Last year, at the Flash Fiction Festival, I was the lucky winner of a weeks writing retreat in Italy, courtesy of Charmaine Wilkerson. (I’ll let you all in on a little secret, Charmaine is just as charming and generous as you thought she was, only more so).
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In late Spring in the High Sierra where I live in the summer, the snow melts off and turns the mountains into a world of mud. In those places of recent fires, this is the season for morel mushrooms, which love the nutrient rich ash. I have a ranger friend who hunts them through the soggy mud, and she cooks them on a portable stove right there in the dark shade of the giant sequoia trees. Fire is an important part of the pulse of the forest. Without it, the giant sequoias would not reseed. Without it, new growth would never have enough light to thrive.
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I’m an Irish novelist, short story writer and flash writer. At the Flash Fiction Festival I’ll be facilitating a workshop on Historical Flash Fiction. The last two novels I’ve written have been set in the nineteenth century, and my novel-in-progress is Edwardian, so for a few years I’ve been steeped in the language, social history, fashion, mores and environment of those times. I love research and, in the throes of it, often come across snippets that can’t be used in the novels, but that I know might work as flash. So, more and more, I’m writing historical flash as well as historical novels, though I’m always pleased, too, when an idea for a contemporary flash hoves into view.
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The 2017 anthology Flash Fiction Festival, One published by Ad Hoc Fiction is power packed into a tiny package. These seventy-four works of micro-fiction, all under 250 words, showcase the work of a vital community made up of publishers, readers, writers, and lovers of flash fiction. The work comes from or was inspired by lectures and prompts discussed at the first literary festival entirely dedicated to flash fiction held in Bath last June.
Just like flash fiction at work, where much of the story is set in the implied, the anthology is an iceberg of what happened at the festival. The whole is greater than the sum of its parts. The life of those stories goes beyond their words and also suggests the thriving energy present at the festival, the communion, the growth.
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Ken reading at the launch of Flash Fiction Festival One.
In the run-up to the festival I’m trying to get media coverage of the event (so if you’re reading this and maybe have a show on Radio 4 or write a literary column for the Guardian, then feel free to get in touch!).
During the Festival I will be popping up as Editor of The A3 Review – a short poetry and prose magazine that folds like a map – which I co-edit alongside Writing Maps publishers Shaun Levin. We’re aiming to provide all festival-goers with a selection of back issues absolutely free.
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I’m getting pumped about the UK’s second annual flash fiction festival, and it’s only March. Last year was inspiring, and I’m sure this year will serve up more of the same.
This year is particularly exciting for me. I’ve just published a collection of flash: Other Household Toxins (Matter Press), an eclectic grouping of 48 stories from the last 10 years that I hope shows the breadth of what’s possible with flash. I’ll be reading from the collection and also signing books at the flash fiction festival in July.
I’ll also be leading the workshop “Do You Have Something to Say?” because I think this is one of the most important topics we can discuss these days as writers of flash. In my opinion, our best stories reveal something about our nature and purpose while challenging us to see these often tragic subjects from fresh angles. I’ve made a commitment to myself starting in 2018 to write only stories that rip me apart—even if this means I write only a few. At the workshop in July, we’ll be talking about how difficult it is to write stories like this and how to avoid their pitfalls.
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In summer 2018, V. Press celebrates its fifth birthday. It’s a very, very delightful coincidence that it also marks the publication of our fifth fiction title!
The press was originally set up and launched at Ledbury Poetry Festival in 2013. But it only really got going in 2015, with three poetry pamphlets. In 2016, V. Press published three poetry pamphlets, a poetry collection and our first flash pamphlet. This increased to nine titles in 2017, with a similar schedule for 2018.
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