Monday 17 November 2014

It's National Short Story Week...

The 17th to 23rd November is National Short Story Week in the UK.

After years of decline the short story has had a resurgence, and the organisation behind this week, works hard to encourage and promote short stories, as do the organisations that support it.

Collections of short stories are becoming very popular, as they can be turned into an e-book, or find a home with a small publisher like Alfie Dog Fiction.

Many of my blogger friends (Patsy Collins, Rosemary Gemmell and Teresa Ashby to name just a few) have had lots of stories published, and they are now giving them another outing in collections.

If you pop over to Sue Moorcroft writes you'll be able to find out more about Wendy Clarke and her new short story collection, "Room in Your Heart". Wendy's name will be recognisable to anyone who has read The People's Friend magazine.

Do you remember a few months back, I was going to try and get an entry done for The Historic House Association Short Story Competition?

In the end I didn't have time, but you can find out who won, the names of the runners-up, and also those who were shortlisted and highly commended, via the National Short Story Week website, here.

Writing short stories are a good way to learn the skills you need to eventually write serials and even  novels. While the parameters are larger in a novel, the same skills in dialogue, narrative and characterisation are needed.

The wonderful thing about short stories is that you can read them anywhere, whether you have five or ten minutes, or an hour...

Long live the short story...




6 comments:

Wendy's Writing said...

Isn't National Short Story Week great, Carol! Thank you very much for mentioning my story collection.

Carolb said...

You're welcome, Wendy. :-)

The National Short Story week is good, anything that encourages the reading and writing of short stories is worthwhile.

Sue Moorcroft said...

Great post, Carol. Every short story is a work of art - and you can't hide much! It has to be complete to succeed. :-)

Patsy said...

Thanks for the mention, Carol.

I'd say I'm a big fan of short stories, but I expect you'd already guessed as much.

Carolb said...

Thanks, Sue. And the only way to succeed with short stories is to persevere. :-)

Carolb said...

You're welcome, Patsy.
I always enjoy your short stories, and you got a mention at last night's writers club discussion section on story openings.