Swanwick Day 3

I continued with Emma Darwin’s course and also attended the very funny and useful ‘Writing Fillers’ workshop. Linda Lewis had a lot to say about decidedly un-literary but quite lucrative submissions that can cheer up frustrated and/or impecunious authors in the gaps between acceptances.

The evening speaker was Peter James, whose ‘Creating a Dead Good Read’ brought the house down at times.

Although I’ve known for years that the Hayes once housed German prisoners of war - there are photographs and other memorabilia on display near the bar - this was the first time I’d taken a walk up to the entrance to the tunnel they dug.

The plaque says it all really.

Posted 15/08/11 - Permalink to this story

Swanwick Day 2

Ripon Writers’ Group was well represented this year. Cathy had won her way to Swanwick in the short story competition (which Lindsay won last year!)

Choosing courses is always difficult, especially when they clash on the programme. I was very torn between ‘Building your novel’ with Emma Darwin and ‘Crime Writing’ with Simon Hall. In the end, and mainly because I had booked a 1:1 with Emma this very morning, I went to hers. It was very informative, as was my tête à tête with Emma, who had gone to a great deal of trouble to annotate the manuscript I sent her in advice and had some useful advice about how my story might be reshaped.

I also attended John Jarrold’s workshop, ‘Horror Fiction in 2011’, and had several of my misconceptions corrected. For one thing, I think that I now understand the difference between true horror (e.g.Stephen King) and urban fantasy (e.g.Charlaine Harris), although I’m still more comfortable with the latter.

Helen Cross was our speaker this evening and gave a very entertaining account of her path to publication and - maybe even more important - staying on it. She has beautiful hair, long and wavy, but I found the way she had to flick it back off her face every few minutes a little distracting. However, that’s a very minor criticism and I was probably guilty of the same thing when I too had locks flowing down to my waist.

Posted 14/08/11 - Permalink to this story

Swanwick 2011

Mid-afternoon saw me at the Hayes Conference Centre in Swanwick, Derbyshire, for my sixth year at The Writers’ Summer School

As always, there was a flurry of meeting old friends and getting to know some of the ‘white badgers’, those who are new to Swanwick this year. (The old sweats have yellow badges.)

After Chairman Xanthe Wells’s welcome and the distribution of certificates to those who had won this year’s Swanwick competitions, we went into dinner and then settled down to enjoy an hour with Iain Banks ‘In interview with John Jarrold’. A session in the bar followed and then, to quote Pepys, to bed.

Posted 13/08/11 - Permalink to this story