writing
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Here’s a new five-word challenge for you. For this week’s challenge, can you tell a story in five words, using the word Lost in it somewhere? Last week, your story needed to contain the word Toy. You sent in some very clever stories. Here they are: Kim Smyth: She toyed with her hair. He buys…
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My Guest Writer this week is the delightful Debbie Ioanna, who I met at the UK Indie Lit Fest recently. Debbie kindly agreed to write a guest post for me about her writing journey: I have always wanted to be a writer. That is such a cliché, right? To be honest, I haven’t always wanted…
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Clarity is key However you’re planning to draw your short story/novel to a close, make it clear. It’s no good having a character who’s been killed off earlier on in the story suddenly turning up at the end alive and well without any explanation. As the writer, you know exactly what’s gone on but your…
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I’m almost at the end of my Harrogate Crime Festival trip. Click for parts one, two and three if you missed them. Last week, I left you with thoughts of another encounter with Harlan Coben. Well, it really hadn’t been enough that he’d spoken to me on the Friday and asked me how I was…
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Last week’s challenge is also this week’s challenge! So, if you haven’t yet had the opportunity to send me a five-word story, with the word Toy in it somewhere, there’s still time! ***
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Perfect Paragraphs If you’re writing an article or story for a magazine, think about your paragraph lengths. When you send your work out, your pages are A4 size. The lengths of your paragraphs may look short on a page that size but imagine them in a newspaper or magazine. You can fit about 16 words…
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If you missed parts and one and two of my Harrogate Crime Writing Festival journey, please click here and here. As we seemed to have settled into the habit of missing all or part of the events we’d booked, we were determined to be right at the front (well, nearish) of day two’s first event.…
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Your five-word challenge is here again, but this time you have two weeks in which to send your story. For this week’s challenge, can you tell a story in five words, using the word Toy in it somewhere? Last week, your story needed to contain the word Fine. You sent in some very clever stories.…
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Thinking about writing an article about a special anniversary date? Some anniversary pieces feature the same information again and again. If you can find a different angle and make a tired theme fresh, then your article is more likely to catch an editor’s eye. Give yourself plenty of time to write your anniversary piece before…
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Last week, I gave some background detail as to how my partner and I first came to attend the Harrogate Crime Writing Festival back in 2017. If you missed it, click here. Part two follows on from last week. I hinted that there was a little bit of drama meaning we missed the first event…
Esther Chilton 