We were happy to welcome back Suzanne Stirke to adjudicate our short story competition. It was obvious as she gave her comments on each entry that Suzanne had given a great deal of thought to them and her constructive criticism was welcomed by their authors as well as being very interesting for everyone else present at the meeting.
The winner was Maggie Cobbett with a story called ‘It’s Better to Play Safe’ about a tourist couple exploring the macabre side of New Orleans. Lotte Wilson took second place with Sheila Whitfield third. There was time after the mid-meeting break for all three winners to read their stories, after which we thanked Suzanne for her hard work on our behalf.
We shall look forward to hearing the remaining entries at our open manuscripts meeting in a fortnight’s time.
Led by Maggie, the challenge was to focus on one of the objects pictured. What did it look and feel like? What was its primary purpose? What else might it be used for – thinking outside the box very much required there. Susan was particularly inventive with the old darning mushroom and Peter with the kitchen roll inner!
Next came the challenge to write a limerick or haiku about the chosen object. Several people wrote both and Sheila even added a third poetic form, a cinquain. A break for refreshments was very welcome after all that.
The final task was to draft a short story in which the same object played a major role. No time for polishing, but maybe we shall be hearing some of these at the next session of members’ MSS.
Thanks have been expressed to the So! Bar for allowing us to hold meetings in one of their upper rooms over the last few months. Unfortunately noise levels from the floor below and accessibility issues have proved too difficult to surmount. Therefore, starting with the meeting on Wednesday 29th May, we shall be back at our previous venue, the Jervaulx Room in the St Wilfrid’s Community Centre.
These items were displayed at last night’s meeting and well in time for ‘their’ session on 12th June. Thinking caps on, please!
Due to circumstances beyond our control, Suzanne Stirke’s adjudication of the ‘Blast from the Past’ competition will now take place on Wednesday, 17th April.
Due to circumstances beyond our control, the talk on comedy writing by Swanwick Writers’ Summer School regular Phil Collins has had to be postponed.
That being so, the meeting on Wednesday, 20th March will now be for Members’ Manuscripts.
We hope to rebook Phil later this year or in 2025.
We welcomed Mary-Jane Holmes as our adjudicator this year. She had obviously put a great deal of thought into the task and did a very thorough job. Before announcing her decision, she read out each of the poems submitted and gave a detailed critique. A written version was also attached to each entry for the poet to peruse at leisure later on.
Charlotte Wilson (pictured above receiving the trophy from Mary-Jane) came first with ‘Pond Life’. Sheila Whitfield was in second place with ‘Inland Dreams’ and Kate Swann came third with ‘On the Scales for Grandad’. Mary-Jane congratulated everyone who had entered the competition. With a high standard overall, the great variety of themes and styles had made choosing the winners difficult.
After the adjudication, Mary-Jane answered questions about her own work and poetry in general.
From her bio: Mary-Jane Holmes wanders and writes in the wilds of Upper Teesdale. She has garnered many awards including winning the Bridport Poetry prize, the Writer’s Digest poetry competition, the Live Canon Poetry Pamphlet Prize, Bath Novella-in-Flash Prize, , Martin Starkie, Dromineer, Reflex Fiction and Mslexia Flash prize as well as the Bedford Poetry competition. She has been shortlisted for the Beverley International Prize for Literature and longlisted for the UK National Poetry Prize twice. Mary-Jane’s poetry collection Heliotrope with Matches and Magnifying Glass is published by Pindrop Press. Her pamphlet Dihedral is published by Live Canon Press and her novella Don’t Tell the Bees, is published by AdHoc Fiction. Her Lockdown poem ‘Letter from Baldersdale’ joins 20 other poems in the National Poetry Archive on their 20th anniversary. Her collection of Flash Fiction was published by V press in 2021 and was shortlisted for the Eyelands Literary prize in 2023.
Her work appears in a variety of publications including Aesthetica. Magma, Modern Poetry in Translation, Mslexia, The Lonely Crowd, Prole The Journal of Compressed Creative Arts, and in anthologies including Best Small Fictions 2014/16/18/20 and Best Microfictions 2020.
She has an MA (Distinction) in Creative Writing from Kellogg College, Oxford and has been awarded an Arts and Humanities Research Council studentship to complete a PhD in poetry and translation at Newcastle University. UK.
New Collection of Short Fiction: Set a Crow to Catch a Crow
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