Tuesday 18 February 2020

Chatting, age and friends

I took part in The People's Friend writing hour today (it's on twitter every Tuesday morning 11-12). This is a good way to 'meet' fellow writers, and ask questions of the fiction team. In response to a question, about characters aged 70, they said that if characters had a story to tell, age wasn't relevant. 

I asked about stories from a child's POV, as I've not seen many in the magazine and was told 'We really like junior viewpoint stories, but we don't seem to get a lot of them sent in!'

Talking of twitter writing events, you may like to join #WritingChat on Wednesday evenings. It's open to all writers and covers all genres. There's a different theme each week, plus you can ask questions and suggest future topics. To take part, just tweet 8-9 using the hashtag.

8 comments:

Penny A said...

I've had a few stories with a child's pov accepted at PF, and have loved writing them! The obvious thing to mention is that *perhaps* your main character will not be as able to carry as much weighty emotion in the narrative as an adult character. On the other hand, you have the chance of showing a less hidebound view of life through their eyes!

Patsy said...

@ Penny – Yes there are positives and negatives for uses a younger POV

Thank you for taking the time to leave a comment and stop me feeling I'm talking to myself again.

Niddy said...

My last sale to PF was from a childs point of view. I don't do them often but sometimes they just seem to work from that POV. Don't always catch the chat on twitter on a Tuesday morning as I'm out of the house. I must say that it is very helpful from both PF questions to the answers that the writers give. It's worth attending the chat.

carrie said...

I've had a couple of junior POV's used in both My Weekly and The People's Friend. Must put my thinking cap on if the Friend wants more! Thanks for letting us know, Patsy. I'm not normally around on a Tuesday morning, unfortunately.

Patsy said...

@ Niddy – Wasn't your first PF sale from a child's POV? About a rainbow shed?

@ Carrie – I'd got it into my head they weren't keen. I suspect others thought the same, so didn't send them, which meant they couldn't publish many, which made us think they didn't want them.

Sharon Haston said...

Thanks for the update Patsy. I am at work during People's Friend Writing Hour but as I follow them on Twitter, I sometimes see some of the conversations and they are usually really helpful.

Patsy said...

@ Sharon – they are. I expect if you tweeted a question afterwards you'd still get a reply.

Sharon Haston said...

Thanks Patsy. I never thought of doing that.