Most of the time I am writing. When I am not writing, I teach, edit and work as a writer and writing tutor on freelance story-telling and creative writing projects. I’m particularly interested in working on projects that involve using the internet to tell stories or that are focused on writing and place (especially if the place is the North West). I like working in prisons and libraries as well as more traditional settings. If you’d like to talk ideas, fees or availability, get in touch.
Here are some details about a few of the projects I’ve worked on recently.
Out on a Limb – online storytelling for Liverpool Biennial
Working with artist and project manager Elaine Speight, I’m delivering a series of workshops to a group of beginner writers in The Wirral. We’re aiming to get them blogging and writing together, examining The Wirral through a series of linked fictions, and contributing to an online fiction commission I’ll be launching in June 2010. You can read my project diary and find out more about the workshops by clicking here.
Rainy City Stories – Writing and Place workshops.
Rainy City Stories is an ‘interactive literary cityscape’ by project editor Kate Feld and site designer Chris Horkan and works by geo-locating user-submitted stories on a map of Manchester. The site is funded by the Manchester Literature Festival’s Freeplay programme, which straddles the intersection of literature and technology. You can read my Rainy City Story, ‘I boycott American Apparel’ here. In May 2010 I was out and about at various locations in Greater Manchester teaching workshops on writing and place for Rainy City Stories.
Too Much Information – a cynical spoken word entertainment
Jo Bell is a poet, poetry professional, blogger and performer extraordinaire. And then there’s me. We got together and combined her poems with my short fictions and created Too Much Information, a spoken word entertainment that takes a cynical look at love. And by ‘love’, we mean stalking, origami flowers, competitive wanking, bitter sex therapy, voices from beyond the grave, bin bags full of rotting leaves and a little bit more stalking.
We’re doing shows during April May and June at the Kendal Brewery Arts Centre, Hexham Books Festival, Birmingham Books Festival and the Liverpool Bluecoat. We’re looking for more dates in Winter 2010.
Sidetrack – collaborative flash fiction at HMP Garth
Funded by the very excellent Writers in Prisons Network and working in collaboration with writer-in-residence and snappy dresser Jane Gallagher, I spent four months in and out of HMP Garth – a category B men’s prison in Leyland, Lancashire. I planned a series of workshops around the idea of fate, choice and what might have beens and using the poem ‘The Road Not Taken’ by Robert Frost as inspiration, helped an established creative writing group put together a group anthology of linked flash fictions and collage which they entered together for the 2010 Koestler Awards.
Word Soup and the Lancashire Writing Hub
Working as an Associate Artist and then as the Writing Development Co-ordinator for Preston based arts development company They Eat Culture, I founded and developed Word Soup and the Lancashire Writing Hub site.
Word Soup is still going strong in Preston and elsewhere and features a monthly dose of the region’s best established and emerging writers including Steven Hall, Joe Stretch, Chris Killen, Sophie Hannah and Robert Shearman. The Lancashire Writing Hub is an online information portal and an off line network of Lancashire based writers, readers, promoters and performers.
You can see Word Soup performers in action at the Lancashire Writing Hub You Tube Channel – developed by poet and Hub volunteer Norman Hadley. You can get up to date with current events and network with the Lancashire literati by going to the Lancashire Writing hub site, here.
Mentoring and manuscript appraisal
I work for agencies and independently as a creative mentor and editor. If you’re interested in commissioning me for this kind of work, get in touch for a chat and free consultation.
What is mentoring? Sara Maitland and Martin Goodman have written a great guide about the mentoring process that you can read here. My focus is on the craft of writing and your work but if there are other issues you’d like to cover (time management, professional development, problems with motivation, developing an on-line presence etc) we can talk about that too.
Manuscript appraisal is a detailed and in-depth written report on the strengths and weaknesses of your novel or collection of short stories. Depending on the length of your manuscript, you’ll receive an 8 – 15 page report from me, and once you’ve had time to digest it, a follow up email where I answer any remaining questions.
I’m particularly interested in working with writers of dark, edgy novels with a literary slant, although I also work with crime, thriller, horror and gritty women’s fiction writers. Being mentored by me is nothing like signing up my MA in Creative Writing although you might want to read my blog and some of my tips for writers before we start.
