ABOUT ME

My photo
Morecambe, Lancashire, United Kingdom
In the mornings I’m a Nursery Cook, the rest of the time a Writer. Been writing for decades: short stories, plays, poems, a sitcom and more recently flash fiction, Creative Writing MA at Lancaster Uni and now several novels. Been placed in competitions (Woman’s Own, Greenacre Writers and flashtagmanchester) and shortlisted in others (Fish, Calderdale, Short Fiction Journal). I won the Calderdale Prize 2011, was runner-up in the Ink Tears Flash Fiction Comp & won the Greenacre Writer Short Story Comp 2013. I have stories in Jawbreakers, Eating My Words, Flash Dogs Anthologies 1-3, 100 RPM and the Stories for Homes anthology. My work’s often described as ‘sweet’ but there’s usually something darker and more sinister beneath the sweetness. I love magical realism and a comedy-tragedy combination. My first novel, Queen of the World, is about a woman who believes she can influence the weather. I’m currently working on a 3rd: Priscilla Parker Reluctant Celebrity Chef. Originally from West Midlands, I love living by the sea in Morecambe, swimming, cycling, theatre, books, food, weather, sitcoms and LBBNML … SQUEEZE!

Tuesday 29 April 2014

Early Writing

Recently I brought a file of very early writing back here from my parent’s house. Eventually all my belongings will be here in my flat in Morecambe. These pieces were written while at primary school up until my very early twenties when I worked in a restaurant and wrote a few little ‘somethings’ (don’t know what they were!) that I showed to someone I worked with.

My first memory of creative writing was a piece I wrote at primary school that, for a few moments, changed me from being an invisible nobody to one of the chosen few; reading out my piece in assembly, seeing it mounted on a wall.

It was a descriptive piece about a lion killing a wildebeest, something I witnessed frequently growing up in the West Midlands. I don’t seem to have this piece (still on that wall?) but I do have this one called ‘Fire!’ It’s about a barn being struck by lightening and then the fire being put out with buckets of water and beatings from ‘ladies in nightgowns’.

Again, I clearly got the idea from television, probably from a Western film. I remember quicksand and rattle snakes being very real dangers back then. I have to admit that television is still a big influence on me.

I plan to blog about more of these early writings in later posts, including the masterpiece, Five Have a Reunion, which is in the picture behind ‘Fire!’.