Tag: short stories

Entering competitions

EditorLeave a comment

Bb9dSFdCQAEZXOD

As if I won’t be busy enough this year with my personal short story writing challenge, I have also set myself a personal challenge to enter four short story writing competitions in 2014.

Crazy! But there’s a method to the madness.

For many years I have jotted down the details of various writing competitions and, in well-meaning fashion, committed them to my diary so that I won’t forget to enter.

The only problem with this approach is forgetting to write the actual story!

So while this year I have, once again, committed various dates to my diary, the difference is I am now actively working towards these deadlines.

And it’s a mixed bag of literary, fantasy and crime – there’s nothing like genre hopping to keep you on your toes.

I have already finished my first entry, a fantasy tale – For Fear of Little Men – but I’m unable to share it for now due to the entry guidelines, at least until I find out how I fare. But I can tell you it’s full of very bad faeries. The good news is my volunteer readers love it, so I am submitting it this week.

Bon voyage little story! I hope you make a great first impression. And if you don’t, well, you might just end up as part of my short story anthology.

I’ll let you know how I go.

Short Story Challenge 2014

Editor2 Comments

10305029_10152395188477351_1642397985745005323_n

Hello 2014!

I’ve decided to welcome in the new year by starting a blog, and setting myself a particular writing challenge – writing a short story a month.

But not only writing a story a month, but having it edited and publishing it via Amazon’s Kindle program. That’s 12 stories in 12 months, ranging in wordage from 2500-7000 a piece – potentially 80,000-odd words or roughly a book’s worth of stories. The other part of this equation involves publishing an anthology of these stories at the end of the year.

It’s a tall order, and perhaps that’s why I’m nailing my colours to the mast now – I need a public platform to keep me honest!

Along the way I’ll be sharing my writing approach, tips and general advice (no tricks – this will be 100% blood, sweat and tears).

I have quite a few other writing projects on the boil this year, but writing short stories on a regular basis (and blogging about it) is all about reforming my writing practises – and setting up some good long-term habits.

As a self-described ‘binge writer’, I’m looking to replace weekly streams of consciousness with structured daily writing.

Working 9-5, my free time is finite, so I will be using mornings commuting and ‘Library Saturdays’ to pen and polish my stories in preparation for publication. Hmmm, that’s a lot of Ps!

Kicking off January is Army Dreamers, my short horror story about a group of soldiers who encounter an ancient and deadly enemy in the Australian outback.

Oh, and did I mention the anthology will be a mixture of horror and fantasy? Well now I have.

Let me know what you think.