Authors Electric

Image Credit:  Images created in Book Brush using Pixabay photos. Book cover image from Chapeltown Books. AI images avoided. One of the lovely things about having a new flash fiction collection out is it will give me plenty of new stories to read at Open Prose Mic Nights.   I usually take part in the Open Prose Mic Night The Writers’ Summer School, Swanwick  hold every August. It’s a great opportunity to discover how stories go down with the audience. In 2025 I read out one or two tales from my then forthcoming Seeing The Other Side precisely for that reason. Am glad to say the tales concerned did get laughs the way they were meant to. When I take part in these events, I look for a balance of old and new stories to share. I like to mix up the moods of the tales too to show what flash fiction can do and be. It is a wonderful format for humorous writing but it can also pull you up sharp and make you think, make you react. I still feel a chill at Hemingway’s classic For sa...

Image Credits:-   Images created in Book Brush using Pixabay photos. One photo from The Writers’ Summer School was taken by me, Allison Symes. Another two were kindly taken by Penny Blackburn at two Open Prose Mic Nights at Swanwick and used with permission. Book cover image is from Bridge House Publishing. AI images avoided. When this post goes live on 18th June 2026, my third flash fiction collection, Seeing The Other Side , should have been published by Bridge House Publishing  via their imprint, Chapeltown Books . The book has been a long time in coming and it is a joy to see it out there.  I’ve long thought what a pity it is you can’t bottle the feeling you have when your book comes out to draw on for encouragement and inspiration during the tougher times of the writing life. I’m busy preparing for launches. The book will have a physical launch, so to speak, at The Writers’ Summer School, Swanwick in Derbyshire in August. It has been a recent development for th...

Image Credit:  Images taken by me, Allison Symes, from the 2025 Writers’ Summer School, Swanwick. By the time this post goes out, I will have just returned from my big writing treat of the year - The Writers’ Summer School, Swanwick.    I get to spend a few days immersed in the writing world. I also love catching up with friends I only see online for the rest of the year. I learn so much from the workshops and courses and the after dinner speakers.  The Hayes, Swanwick, Derbyshire - home to The Writers' Summer School for over 70 years. I also find this break away reaffirms my belief in myself as a writer by helping me fight Imposter Syndrome. Real writers go to conferences, don’t they, whether said events are online or in person, day events, or longer. Also last month, I was involved with a friend’s online book launch. That went well, I’m glad to say, but what is lovely here is with this and Swanwick, there was plenty of writer engagement. For the online launch, that...

Image Credits:-  Images created in Book Brush using Pixabay photos. Photo of The Hayes, Swanwick and screenshot were taken by me, Allison Symes. I’ve just returned from a major highlight of my writing year, having spent six days at The Writers’ Summer School, Swanwick in lovely Derbyshire, immersed in the wonderful world of writing. I’ve learned so much from the courses, caught up with many friends whom I only see online for the rest of the year, and I was glad to be running a two part course.    My course was on Editing as an Author, Editing as a Competition Judge . I wear both hats and will be judging again soon. Seeing how something is done and why is invaluable, which was my approach for this course.  The great joy of writing events is being with like-minded people who understand your drive to write, who know what it is to have to handle rejections as well as acceptances, and to not have to explain why you write. You just do. So do they.    I’ve been g...

Image Credit:  Images created in Book Brush using Pixabay photos. Do you write anything connected to holidays, whether they’re ones you’ve taken, or ones where you've sent your characters away? I don’t though I can see the appeal. You’ve got the chance to put your characters out of their normal environment. How would that change their behaviour and attitudes? What would be the consequences? I’m thinking about Death on the Nile by Agatha Christie here. What was supposed to be a honeymoon trip became something different. How could you make use of holidays you’ve taken to enhance your stories? One idea is to use the landscape of where you’ve visited as a model for the setting for your story.  I was in lovely Northumberland last autumn and was staying near a lovely town with a gorgeous river running through it. So I could take that idea and fictionalise it for my story or I could take certain elements only and put those in my tale. Holiday photos can also inspire ideas later. Lan...