Drying out

Well you lot forgot to pray for good weather for me, didn't you? Come on, own up. And I did ask so nicely...

It was wet, cold and windy in Pembrokeshire. And seasoned camper that I am, I forgot to pack any footwear other than sandals. We did get a few sunny days, so we had a good time anyway, and I came back to a sale to Fiction Feast so it's not all bad. Here's our tent on a rare good day:

And here's the state of the waterlogged field and my poor, poor, miserable feet:



The kids had fun. We went to a reconstructed Iron Age village. Here's my son, fearsomely warpainted with woad:

Other than that we saw plenty of rainbows. Considered mugging fellow campers for their wellies. Learnt that the tent leaks in three places. Worked out an arrangement for cooking inside the tent. Visited St David's Cathedral and Pembroke castle. Walked miles of clifftop paths. Brought home a set of slate place mats and a lot of muddy clothes.

And read a book about the last invasion of Britain - in 1797 a motley crew of Frenchmen led by an American landed near Fishguard in an attempt to rally the British peasants in revolt against the government. They failed, and were rounded up by a Welshwoman named Jemima. (And you all thought 1066 was the last time Britain was invaded, didn't you? Glad to have taught you something new!) There's a tapestry depicting this invasion, too. Bayeux, eat your heart out.

Sunny Pembrokeshire

It IS going to be sunny in Pembrokeshire for the next week, isn't it? Promise me, please? We're off for a week's camping. The day job's been hideous for the last couple of months so I badly need to de-stress. Best way I know is to lounge around outside a tent, with a glass of wine and a good book. In the sunshine.

See you all in a week or so.

Best of the Web!

Lookee here - this blog's been nominated one of the best of the web for writers' resources! Along with the brilliant Sally and Cally. Wow - I'm so chuffed to be there, chuffed too that two of my buddies are also there.

Real recognition! I am Somebody! (Or at least my blog is.)

(I have put Iva to bed, by the way. She was sorely hungover. Thank goodness the editors we deal with day to day are nothing like her.)

Blog Takeover Day

For the wonderful idea that was Sally Quilford's Blog takeover day, I thought I'd get a celebrity guest blogger for the day. In keeping with the theme of this blog, there was really no question over who to ask... so without further ado, I'll hand over to a woman who needs no introduction.


Hello there Womagwriter's blog readers! When Womag asked me to step in for the day and provide a guest blog post I nearly refused. She knows, well you all know don't you, darlings? just how busy I am. We're up to 1000 subs a day here at My Take A Weekly Fiction Special. I'm literally drowning in paper. But I said I'd do it, so here I am, pen in hand, scribbling furiously for you. Ha ha, I suppose it makes a change - usually you lot are all scribbling furiously for me!

Womag suggested I write about a typical day in the life of an overworked fiction editor. So that's what I'll write. Today I was up at 6am, but back in bed again at five past, and maybe that's too much detail. I was properly up and breakfasted by eleven which is good going. And then I began on the day's mound of stories. I work at home, dear writers. And I do all the reading myself, since we sacked all the out-readers in a cost-cutting exercise. So with just 347 stories to get through before lunch, I made a start.

Of the first batch, I could use none of them. 5 ended with it all being a dream, 27 were printed in pink ink, 19 were about alien spacecraft and 2 were written in Swahili. Oddly, no less than 158 stories featured a piano tuner. All of which I've seen before, so this batch were sent straight back with the 'well-worn theme' box firmly ticked.

I'm often asked what I look for in a short story. That's easy to answer. I know exactly what my readers like - cosy crime and relationship stories. So I look for cosy crime and relationship stories written in a way I've never seen before. Of course, having read 21,978,890 stories during the course of my career it must be hard to write something I've never read before, but that, dear writers, is your problem, not mine!

By 2.30pm I was becoming tired of reading. At this stage I tend to start fiddling with the manuscripts, taking staples out, putting them back in again. It's a nervous habit, I can't help myself. I decided to try to complete 2 piles of stories by 3pm, so I scrawled 15.00 - 2p? on the manuscript I was currently reading to remind myself of my goal. Oh dear, sometimes I wonder what you poor writers must think of these cryptic scrawls on your stories when they come back to you! I really should apologise... but I won't.

Happily I hit my target, and completed my reading by 4pm, with the help of a miniature bottle of gin. I only buy miniatures. Just in case I get carried away and read for too long. It can make one go quite cross-eyed. I'd decided to buy three stories, which is a good haul from 582.

By the time I'd posted the returns and emailed the acceptances, it was wine o'clock. Thankfully my dear husband Rupert had already cooked dinner - steak. Mine was rare, very rare, just how I like it. The way the blood oozes out as I bite into it - mmm.

So dear writers, I hope this has given you a teensy insight into my working life. Keep sending those stories, and maybe it'll be YOU one day gracing the pages of my magazine, or possibly my dinner plate. Really, I don't know how some fiction editors get such fearsome reputations. We're gentle as lambs, inside.

Signed, Iva Mina Streak, fiction editor.

Happy Christmas!

I know it's August 10th, but as Geri says here, you need to be thinking crackers, crackling fires, and nutcracker suites now, if you want to be in the Christmas mags. Great post over on Strictly Writing, go take a look!

Calling all Bloggers....

Sally Quilford has had a marvellous idea: let someone else - famous, fictional, animal, you choose! - take over your blog for a day on Tuesday.

Full details on her blog, here.

Now then, who's going to get their hands on this one - one of my cats perhaps? My long-suffering hubby? Or a character from the novel I'm currently reading...

The importance of the correct audience

As I said in my last post, I have a story in the latest Take A Break's Fiction Feast, just out.

My husband is lovely, supportive, thoughtful and a fabulous life-partner. But he is completely uninterested in short stories for women's magazines. I long ago gave up on asking him to read and comment on my efforts, and we agreed he would read only those I got published.

So when FF arrived in the post this morning, I gave him the story to read. Actually I re-read it myself first, to see if there were editorial changes and to remind myself about it. I rather like it, I think it's one of my better stories.

Hubby got round to reading it this evening, and was left completely unmoved. Er, so, what's the moral? he said. It's just a bit, well, this happened and that happened...

Well, I'm not sure there is a moral - and I don't think all stories need one as such. There is definitely what Della Galton terms 'a universal truth' - which in this case is that if you take away one member of a family you can destroy the entire family. Yes, hubby said, I got that from the first few hundred words, but then it went on... Well yes, and then I went on to show how the situation was resolved after a proper moment of realisation for the main character.

I suppose his reaction is an improvement. When he read my first published story, he pronounced it drivel. Yes of course he was proud of me for having written it and sold it, but it simply wasn't to his taste. Neither was this one, it seems.

Good job he's not my target audience!

In other news...

I have a coffee break story in the My Weekly dated 1st August, and I think there'll be one of my stories in the next Take A Break's Fiction Feast which should be out later this week. My Weekly seem to be paying on publication these days, so payment for these two stories ended up arriving on the same day.

Which was all very nice!