris Owen

‘Reports of my death have been greatly exaggerated’

This example is an often used quotation attributed to many others from Churchill to Roosevelt but was in fact manufactured to order by Mark Twain (Samuel Clemens).

It was part of an apocryphal tale that Twain promoted for a long while. When a reporter wrote a story speculating about his death, the author replied to him, stating that he was alive and well. This prompted the reporter to seek out the author personally and when challenged, Clemens replied with the now legendary phrase. He definitely began a trend, albeit unintentionally, of manufacturing quotes to tease his readers and thereby rekindle flagging interest in his work.

The quotation can be a powerful tool to establish your characters quickly and assertively in the reader’s mind. An ascribed quotation is the seed of character, for the author invariably wants to make a point or a succinct observation based on experience.

Although misquotations are rife, those quotes famously attributed to noted figures are fast becoming an industry in themselves, leading to whole works dedicated to famous people’s remarks.

Being profuse and varied, they are often listed under typical headings such the following:-

POLITICAL

The famous politician Lady Nancy Astor, after their now legendary spats, publicly rebuked Winston Churchill with the following churlish remarks:

‘Sir, If I was married to you I would put poison in your tea.’ Which prompted this response from the great man: ‘Madam if you were my wife, I would drink it.’

Another was –

‘Winston, you are a drunk!’
His rebuttal belies his famously acidic wit
‘Madam, you are ugly. But in the morning I shall be sober.’

HISTORICAL

Admiral Lord Horatio Nelson
2nd April 1801, at the Battle of Copenhagen whilst using a telescope he put his blind eye to the eyepiece and pointing it at the enemy’s ships reportedly remarked:-

‘I see no ships.’

George Washington (First President of the USA)
(Commenting on one of the many disputes with the British Empire as the US battled to free itself from colonial rule)

‘If freedom of speech is taken away, then we may be led dumb and silent to the slaughter’ Some quotes have transpired to be prophetic as in the following:-

Martin Luther King Jr. (Civil rights activist & preacher)
‘And I’ve looked over. And I’ve seen the promised land. I may not get there with you.’

(An edited extract part of his ‘I see the Promised Land’ Speech, given on April 3rd 1968)

(Truly prophetic as he was brutally assassinated on April 4th 1968)

Abraham Lincoln (16th President of USA)

‘You can fool some of the people all of the time and all of the people some of the time. But you cannot fool all of the people all of the time.’

Another victim of assassination on 14th April, 1865.

(Shot by John Wilkes Booth, actor and disaffected Southerner, in Ford’s Theatre, Washington DC. On the cusp of the union (Northern States) victory in the American Civil War.)

MILITARY

‘There is nothing stirs the blood so much as the sight of a marching military band. And that is the trouble with the world.’

(I must put myself in the frame for authorship of this one – unless you know differently??) SCIENTIFIC

“Two possibilities exist: either we are alone in the Universe or we are not. Both are equally terrifying.” — Arthur C. Clarke

‘Any sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from magic.’

COMICAL

Groucho Marx:(Comedian, Film Star and noted wit)

‘I refuse to join any club that would have me as a member.’

‘Television is very good for my education – every time it’s turned on I go into another room and read a book.’

These threads of succinct dialogue pull together the three-dimensional aspect of characters. Whether they are real or fiction, they give us a potted insight into their character traits

Underestimate their power at your peril.

Through Adversity to the Stars

by Chris Owen

“Per ardua ad astra” is a Latin phrase that means “through adversity to the stars.” It is the motto of the Royal Air Force.

For the Science Fiction author, the arduous task of creating new worlds defines perhaps the hardest branch of creative writing. Not only does he or she have to create plausible characters, they have to create a whole universe, sometimes a new ethos, from scratch.

When this inexorable formula works, landmark fiction is produced that pulls humanity through another rabbit hole into a different universe. Examples abound, such as H.G. Wells’ ground-breaking melodrama The War of the Worlds, which flabbergasted its Victorian audience more used to horse & carriage-paced technological thinking. This story was later adapted for American radio by Orson Welles and broadcast in 1938, much to the consternation of a supposedly more sophisticated national audience. They were convinced enough to believe that Earth was actually being invaded by Martians. Suddenly, our cultural awareness was tilted towards the heavens and their potential for allowing expansion of our literary horizons.abound,

This was never more evident when the genius of Arthur C.Clarke was acknowledged by the attraction of another genius from another medium – the cinema. Stanley Kubrick, the great auteur director, collaborated with Clarke on the movie 2001: a Space Odyssey in 1965, which was based on his short story called The Sentinel, and a new storytelling medium emerged. One could argue that modern life is the accumulation of scientific civilisation – i.e. technology. So whatever the genre we write in, it includes Sci-Fi elements because our world functions this way and has now come to define our modern society.

Policemen no longer rush to phone boxes to summon assistance or trawl through endless manual records to track or identify criminals or suspects. iPhones and computer databases afford fingertip interrogation 24/7 on tap. Lovers no longer communicate through secret handwritten letters but by zoom or email or text speech. Technology has fundamentally changed our society and how it works. This is reflected in our literary arts.

Clarke’s third law states that:
‘Any sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from magic.’

This would certainly apply to someone from even as recently as the nineteen-fifties or sixties. They would be totally baffled by an Alexa device; being unable to explain its function.

Even a smartphone that can become a wireless telephone as well as a live-link television or a computer communicating instantly across the globe – and all contained in one device, would indeed be viewed as magic by these denizens of the relatively recent past.

Clarke also added: “The Russian rocket scientist Tsiolkovsky famously stated, Earth is the cradle of humanity, but one cannot remain in the cradle forever.”

All original writing, whatever genre, is based upon our experiences on a spinning ball in space equipped with a favourable eco-system enabling humans and all life to exist and thrive. This will change when we explore the cosmos. So, it would seem we are meant to venture forth into the unknown along with our literature, which will be shaped accordingly.

Shakespeare, our greatest author writing in the English language, proved that he was indeed a writer ‘ for all time’ when he added the following line to his tragedy Hamlet:
‘There are more things in heaven and earth, Horatio, than are dreamt of in your philosophy.’

(Our titular hero delivers the line to his friend, who witnessed the ghost of his murdered father.)

One could speculate that this line was intended to broaden a character’s existential view of the world. However, I would argue, given Shakespeare’s subtle wit and towering intellect, that it was to be interpreted by audiences not just as a bald statement but as an open-ended comment on the development of mankind. Perhaps it flew over the heads of theatregoers in his time, but the deeper meaning, with all its inferences, has not been lost on succeeding generations, which, I am sure, was the bard’s ultimate intention.

I began with a famous Latin phrase and truly believe that we should all embrace our new creative writing mantle. I write these words in the aspirational hope of encouraging fellow writers to search for their literary goals and follow wherever they may take them; even upwards to the stars.

To paraphrase our Star Trek hero Mr. Spock: ‘Live long and prosper – and keep writing.’

We are Mere Vessels

by Christopher Owen

Timbre  – is that unforgettable resonance that stays with you long after a story you have just read. Not unlike when listening to music, you realise that a certain musician has provided a soundtrack to your life over the years. Usually, they are expressing simple, straightforward emotions.

So simple that, as in the case of story-telling, the words stay in the memory and seep into our souls forever.

Ernest Hemingway’s work is infused with this mysterious, magical way with words. They were often simple, used in short sentences. Such as ‘He came to the river, and he saw it was there.’ (Excerpt from: Big Two-hearted River)

This revelation is never forced upon us. It quietly seduces us sometimes in the wee small hours when the doorway into our hearts is left unguarded. Much like endorphins released into the brain, we seek the same pleasing high over and over, which is only satisfied with repeated doses.

I believe we are mere vessels to be filled with knowledge of the meaning of life in the context of the human condition. Literature should act as a torch to be shone into the dark corners of the psyche.

Hemingway wrote: ‘Prose is architecture not window-dressing.’

The greatest wordsmith of the English language ‘for all time’ as Ben Jonson styled him, was undoubtedly William Shakespeare. When we strip back the contemporary idiosyncrasies of language used in his writings, we find the text is laden with truisms that belie a great intellect.

For example:

‘To thine own self be true.’

‘The fault lies not in our stars but in ourselves’

‘We are the stuff that dreams are made on and our little lives are rounded with a sleep’

‘All the world’s a stage and all the men and women merely players’

This curious fact has puzzled fans for years struggling to explain the author’s comprehensive knowledge.There is no record of the accredited bard ever completing elementary education or even attending a University in England. This would have fuelled his encyclopedic knowledge of Science, classical history, the arts, or politics, as featured in the text of the plays.

This has given rise to the theory that the real author was a nobleman, writing under a pseudonym. In this case, the prime contender was the Earl of Oxford Edward de Vere, a contemporary who frequented London and could have known Shakespeare personally.

If he was connected or at least a possible sponsor providing financial support, the Earl certainly knew the right contacts at court to get the plays produced – backed by royalty.

The theory of his involvement falls down when we learn that De Vere died in 1604 and the records show Shakespeare was still writing and producing as a sharer (partner) in the London Globe Playhouse up to 1612 and died in 1616.

In 1623 the first folio was produced listing all the complete works to hand written by Shakespeare.If there was another candidate for the authorship I am sure all those participating playhouse colleagues who paid for the printing out of their own pockets, including the playwright and his friend Ben Jonson, would have acknowledged an alternative source if they were aware of the fact.

No others are mentioned or even alluded to in the preface text, as an alternative to the ‘Swan of Avon,’ as Jonson referred to William Shakespeare.

So, keep writing from the heart, before A.I. takes over.

Who knows, compared to this terrifying prospect, you could be the next Shakespeare.

What a Surprise!

By Christopher Owen

The lexicon of culture began with a series of marks found by archaeologists on a cave wall. Thirty-two distinctly unique language glyphs appear in cave drawings dating back 65,000 years. This was the basis of an alphabet of mass communication that enabled writers to speak to an audience comprising other tribe members.

This remarkable date is some 20,000 years before previous scientific evidence suggested the appearance of homo sapiens – i.e. modern humans. This shocking deduction, bearing in mind only one species is shown in the fossil record, indicates they were therefore not made by humans but – Neanderthals.

Paint, e.g.ochre, cannot be dated, so deposits of diluted stone in water dripping over the etchings were carbon-dated, revealing traces dating back to this period. Recent research reveals that 2% of our modern DNA is of Neanderthal origin. They were us, not backward cave dwellers; It’s as simple as that.
So, it could be argued that the beginnings of a written language could date from that time.

This pre-dates previous deductions that abstract conceptual thought was first evidenced by the early civilisations: such as the Sumarians and the Chinese who produced early forms of maps, paintings, and scroll-form books circa 10000 BC. Banknotes and coinage were first produced in China in the 7th century AD. This revolutionary concept was embodied in the abstract notion of a bearer offering payment for goods instead of barter, which would be honoured by an absent payee bank willing to reimbuse the face value. Through this method, modern commerce began, which ultimately enabled civilisation to become global and with it the spread of culture in the form of the printed word—books.
Our writing craft is therefore far older than we thought.

Most academics would argue that the general circulation of printed books was first developed with the Gutenburg press in Germany in the 16th century AD, utilising a printing press with a revolutionary moveable typeface, thus enabling mass production.

However, the most beautiful examples of books are those laboriously created by hand in the scriptoriums of European monasteries circa 7th century AD. They were produced by dedicated monks of each particular holy order, for consumption by the educated few only and expressly for the purpose of assisting the clergy in the spread of religion by depicting the veneration of god through words and pictures.

Recorded myths and legends for general consumption do not appear in print until the 11th century when the first versions of the classic tales of heroes begin with the story of Beowulf a Celtic warrior. His deeds, told in the form of elegiac poems, were of vanquishing witches and fairytale creatures for grateful kings before setting off on epic voyages.

In the present, we writers, particularly fiction novelists, are the new merchant venturers of the age voyaging onto the sea of literary unknowns with few rules, no star to guide us and no paddles to save us all.

Good Sailing and good fortune!

Our Fundamental Right to Write

By Christoper Owen

First order of business, may I offer felicitations to fellow writers in this first month of a new age. The Carolinian age. God save the King!

How we will all fair is a matter for the gods in this increasingly perilous 21st century world. Speaking personally, I’m sure we all presumed pre-pandemic, that it was destined to be a settled age where most united nations ventured boldly forth into the cosmos together to pursue myriad voyages of discovery. Alas, we are all plunged back into a dark and uncertain future.

Where everyman’s word, whether written or spoken, will be weighed and tested against many an autocratic country’s own particular version of the truth and if found wanting, severely punished.

As we awake to our new age, we find nothing has changed. The world is still plagued by exactly the same ills that greeted the previous newly-crowned monarch of the Carolinian age.

War, famine, pandemic disease, corruption, despotism.

This ‘brave new world’ is an age where, in some countries around the globe, the promulgation of free speech or the written word is curtailed and personal freedoms violently suppressed, regardless of the authors’ age or gender.

In a more gentlemanly age, a woman’s sensitivities and rights were revered.

However, as an example Jane Austen, now regarded as a world literary figure, in her time was not in law allowed to vote, buy property in her own right or deny the wishes of any male relative.

As writers, we all deal in the written word and should therefore cherish our own particular freedoms in an increasingly shrinking world.

As Thomas Payne the great reformer and philosopher once said: ‘I may not agree with what you say but I will fight to the death for your right to say it.’

There in a nutshell are the core ideals of freedom of thought and self-expression as contained in that little word with a big premise labelled: Democracy.

Perhaps we should not lift the lid on our own unenlightened colonial past least we discover some unpleasant truths about our own behaviour towards our fellow man.

Yet, if freedom of expression is such a simple basic right, why do so many despotic governments refuse to permit it?

Daily Diary Date with self

By Christopher Owen

Sorry can’t stop for too long – am off to join captain Krebble on the Starship Explorer parked at the Solar system’s edge. Our mission is to free the slaves on Lunark 4. Then it’s off to join Ahab on the whaling vessel Pequod for reading and research – and that’s just in one day!

Tomorrow is another busy day travelling to darkest Dorset to help Inspector Diamond to solve another baffling case.

Name another job where you can be deep in a cobalt mine on Pluto one day and inside the mind of a killer the next.

The only limit is your own imagination (and how fast you can get the words down on paper).

Don’t tell me it’s too difficult or it can’t be done because navigating mental roadblocks is part and parcel of the job. The only enemy is time and your own reluctance to overcome difficulties with stamina, fortitude and sheer doggedness. 

Remember,the only person who can write the outcome of a story written by you, is you.

Yes, creative writing is a solitary occupation, always will be. 

No-one can do it for you and the only true measure of success is when your writing somehow reveals an aspect of the human condition that others react to.

(Assuming you can get it out there to a waiting world or can afford self-publishing.)

Always remember, persistence pays.

The following authors are remembered only for the one successful novel of their whole careers.

• Margaret Mitchell = ‘Gone with the Wind’
• J.D. Salinger = ‘Catcher in the Rye’
• Harper Lee = ‘To Kill a Mockingbird’

We all fight this battle with the self every day.

Call it writing if you like but to me it’s a way of life.

Another day at the rock face and the only way is up.

Entering Competitions – A Word to the Wise

by Christopher Owen

Writing innovative original fiction to order is at once achievable and at the same time impossible.

There must be lots of pet theories out there about the formula for winning writing competitions.

The simple truth is that there is no such thing.

What will attract the judges’ eye and how they should be able to glean from your submission that which is obvious to you, may not be so for them or the average reader.

And also what is uniquely discernible as well as what is noteworthy. 

Any personal style lies somewhere between these two extremes.

I have also learned that when you submit early, well before the deadline of a competition, the initial enthusiasm that carried your story over the theoretical winning line six months earlier, when you read it again later, can wane dramatically. 

There is some merit in the advice to write a piece and then lock it away for re-reading in some weeks or even months time. This simple practice can often reveal errors prior to submission.

This happened to me recently when I looked at a story I had entered and decided it was unreadable due to its format. The myriad faults were obvious and glaring.

However, the plotline was still viable and should have grabbed the reader from the first line but failed spectacularly to do so.

I discovered there was too much exposition (narrative description) and not enough textual hooks to pull the reader in.The key to this dilemma is the steadfast and uncompromising application of dialogue. 

Exposition should mostly come from a character’s lips as they tell the story for you.

Mark Twain once said: ‘Don’t tell the reader the old lady screamed – bring her on and let her scream.’

For me, it was a lesson learned the hard way. I had decided from the concept stage that because it was set in an earlier time period that I had to reconstruct that world for the reader in the minutest detail. 

Everything from then on became reportage laced with a plethora of adjectives – which is not storytelling. Stephen King has famously parodied the original saying with his observational truism that: ‘The road to hell is paved with adjectives.’

I overlooked the reader’s own imagination for interpretive geographical detail when my original intention should have been to get them to immediately focus on the self-evident dire predicament of the main protagonists from the beginning.

This is a vital component of the storytelling process that the reader couldn’t  possibly second guess without my help and would have given the piece much more poignancy, pace and dynamic thrust.

Will I ever learn from my mistakes? – I sincerely hope so.

Chris

2022 Retreat: Criccieth

2022 Doris Gooderson Competition – FIRST

Lewis

by Christine Howe

Gerald’s eyes no longer brightened on seeing Joyce, but he would raise his shaggy eyebrows when she sat down and took his hands in hers. These days it was all about clinging to the little positives. Was it preferable to lose your other half suddenly, or to have this disappearing-into-the woods sort of loss, wanting to beckon him back? Joyce visited twice a week at The Magnolias where Gerald was cared for, but captive.

She bent to give him a hug, but he wrestled himself free of her embrace. 

‘Lewis,’ he said, ‘Lewis.’ His voice was growly and cross.

‘Who’s this Lewis?’ A care assistant rustled by in her plastic apron, dispensing tea in beakers and drinking cups. ‘He says Lewis all the time now.’

Joyce shook her head. ‘I’ve no idea.’ To Gerald she said, ‘Tell me about Lewis. Shall I bring the photo album next time and we’ll look for him? Yes?’

Gerald mumbled, and withdrew his hand from Joyce’s patting. She watched him eat gingerbread and drink his tea; calm only when eating. He was restless these days, pacing about the lounge while the more sedentary residents tracked his movements like spectators at a sporting fixture.

Back at home Joyce phoned their daughter Catherine. ‘Did your dad ever mention someone called Lewis? He’s got this Lewis on his mind.’

‘Inspector Morse’s sidekick?’ Catherine laughed. ‘Honestly Mum, it could be anyone.’

Joyce frowned. In her mind’s eye she saw Gerald pacing, eyes not brightening on seeing her, arms pushing her away. 

For her next visit she put the photo album in her shopping bag, together with short-sleeved shirts for Gerald to wear in the warmer weather and a pack of his favourite caramel wafers. She called in at the library before catching the bus and found an illustrated book of dog breeds, and put that in the shopping bag too. The bag was heavy and it dragged on her arm as she toiled up the hill from the bus stop to The Magnolias. Gerald resisted when she went to greet him with a hug. It wasn’t an aggressive resistance, just a firm push away. 

‘Still repeating Lewis,’ a care assistant said chirpily. ‘Not solved the mystery yet?’

‘Doing my best.’ 

‘Well, not to worry. He enjoys his meals and he’s a good sleeper. Doris over there says toodle-oo from morning ’til night.’

Beneath the cheeriness Joyce sensed that having to listen to both toodle-oo and Lewis endlessly repeated during an eight-hour shift was wearing. She smiled in acceptance of the young woman’s attempted comfort; words as sugared as the cake now being dished out with the afternoon cup of tea.She opened the dog book and began to turn the pages. 

Gerald jabbed a sticky finger at a page. He’d marked the image of an Old English Sheepdog with a smear of butter icing. Unlikely that such a large dog could have been the family pet.

‘Oh, clever you — you’ve remembered the dog from those paint adverts.’

A spark had been ignited in a dark recess of Gerald’s mind. Another little positive. She took a tissue from her handbag and wiped the page clean. Next, she tried him with the photo album, which they had looked at together several times, but not with the Lewis objective.

‘Catherine.’ He pointed at their daughter squinting into the sun on a holiday photo. Another achievement to chalk up that day, but still no Lewis.

That night Joyce lay awake. How could it be that in all their years of marriage Gerald hadn’t mentioned Lewis? Or perhaps he had related an anecdote about him and she had been inattentive, his words and the name drifting over her head like a balloon while she concentrated on her cross-stitch. If she had failed him then, she mustn’t fail him now. In the darkness she wiped her eyes. Etched in her memory would be his repetition of Lewis and his endless circuits of the care home lounge fuelled by his frustration.

Their next significant wedding anniversary would be Diamond, if Gerald lived long enough to greet it. The thing with a long marriage was that it seemed like your whole life and all your experience.

By the time the sun came up she was cheerful, though gritty-eyed. She’d identified other avenues to pursue in the search for Lewis, so those sleepless hours hadn’t been wasted. Lewis could be a former colleague at Fraser’s, or a pal from the carpet bowls club. Gerald and their neighbour Sydney had gone off to play carpet bowls every Wednesday afternoon with their bowling shoes in drawstring bags, until Gerald had become too unwell to play. 

Sydney was hanging out his washing and she called to him, ‘Sydney, did Gerald ever mention someone called Lewis? Bowls club maybe?’

Sydney shook his head. ‘Why?’

‘He’s got this Lewis on his mind and I don’t know who he is, or was. Any ideas?’

Sydney picked up his laundry basket. ‘Didn’t Gerald do National Service? Maybe Lewis hails from that time.’

He scuttled back indoors, leaving Joyce standing by her empty washing line. She hadn’t seen any photographs of Gerald on National Service. She would look in the sideboard for their large manila envelope labelled Miscellaneous Photos. Joyce found the envelope and in it a photograph of a Fraser’s staff Christmas meal from thirty years before. It hadn’t made it into the album as the photo was a poor one of Joyce, catching her with a forkful of turkey half-way to her mouth. Several potential candidates for Lewis, though. From the bus that day she admired people’s front gardens. The season inspired hope.

She was completing her entry in the signing-in book, glancing at the clock on the wall, when a care assistant passed by and said, ‘Your Gerald has a visitor. It’s the mystery man, Lewis. Been here an hour.’

Joyce dropped the signing-in Biro on its tethering string and rushed to the dementia wing. Through the toughened glass panel of the lounge door, she saw Gerald with a man she’d never met, a man who held Gerald’s hands in his. Faces in the lounge turned to look at her, but she had eyes only for Gerald and Lewis. Gerald bent forward and rested his head on the other man’s shoulder, his face turned in to his neck. A sob rose in Joyce’s throat.

‘What a burden you’ve carried all these years,’ she whispered, her breath misting the glass.

She turned away, and deposited her shopping bag containing more summer shirts and a further supply of caramel wafers in the corridor outside Gerald’s room door. And then, touching the wall with her hand to steady herself, she made her way back to the main entrance.

‘Not staying for a cup of tea today, Joyce?’ a care assistant called after her.

Over her shoulder she said, ‘No, I’ll let Gerald enjoy Lewis’s visit. They’ve waited a long time.’

‘I’ll sign you out. It’s not like you to forget.’

Joyce hurried away, down the hill to the bus stop. Gerald’s retreat into the woods had come to a temporary halt. Hers had only just begun.

Biography

Christine Howe lives in Cumbria and is a member of Carlisle Writers’ Group. The urge to generate some words of her own came after the passage of many books through her hands while working in libraries. She is currently planning her fifth novel and hopes to find a publisher for at least one of the other four. In 2020 she was awarded second prize in the Louise Walters Books Page 100 competition. Her short fiction has been published in anthologies such as The Best of CaféLit, shortlisted in a Flash 500 competition and is featured in the Carlisle Writers’ Group latest anthology and on their blog: https://carlislewritersgroup.wordpress.com/

Christine’s own blog, Writing from a Small Place, can be found at https://christinemhowewrites.wordpress.com

On Twitter she is @christimhowe

2022 Doris Gooderson Competition – SECOND

The Potent Lily

by Heather Alabaster

When I first saw Jane, she was standing, in that odd way she does, with her arms folded behind her back, among the seasonal lily display. When I say ‘among’ she was right in between the pots, head low to inhale the scent, so that her coppery hair all but tangled with a bevy of golden stamens. I was bewitched, there and then, by her subtle beauty. 

I was on what we called the ‘shoplifter-lookout’ till – with a good view down past the racks of small items, seed packets, string, hand tools and so on, and a partial sight of the plant courtyard beyond. Jane looked stunning, roaming along the racks and stands, scanning them intently – a picture in her sleeveless summer dress. When she picked things up, I could see her slim-fingered, pretty hands. I glanced at mine – well, half a lifetime of heavy work, lifting and shifting, had left its gnarly marks. Strong hands they are though, capable.

So I watched out for her after that, and I was lucky, she came in often, sometimes checking a list, always purposeful. She bought netting and stakes, a curved pruning knife, weedkiller, and one day an axe, chosen carefully for its grip. She nearly always bought gardening gloves too. I watched her try them on; at first she bought the flowery cotton sort, but soon moved onto thicker ones: canvas, then leather. The day she searched for heavy, rubberised builder’s gloves I was standing behind her, and I saw her poor hands close up. They were now coarse and red, grazed on the knuckles, and I think there were blisters on her palms. I wanted to kiss them away.

That was the day when everything changed. She beckoned me and asked for a pair in her size. I picked them from the display like precious objects. When I put the gloves into her hands I couldn’t help holding on. I held on to her hands, and she looked right into my eyes, and through my flesh and bones it seemed; before she pulled away.

‘I’m so sorry’, I murmured. ‘I can see your hands are sore, and these gloves are stiff, may I help you ease them on?’ And she let me smooth them over her fragile hands, while I flushed with ridiculous confusion. 

‘That’s kind, thank you.’ she said hesitating. Then twisting back to the shelves, she spoke softly over her shoulder; I could see her cheek and the side of her pink-painted mouth as it moved. 

‘It’s just that there’s rubbish I have to clear up, useless leftovers, that wouldn’t … that I couldn’t get rid of. So I’m burying everything, smothering it. It’ll rot down into compost, mostly. I’ve made a good start, but it’s tough going and I need to get it finished.’ Her face tensed, and the rubber-hidden hands clenched into fists.

‘Is there anyone to help?’ I was fishing, and she knew it, and again took her time to reply.

‘There was, but well, it didn’t work out, it was suffocating me’. Her voice was low, there was even a catch in it, but then it brightened. ‘So I’m clearing up, making a new start. I suppose you could say I’m turning things round.’

And then she did turn round, and shot another questioning look from under her eyelashes, and I swear she was smouldering at me. I took a risk and held her elbow, angling myself beside her, so close that she must surely have felt the heat of me. She didn’t draw back.

‘If you’ve come this far, and you’re nearly finished, let me help you.’ Which was when she unpeeled the gloves, took firm hold of my capable hands and pressed them to her breast.  

*

 Ruthie continued working at the garden centre. She didn’t move in with me until long after the fuss over Harry’s disappearance died down. Investigators, reporters and earnest counselling volunteers came and went. I gave them tea and lavender biscuits, sitting on the terrace, all through the sultry remnants of summer. 

‘Harry was a private person, secretive.’ I told them. ‘A little selfish too. I’m afraid there were girlfriends, more than one. I didn’t confront him, I didn’t want him ever to leave me, I wanted him close. But whatever has become of him, I feel sure he cannot forget me and our last hours together.’ Then, when I wrung my hands or dabbed an eye and bravely pushed back my hair, they would pat my bare knee lightly, squeeze my shoulder for a long moment, or even offer up a prayer.

We began to grow more lilies Ruthie and I, our favourites. Because the barrow we had made was perfect for them, arching quite naturally out of its tranquil spot. Close to the river, and fretted with shade from a shimmering silver birch, the earth was moist and deep. So, through grasses and summer campion, we had dug, heaped and sculpted a smooth mound, turfed and set it with lilies and twining periwinkle, like the shrine of an ancient idol. And of course, as Ruthie drily remarked, there was no need of extra nourishment for the soil. 

So now, at midsummer, Lilium Regale rise up like a troop of tall angels lifting their slender, rosy-backed trumpets to the sky. There are proud folds of Stargazer and white Casablanca too, whose gales of scent billow from their extravagant, jostling heads. Such luxurious abandon, such rich pleasure — it was always at the root of us, it bound us. Ruthie would bring me sheaves of lilies in the early days, and still sometimes now. When she does, she is perfumed by them, and there may be amber dusts of pollen on her sleeve.

Biography

Heather Alabaster lives in Durham with her husband. She wrote occasional stories and poems from early school years, though work years, in libraries and in publishing, were all about facts and not fiction. Now that her focus has changed she often has themes in her head – then when the opening lines show up, she knows she can get on and create interesting characters to give life to them.

2022 Doris Gooderson Competition – THIRD

The Other People

By Denny Jace

The Other People walk past our flat all day; I watch them through the window. They hold bags, phones, steaming cardboard coffee cups and sometimes each other’s hands.

Yesterday a mum and dad swung their boy right off the floor like he was a monkey. Every two steps they’d stop and swing him high. His face crumpled with laughter, I was too far away to hear his shrieks of joy, but I imagined his mouth open wide and so I made the sounds myself until the window fogged up. I rubbed it clear, pressed my cheek against the glass pane as they passed by, straining to see, not wanting them to disappear. When they’d gone, I stretched up both of my arms, high above my head and imagined it was me swinging and not just The Other People.

Today the streets are empty, the storm has frightened them all away. The livid wind hurls debris from its wicked fingers. Bashing walls and bending trees until their leaves scatter and die. The birds that sit on the pilons have gone back to their nests; the air too thick to fly.

I roll my forehead across the glass pane and then look up. The sky is low, swollen and bruised. I worry it might fall but then I remember that I can catch it because I’m a brave little chicken.

I wish the storm away and for The Other People to come back and then I see two boys on the pavement down below, arguing and shoving each other. They puff out peacock chests, their hair soaking glossy helmets, clinging to their heads. From up here they have no faces, like God forgot his pen.  I bang on the window; they can’t hear me but I’m giggling because I imagine them with drawn on moustaches and wobbly spectacles. They look so small, the same size as my fingers as they press against the glass. 

Outside is like a dolls house; The Other People are tiny puppets; new ones appearing throughout the day. If I opened the window I could reach down and scoop them up, carry them in the palm of my hand. They could come inside to play; they’d be perfectly safe. If they stayed quiet. Perfectly safe as long as you stay quiet, that’s what Mum says when she knows Laura Parker’s coming to visit. Nosey fucking Parker is also what mum says. Laura wears a lanyard with her picture on and carries a clipboard. I wear my clean dress and smile. She asks questions to catch mum out and makes lots of notes and nods. They talk about what The Other People do and what we should do, but don’t. 

I push at the plastic frame, run my fingers across the locks that don’t have keys. The windows don’t open, Mum says it’s not safe outside so that’s why we stay in. Mum is right and Laura is a liar. But then sometimes, mum makes a ‘play promise’; next week I’ll take you to the park. But a promise is like a dream, it’s not real, it won’t happen and eventually you forget about it.

The rain batters the street, shards of glass stinging the pavement. It bounces up and stabs at my window. I stretch my eyes open wide, play a little game with myself where I refuse to blink, even when I think the glass will smash and splinter itself right into my eyeballs. 

I am bored now that The Other People are hiding. ‘I spy with my little eye something beginning with… ’ No one answers so I use my other voice but that doesn’t work either. My breath fogs up the window, so I use my finger as a pen to make shapes on the glass but the shapes cry tears that trickle down into a puddle on the window ledge.

I look behind me, the lounge is as empty as me. I don’t like to be alone.

I am not alone. Mum is here and so is Gary. The last time I checked, they were asleep on the kitchen floor. He was wearing a tie with yellow ducks that didn’t quack. But it was tied tight around his arm instead of his neck. He’s not like The Other People, he’s real like us. He fixes Mum with needles and pills, foil and campfires. He doesn’t live here but when he comes, she is as happy as a clown and dances around the lounge, turning the radio up full blast. But then they fall asleep, and mum forgets about our dinner and our tea. I think that she forgets about me.

My tummy rumbles, the angry lion is rattling my ribcage. I know the cupboards are full of nothing, so I mooch around the floor searching like an anteater. Yesterday I found a lonely apple that had rolled under the sofa. It was velvet with mold. I didn’t eat it. It was a bad apple, which is sometimes what Gary calls me. 

On the coffee table are little sweets in a tiny plastic bag, pretty rainbow colours. I crawl on my hands and knees towards them. Too small to be Smarties, too flat to be Skittles. I know that they are special because of the look Gary gave to mum when he pressed the bag into her hand. They had kissed and I hid my face behind a cushion

Share and share a like, mum says when I sit in her bath water, so I’m sure she won’t mind sharing her kissing sweets. I empty them into my hand; Eenie Meenie, Miney Mo. 

Wrekin Writers Anthology 2021 Front Cover Image Vote

There are three choices this year. Scroll down to view, then vote for your favourite at the bottom of the page! Closing date for voting is 11.59pm on Saturday 1st October 2022.

Image 1 – Snowy Wrekin View

Snowy Wrekin View

Image 2 – Wrekin View of South Shropshire

Wrekin View of South Shropshire

Image 3 – The Wrekin Transmitter

The Wrekin transmitter

January 2022 Newsletter

The newsletter available for the January 2022 meeting can be downloaded here:

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December 2021 Newsletter

The December 2021 Newsletter can be downloaded here:

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November 2021 Newsletter

The newsletter for the November 2021 meeting can be downloaded here:

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October 2021 Newsletter

The October 2021 newsletter can be found here:

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2021 Doris Gooderson – First Place

Biography:

Alison is a professional copywriter in the IT industry and she also writes for pleasure.  She usually writes humorous verse and performance pieces, often as Alison Absolute.  She’s an ex slam champion (Cheltenham Lit Fest, Worcestershire etc) and a member of Bridgnorth Writers. “I will now write more short stories!” she says,

Her younger son is a keen ornithologist and so they’ve spent many a happy hour together lurking in bird hides near marshes.  That’s what inspired the story – that and him growing up and away from her, as children do.  Alison’s prize money will go towards buying him a kayak for his birthday, so he can pursue the unfortunate birds even more closely!

The Hide by Alison Nichol-Smith

It had snowed this year, and the day was crisp, bright and breathtakingly cold. I had hoped for some patches of clear water where waders and waterfowl might gather, but the pools were almost iced over.  Still, the intense cold meant the paths were frozen too, making them easier to negotiate, even those leading right across the marshes.  I was wearing Hunters, but Colm was just in trainers, so that mattered. 

Oh, but it was beautiful, that morning on the marshes.  The dry brown rushes rimed with frost and every green blade of grass a tiny explosion of crystal stars beneath our feet.  Together we crossed the little wooden bridge, where the stream still ran deep with rich brown silt, giving us hope that the top pool might not be frozen. 

And then we were at the hide; a dark bulk rising up, silhouetted against the sky with the sun behind.  Every year, we come to this same place, and every year, as we reach the path, I feel half an urge to turn back.

And so we climb, Colm in front, me following, up the steps of the Endersley hide, our hide.  It’s empty, of course, as always, every year.  We choose our stations along the bench, lift and peg back our chosen flaps, steadying our elbows and binoculars on the ledge.  

Colm looks out over the frozen water, while I sneak a sideways glance at my beautiful son.  Thirteen years old today.  He has changed so much over this past year.  He is taller now; not quite my height, but very nearly.  By this time next year he’ll probably tower above me.  His face has changed too.  There has always been the calm intensity you’d expect of dedicated birdwatcher, but there is a solemnity now, a gravitas befitting his advancing years.  On a lighter note, his complexion could be worse, but adolescence is peppering the area around his nose with pimples and blackheads. I itch to squeeze one; an unworthy emotion I fight to supress.

Feeling my eyes on him, Colm turns and gives me a quick, self-conscious smile.  I smile back, and we both return to our binoculars,  But I can help looking again at him, the wonder of him, the beauty of his profile, the  sweet curl of his left ear, and he turns and grins again.  This time, we both hold the smile and he shuffles a little towards me, along the wooden bench.  I shuffled towards him too, until we are close enough to touch gloved hands, which we do.  

‘I do love you so, my darling’ I say to him.

‘Me too, Mum’ he says. I squeeze his hand, then release it so he can get back to his birding. 

The hide has the cheap insistent smell of cut pine, the interior raw and orange-toned, too bright against the white glare of snow and ice.  Hides should have dark corners, hidden places.  High up here above the marshes, in the bright snowlight, I feel exposed.  

‘I can see a heron’ says Colm.

I can see it too on the far side of the pool, grey and stately, balanced solemnly on one slender white leg, blending into the rushes, astonishingly still. A heron is not in general a big deal for us, but on a day like this, it’s something.  And we need something to mark this particular year.  The year it snowed.  The year we saw the heron.

Thirteen years old.   I can hardly believe it.  He’s wearing a padded black jacket, some sort of ski wear perhaps, blue jeans, white trainers.  He carries a backpack which I know will be full of his favourite bird books.  His hair is not really blond now, more a pale brown, very fine and silky.  He wears no hat or scarf.  He must be cold.  Goodness knows I am.  And the air is growing colder as the sun lowers in the sky, the light thinning and metallic.  At any moment, Colm is going to say:

‘Should we go back?  Should we go to the cafe?’

I know he’s going to say that.  He says it every year.  And so I play along.  

‘What will you have?  Hot chocolate with whipped cream and marshmallows?  Or are you too old for marshmallows now you’re a teenager?’

‘I’m never too old for marshmallows.’

I rise.  He stays seated. Still watching.

‘You go ahead.’  He says ‘I’ll follow along’

The sun slants through in dazzling golden bars behind him.  I can barely see his face.  I move towards him, bend and kiss the top if his head, his silky brown hair. He smells of herbs, dried bracken, soap and nice boy’s sweat.

‘Happy birthday, Colm darling’ I say.  ‘Thanks, Mum’ he says, his clear hazel eyes looking so candidly into mine.

I close the door of the hide behind me, and stumble down the steps, heart thudding against my ribs; not just with the cold.  Along the path, I pick half a dozen fat bull-rushes, tugging and snapping the strong stems.  You’re not meant to, but I always do.  I walk quickly down to the cafe, boots crunching on the frozen snow.  Don’t look back.  

He doesn’t follow, of course, as I know he won’t.  Can’t.   I buy a cup of hot chocolate with marshmallows, and sit there drinking the sickly stuff myself, alone.  On the table beside me, the bull-rushes thaw and drip.   

Four o’clock, and it’s time for them to close up.  They show me out tenderly, the last visitor of the day.  I drive home, stopping off at the cemetery, as I do every year. In the growing dark, I place my bull-rushes on Colm’s grave. 

Thirteen years old today.  Who’d have thought it?  Fourteen next year. That’s twice seven: he’ll have been gone then for as many years as he was here with me.  And I will survive another year, against all the odds, against my own inclination.  Because he’ll hold me to that one precious day, his birthday, when we’ll meet again at the wildfowl reserve he loved so much. 

He’ll be taller than me next year, his voice will have settled down, and maybe we’ll see a water-rail, or even a kingfisher if the weather is kinder to us.  And maybe one year he’ll have grown too old for birdwatching, and that will be that: I’ll visit the hide alone.

But until then, I still have my son.

2021 Doris Gooderson – Second Place

Biography

Maria is a science journalist who loves to write short stories in her spare time. After making it on to various competition shortlists over the past few years, such as the Wells Literary Festival, HISSAC and ChipLit, this year she was delighted to win the Bibliophone short story prize (https://www.bibliophone.com/) and come second in the Doris Gooderson competition. Perhaps one day she will take the leap and start that novel she’s always wanted to write.

Twitter: Maria Burke @MariaBstories

Mister Beaman’s Bible by Maria Burke

I was 16 when Ma volunteered me to help Mr Beaman. He must have been about 92 then.

Ma said to make sure to get some fresh air in, on account of old folks’ houses smelling pretty off sometimes. It’s just what happens when you get old, she said. Maybe my room smells that like that too now.

I was as nervous as a deer that first time. I’d never met him before though I’d seen him driving round town in a red truck, his little grey head peering over the steering wheel. Strange thing was I felt comfortable with him right from the get-go. I went twice a week to do the cooking and the cleaning. I didn’t mind – not that I had any choice in the matter – and anyway, I was used to it, being the youngest of ten. 

Sometimes he’d put the gramophone on and we’d sing along to a record. I’d tell him about my little job at the school, helping the teacher. Or there was always some family drama to relate, what with there being so many of us and the family growing all the time. 

Sometimes he’d tell me about his family. About what he got up to with his brothers on the farm. They’d all passed away by this time. He’d lost his wife a long time ago, too. Barbara her name was and she had red hair ‘like the leaves in the fall’. Their two little babies had red hair, too, but they never made it past their first birthdays. ‘Being the last one at the party is no fun, Violet,’ he said.

Then one day Mr Beaman sat me down. I must have been visiting for a year or so, I guess.

‘Now, Violet, I want you to do something for me. I want you to marry me.’

My mouth dropped open like a trapdoor. 

‘Times are tough. Jobs are hard to come by. I know your family are struggling. But I can help. If you married me, you see, you’d get my war pension when I die.’

‘Oh Mr Beaman,’ I said. ‘It wouldn’t be right!’

‘Now, Violet, that’s not so. I should say… ’ He cleared his throat. ‘There’d be no intimacy of the conjugal sort. You’d still live at home and come here just like now.’

I was as red as a beetroot, as you can imagine. 

‘Nothing would change but when I pass over I’d like to know that you’d be looked after.’

My eyes filled with tears. ‘But what would people say?’ 

‘We’d keep it secret and no-one would know.’ He sighed and took off his glasses then. His lovely blue eyes were all cloudy. He looked out the window but I knew he couldn’t see anything, what with his cataracts and all.

‘Violet, I was just about to give up when you came along and now I feel better than I’ve done in years. Marrying you would be my way of saying thank you.’ 

In my heart I felt it was wrong, but this was the Great Depression and he was right, times were hard. And that’s how it happened. We married in secret and things carried on as they always had, only now he would joke that I should call him Jack. But he was always Mr Beaman to me. We were married for three years before he died in his sleep. I truly believe it was our marriage that kept him going just that little bit longer. That’s why I agreed to it in the end, if I’m honest.

Nobody knew. Not till now. I knew there’d be a scandal. And I couldn’t bring myself to claim that pension. I made my own way in the world. 

I’m 101 now. People ask ‘what’s the secret to a long life, Vi?’ Just get on with it, I say. There’s too much complaining these days, not enough suffering in silence. My great-nieces are always weeping over this or that. They say I’m a tough cookie, not even shedding a tear at their parents’ funerals. Pastor Jonah says I’m stoic. I had to look it up. It means unflappable. I guess that’s about right.

There’s another secret to my long life, I might add. Having people around me. That’s why I like being here in the nursing home. And I understand now what Mr Beaman must have felt. You don’t want to be the only one left at the party.

When people ask me why I never married, I tell them to mind their own darned business. Never met a man I liked enough, and that’s the truth. But I don’t mention Mr Beaman. He’s always been a secret.  

Do you know Pastor Jonah? We have very good conversations. I’ve been a Methodist all my life but I’ve never met a pastor like Jonah. It must be this modern approach. Anyway, we were talking one day, like we do. And I thought – what the heck – I’m going to tell him about Mr Beaman. So I did, and he was pretty flabbergasted. But it was when I told him about some of Mr Beaman’s stories that he really sat up. 

Because of Mr Beaman being a veteran of the Civil War. I had no idea it was such a big deal. Mr Beaman didn’t like talking about it much, but sometimes he’d tell me bits and pieces like when I found his Union medal at the back of a cupboard.

Anyhow, Pastor Jonah got real excited. ‘That means you’re a widow of a Civil War veteran, Miss Stone. Gosh, there can’t be anyone left alive that can claim that!’

So one thing led to another and he got in touch with some group here in Missouri. And they checked my story, and found Mr Beaman’s Army records. There being no marriage certificate I could show them, I let them see the Bible. It was the one thing I saved from our time together. 

Handle it carefully now, the pages are so fragile. In the front is Mr Beaman’s family tree written in his own hand. There’s his grandparents, then his parents and his brothers. Then Barbara and the two babies. And here do you see? His writing is very shaky now. Can you read it? Violet Emily Stone, that’s me, married September 3rd 1936. 

Now I’m famous, apparently. How Mr Beaman would chuckle. I’ve done lots of recordings for these so-called heritage organisations and schools and such. I like it, talking to people. Not much else to do at my age.

But you’re the best visitors I’ve had, and that’s a fact. You could have knocked me over with a feather when you told me who you were. Fancy, Mr Beaman’s brother having a whole family I knew nothing about. 

And what’s this? You brought me a present. Why, thank you kindly, you didn’t need to do that. Oh my goodness me! Is this Mr Beaman? He looks so young, so handsome. Gosh, I don’t know where these tears are coming from. Forgive me snivelling, it’s just… he’s the only man who ever loved me.

2021 Doris Gooderson – Third Place Entry

Biography

Alyson has spent the last thirty years living and working overseas in education. She writes short stories and travel pieces and has been published in magazines in the UK and online. She has several incomplete novels lurking in the depths of her computer which some day she hopes to finish but flash fiction remains her favourite medium.

Sea Change by Alyson Hilbourne

In town, the curling faded postcards depict an aquamarine sea that is undoubtedly bathtub warm and as clear as glass.
Today, however, the steel grey ocean snarls and flecks of white spittle decorate the curling lips of the waves. Breakers smash up on the beach, stretching as far as they dare and dragging away the sand as they leave. Between the waves, eddies appear, like bubbling cauldrons spewing foam from deep within.
“Lucky we’ve got the beach hut for the week,” Dad says, his words immediately ripped away by the wind.
He leads the way carrying the cool box while Mum toils behind with several camping chairs and a bag of towels. Danny and | trail at the rear, 

struggling to walk in new flip-flops, carting a tangle of buckets, spades and inflatable toys. 

Inside the hut we huddle in jackets, cupping tea brewed on the primus, while we listen to the wind hurt spray against the wooden hut. 

“We’re being watched,” Dad says, nodding through the open door. Out beyond the breakers, two heads bob in and out of the water, dark soulful eyes fixed on us.
“Atlantic grey seals,” Dad adds, peering through the binoculars. “Nosy blighters. Nothing to see here.” He motions at them to go away.
“Can | see?” Danny holds out a hand for the binoculars. Grudgingly, Dad passes them over and Danny grins as he looks through the lenses. “Pd like to swim with them,” Danny says. 

“Huh? They’re wild animals,” Dad sneers, grabbing back the binoculars. “They wouldn’t want you.” 

Mum flinches and stares down at her tea. Danny and | don’t look at each other. We sit, stiff and tense, as the air pulses with unsaid words. The hut is too small for all of us. 

Next day the sea is calmer, and we can explore the beach. Danny builds an enormous sand castle, digging a moat and piling sand up in a mound. He empties buckets of compacted sand around the edge to make turrets. I find him shells to decorate the towers. 

Two boys come across and stand watching. Saying nothing, they squat and use their hands to scrape out more sand from around the moat. In some silent understanding, the three boys dig a canal from the castle down to the water’s edge. As the tide turns, they try to protect the stronghold, shovelling up barriers of sand until they are all covered in it and rush into the sea, laughing and giggling to wash off. 

The pattern of the holiday is set. For a couple of days, the sun comes out, and the sea is invitingly calm. Danny swims with his friends and they push each other off the inflatable dolphin or kick a ball about on the beach. The three of them slip between the land and the water as if there is no dividing line. 

Mum keeps on her long-sleeved shirt and dark glasses as she dozes in her chair. Dad scans the beach with his binoculars and gives a running commentary on what other people are doing.
| stretch out on my towel, listening to my music, wondering what I will tell my friends when we get back home. 

“ don’t want to leave,” Danny whispers to me that night, back at the hotel. “It’s better here, isn’t it?” 

I give him a small smile. There are people around. It’s always better with people around. 

Our last day and the wind picks up, pummelling the wooden beach hut until it creaks and groans. The wooden shutters rattle. 

Mum, Dad and I stay under shelter as the sky turns slate grey and clouds scud across the sky. Large drops of rain pockmark the ocean surface while the waves rise up and start snapping at the beach. Danny spends the last afternoon with his friends. 

As the waves crest, they smash down on the sand, disintegrating into a lacy residue. Seagulls are tossed about like discarded sweet wrappers. The air tastes of salt and it’s hard to hear each other speak over the noise of the sea. 

“Time to go,” Dad says, packing up the chairs. Mum shivers and appears about to argue but then thinks better of it and puts towels and biscuits in her bag. | gather up the buckets and spades. 

“Danny! Time to go,” Dad yells from the doorway jangling the beach hut keys in his hand. 

He waits expectantly for Danny to scamper back. When he doesn’t immediately appear, Dad cracks his knuckles, scowling. Something heavy lodges in my stomach and Mum twitches. lt doesn’t do to keep Dad waiting. But as we look out of the hut the beach is emptying. The wind increases and it begins to rain. People beat a retreat to cafes or their hotels. Our beach hut is the only one still open. 

“Where is he?” Dad snarls, flecks of white spittle decorating the angry curl of his lip. “I thought you were watching him.” 

Mum shrinks away. 

“You were by the door,” she retorts, but | wish she hadn’t because Dad’s arm lashes out and smashes across her face, knocking her sunglasses to the ground and exposing the nicotine coloured ring around her left eye. Blood bubbies up under the skin of her cheek and tears glaze her eves. 

| slip away on to the sand, searching round behind the beach huts. “Danny! Danny!” | yell, circling back to the water’s edge. 

Above the tide line, just beyond the reach of the sea, I find, neatly paired, Danny’s flip-flops. 

| look up. 

Out beyond the breakers three heads with dark soulful eyes watch me, and | think a flipper waves before the next swell takes them away, leaving a lacy frill§ of foam between the waves. 

September 2021 Newsletter

The newsletter for September 2021 can be found here:

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2021 Doris Gooderson Shortlisted Entries

The entries in the 2021 Doris Gooderson Short Story competition that have made it through to the shortlist are:

An Ordinary Birthday Party

Child’s Play

Fast Train Approaching

Freedom Comes in Many Guises

Her Things

In Which the Zebra Goes Visiting and Escapes from a Tight Place

It Takes All Sorts

Mac The Knife

Mr Beaman’s Bible: A True Story from Missouri

Reflections

Rose Quartz

Sea Change

Seizing the Initiative

Shakespeare and Shoes

Stone Angel

The Hide

The Honeymoon

The Reluctant Ghost

There’s Always Tomorrow

Watcher in the Dry

2021 August Newsletter

August’s newsletter can be downloaded here:

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July 2021 newsletter

The newsletter for the July 2021 meeting can be downloaded here:

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Jan Johnstone’s new book on John Wilkinson

Jan Johnstone has just released her latest title, John Wilkinson, Ironmaster – Told By Those Who knew him. It’s available from Amazon in Kindle and paperback format.

Told in a creative non-fiction style, most of the characters within the pages were real people: his father, mother, brothers and sisters, business colleagues, wives and mistress but in order to carry the story, some of the characters are necessarily fictitious these identified in the contents page thus (*).

What they relate however, is based on actual recorded events. At the end of each chapter is a section entitled ‘Historical Notes’. Here the reader will find brief details of what happened to both the people and the many locations where John Wilkinson and his family were involved along with details of sites open to visitors today.

Jan Johnstone has lived in Shropshire all her life and has been writing for as long as she can remember. She has had numerous articles as well as short stories published both at home and abroad in historical, specialist and general interest magazines.

Social history is a particular interest and two books have been published by Pen & Sword, Oswestry and Whitchurch in the Great War and Shropshire at War 1939-1945. Two other books are available on Amazon, Promise ofTomorrow written under the pseudonym Jan Davies, a fictionalised family saga beginning in Ironbridge in 1759, and Hadley – The Story of a Shropshire Village written in conjunction with her sister Margaret Jones.

For more information, visit: https://www.amazon.co.uk/John-Wilkinson-Ironmaster-Those-Knew/dp/B096XM7FKY/ref=sr_1_2?dchild=1&keywords=Jan+Johnstone&qid=1624189555&sr=8-2

June 2021 Newsletter

The newsletter for the June 2021 meeting can be found here:

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May 2021 Newsletter

The newsletter for the May 2021 meeting can be downloaded here:

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April 2021 Newsletter

The newsletter for April 2021’s meeting can be downloaded here:

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March 2021 Newsletter

You can download the March 2021 Newsletter can here:

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February 2021 Newsletter

The February 2021 newsletter can be found here:

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January 2021 Newsletter

The newsletter for the January 2021 newsletter can be downloaded here:

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The Call Of Catalonia by Sue Crampton

The Call of Catalonia by Sue Crampton

Sue Crampton’s latest book has recently been published.

Sue was enchanted with the Costa Brava when she visited the country in 1962 on her family’s first foreign holiday. She returned forty years later and fell completely under its spell. The magical landscape, unique culture, and charisma were still there but now the people had re-established their Catalan identity and were struggling towards independence from Spain. Their history and this struggle inspired these stories.