writers

After much faffing and fiddlestuff, @Aethalope and I are proud to present the first episode of our new podcast: Two Wayward Writers From Borneo's ancient rainforest to the windswept beaches of the English coast, Laura and Rachel are writers on a journey, but they’re not sticking to the path...

Join our Weekly Writers’ Huddle this Saturday May 23rd at 5.00pm UK (BST). Hosted by top literary agent and bestselling author, Peter Cox. It’s a welcoming, practical space to bring your work in progress to get readers' honest first impressions and feedback in real time from the sharpest and...

Writers are socially observant. We find people endlessly fascinating, and real life is mysterious. Sometimes it's hard to stop staring at the strut and squawk of my fellow man. They can be quite inspiring. Sometimes it's hard to stop talking to them to see what in the world they're thinking...

https://protopianprize.com/ Not sure how I feel about that AI prize thing.. but posting anyway. The other prizes might be a good thing. Habitat press is publishing novels where we get out of this mess we're in and "do better." https://www.greenstories.org.uk/

Writers are always writing about infidelity. It's so dramatic. The wickedness of it, the secrecy, the complications, the finding that you thought you were one person but you're also this other person. The innocent life and the guilty life. My God, it's just full of stuff for a writer. I doubt it...

This article says that the market is advocating just having writers openly say they write with AI and give them their own space. On reflection that sounds like the way forward. Harlequin romances have existed in the space for readers who want the same formula repeated and are happy. Testing is...

https://www.wordsacrosseurope.eu/

“Beginning writers tend to be verbose. We can’t tell the difference between an essential detail and an inessential one. We’re like golden retrievers romping through Storyland, and pretty much every damn thing we see is a squirrel.” Chuck Palahniuk

Here is a really interesting post about writing that reads like a camera or TV show, and how this is increasingly prevalent among writers who don't read. https://open.substack.com/pub/countercraft/p/what-not-reading-does-to-your-writing?utm_source=share&utm_medium=android&r=27owpo

Writers, like teeth, are divided into incisors and grinders. Walter Bagehot

I'm doing a little research about short stories. Do you write short stories, or focus only on longer forms such as novels? How often would you compose a short story, and how many are in your back catalogue (either published or sitting unpublished)? Thank you.

If you have 10k words of adult fiction maybe this is your chance. https://www.curtisbrowncreative.co.uk/discoveries-2026 The prize doesn’t require writers to have finished a novel – only to have started one – and it is free to enter. We're looking for writing that shows real potential, not...

Excellent blog post from Chuck Wendig. Too good not to share. Fuck AI indeed. https://terribleminds.com/ramble/2025/12/08/gifts-for-writers-2026/

I don't know if you're aware of a new online literary magazine called Thin Skin? Thin Skin Magazine They only take submissions from writers over 50. They've published four issues so far, and the quality of stories is very high. Free to submit, and all submissions are anonymous. They don't...

“Writers don’t have lifestyles. They sit in little rooms and write.” Norman Mailer

Our latest writing competition has a prize pot of £1,000 up for grabs, plus an additional prize for any story or poem set in a Historic Houses property. Here are the details: Deadline: 23:59 (UK time) on Wednesday 5th November 2025 Entry Fee: £8 per entry (£15 for two entries or £21 for three...

https://www.cnbc.com/2023/10/27/new-tool-lets-artists-poison-their-artwork-to-deter-ai-companies.html?utm_campaign=trueanthem&utm_content=main&utm_medium=social&utm_source=facebook We only loose if we concede wo a fight. AI is not inevitable.

So, last year I entered a short story competition with a first prize of a week at the Swanwick Writers Summer School and was absolutely delighted when I won. This year I entered the children's story section of the competition and guess what. Whoo Hoo! Two in a row...

Can I just mention that this Saturday’s Huddle will start with a short demo by Litopian @Ed Simnett about markdown. Markdown is the most basic sort of plain text editing you’ll find. It’s been around for decades. Today, an increasing number of writers are finding that it’s just their cup of...