My favourite reply was... Well, it was impossible to pick just one, so joint first place goes to –
the third one down beginning "Against her better judgement," (and not just because that sums up quite a few of my life choices) the one giving me the great suggestion of "Dastardly Deeds and Delightful Decadence" for another book in my cosy mystery series and the one advising drinking a Tequila Sunrise as the safest option.
They were all really good though. If you've not read them, click here and scroll through the comments. You should always read the comments - they're definitely the best part of this blog.
The writers of the above mentioned gems win their choice of ebook download from my Slightly Spooky Stories series. Please email me at patsycollins53@yahoo.com to say which you'd like. Fee free to say which was yours in the comments, if you'd like to.
What really happened is that I had the phone in the pocket of my very blue trousers. Gary and I were walking, and talking about a variety of subjects including voice activated technology and panoramic photography. We discovered my phone had taken a panoramic photo of my pocket. I don't have anything voice activated on it, and the camera app wasn't open. Nothing was. To take the picture myself, I'd have had to enter my six digit password, select the camera app, chosen pano mode and press start. Weird, eh?
Womag news
The new fiction editor at My Weekly is Sian Dolan. There's no change to the 'closed list' situation, but there are other changes. If you're one of those who can submit to this market, read the latest guidelines carefully!
Free entry competition news
Here's an interesting travel writing competition. You're invited to recount a journey in the footsteps of a literary hero. I like visiting the locations of books I've enjoyed - does that count? The first prize is publication and $300. There's an option to pay rather a lot of money to have your entry assessed. That might be worthwhile to anyone interested in submitting work to the organisers, but it's not a requirement of entry.
I mentioned travel, which as you've probably realised by now, means you get a random selection of photos from my trips.
This one is for poems on the theme of
I'm probably going to pass on those two, but I am working on entries for some competitions I've mentioned over the last month or so.
17 comments:
Thanks as always Patsy.
Love the true blue story and all the comments!
Feel free to delete this comment and just amend the post, but the poetry competition this year is actually on the theme of 'Decolonising Minds and Shared Identities'. I'm not even quite sure what that means this early in the morning! 🤪 https://www.togethernesspoetrychallenge.org/2025-poetry-challenge
Brilliant well done winners, you'd nearly think there were some creative writers there....oh wait! But as is often the case fact is stranger than fiction, how weird and scary, Patsy.
Many congratulations to the winners, well deserved! Strange and slightly frightening how the photograph managed to take itself. Having read Jenny's comment on the theme for one of the above comps, I have no idea what it means either without the intake of very strong coffee. So, it's a no from me!
Same here Elizabeth. I have no idea what it means! Well done to all with positive news. I haven't anything to report. I'm looking at old stories and trying to re-draft them.
@ Jenny - thanks for the info on the theme. I've had several cups of tea and been for a walk, so can't blame the earliness in the day for not understanding what they're getting at. I'm not sure it'll be any clearer tonight after a glass of wine, but I can hope!
@ Sheelagh – I knew I could count on some interesting and imaginative answers!
@ Elizabeth – It was a bit disturbing. I don't think technology necessarily spies on us in a 'knows who I am and what I'm thinking' way, but I'd rather it didn't listen at all.
@ Sharon – I sometimes go through old stories which never got finished to my satisfaction. It's amazing how leaving them alone for a while can help us see what they need.
That is really crazy that your phone took the photo all by itself. Mine has a feature where I can just swipe and the camera comes up without needing to enter the code, but I would still have to activate it and select pano.
Ally27
Thank you Patsy, as always, for all the info and thank you to all those who contributed writing news.
I loved reading the suggested answers - very imaginative indeed. It's definitely strange - dare I say eerie - that your phone managed to take a photo all by itself, given the stages you would normally have to go through to take one. I'm sure that you could craft a spooky story from that experience - perhaps for a Halloween themed competition? After all, the spooky season isn't too far off.
I know there are no prizes for guessing but was that second photo taken at the beautiful Kingston Lacey perchance? If so, then you weren't a million miles from me. I once enjoyed a delightful picnic in the grounds there. It was delightful because despite being a gloriously sunny day in June, there were hardly any visitors that day, so it was very quiet. My date and I pretended that we were the owners of Kingston Lacey and that all its grounds belonged to us. Sigh ...
I had been wondering if My Weekly was still operating a closed list system, so thank you for confirming that is still the case. At least I know not to bother submitting to them.
Congratulations to all those with positive news and best of luck to all those who have submitted recently.
Happy writing!
Oh, I do look forward to your blog (and all the comments) each week, Patsy. I’m sorry I don’t engage more often. (I still have imposter syndrome among all you successful writers...)
The Ozzy Osbourne answer to your blue picture conundrum was mine though.😊 I’m tickled that you liked it. That idea just came to me while I was swimming. Nothing like a few quiet lengths to give you some headspace.
Loved reading the real story behind the blue picture. A little scary how our machines listen to us though.
I’ve been trying to write a bit more recently. I entered the Best Summer one, but imagine the winners will have heard by now. I’ve also entered the Prima one, and the 53 word story one (did I read about that here? https://www.press53.com/53word-story-contest). And I’m working on a Val Wood story too.
Good luck everyone.
The People's Friend Editor's Blog page is currently showing as 'oops, page not found' - along with their new word count and submissions page. Any thoughts on this one please anybody?
Patsy - thank you for your upbeat and cheerful posts which keep us all going, always look forward to them, the pocket picture was puzzling.....
Have a quite and happy Sunday everyone.
Kind regards, Sue
@ Alex - It was slightly alarming. Maybe I should start talking about large sums of money appearing in my bank account?
@ Ally27 - Yes, that's Kingston Lacey! Do you go when the snowdrops are out? I do when I can.
I've not seen any official, but I don't get the impression My Weekly are likely to open up submissions to new writers (unless they're well known novelists)
@ Ruth - It's lovely to hear that you look forward to the blog!
Congratulations on being a winner in my little competition! It was clever to add something topical too. Good luck with your other submissions.
@ Sue - I've just had a look and it seems OK now, so it was probably just a temporary technical blip (or technology taking over and it's made subtle differences which will eventually lead to the collapse of civilisation!)
@ Ruth - please email me at patsycollins53@yahoo.com so I can send your prize.
The fiction ed's blog at TPF hasn't been operating now for months. They decided to phase it out.
Re PF - Sharon - confused now because it was there on Saturday!
All I can find now is a page from August 2024 about submissions but I know there was a more recent one to do with current word length requirements and even that's gone now. Patsy, I can't find the page you said has re-appeared. There is nothing else of more recent date. I'll look in your own submissions guidelines under PF to see if the latest guidelines are in there. Has anyone else had this problem? Thank you. Kind regards, Sue
Maybe they are having work done on their website, or it was a glitch? I haven't heard that the fiction Ed's blog has returned. I know it was phased out ages ago. Are you looking at the submissions info page instead? I'll look later today.
Here are the new, updated lengths for TPF:
For the weekly:
1, 200, 2000, & 3,000
For the PF special:
1000, 1, 500, 2,500 & 3, 500 & 4,000
Can go 10 % under, but not over.
I'm claiming Dastardly Deeds but I have to say Ruth's had me chuckling! They were all amusing but no one beat the real reason! I think I'm a late developer because my new (second hand) car has started flashing things at me: never had that before, the best one (?) being, the car is front of you has started moving (at traffic lights - like you were asleep and missed it). Apologies for my lateness to this page but the long awaited "The Move: a horror story" happened on Friday. I have no chance in unpicking the meaning of that theme, but thank you for the selection here... WHEN I have more time...
@ Sharon and Sue – I think Sharon is right and they're working on the website, as I've found the guidelines, not found, them and then not found them again at different times.
I can now find a downloadable document with the 'latest' submission guidelines, except that it says 10% leeway either way on word counts. As that's changed I don't know how reliable the rest is. It's all rather confusing!
Thanks for your update, Sharon.
@ Marguerite – Moving home is often very stressful. I hope life settles down for you soon.
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