Winners announced for Donegal Creameries NWW Poetry Prize 2013

The winners and commendations have been announced for Donegal Creameries NWW Poetry Prize 2013. See here or below.

Some submission opportunities in early 2014

Gee it's 2014 already, and where to send all those lovely poems and stories? Here are some ideas.

Is it my fault?

The New Yorker Fiction Podcast is a small miracle. Every month, a writer who has been published in the magazine picks a story from the archive, and reads it out loud. A short discussion between the fiction editor and the writer about themes arising from the story wraps it up.
I love to hear a story read aloud, and good short fiction is available to listen to from more varied sources, but it is the New Yorker version I return to repeatedly. You learn so much about an author from their choice. The New Yorker archive is venerable and extensive, so you won't hear a dud. Then, there is the discussion, which is lucid and intelligent without veering into arid intellectual posturing.
I listened to the latest podcast: Jonathan Safran Foer reading Amos Oz's story, "The King of Norway". You can listen for yourself here. As the story unfolded, I formed opinions about the characters. In the discussion, Jonathan Safran Foer blew them away, making me go through a paradigm shift about what I had just heard, challenging my casual judgements, giving me new insights and shedding richness upon my narrow interpretation.
That's not bad for 30 minutes listening. It made me think about the dangers of throwaway reading (or listening), of not paying sufficient attention. It made me think of a chilling Twitter exchange I saw yesterday, where a reader reeled off some master short story practitioners of whom he was "a bit bored". Perhaps we need to be aware of our limitations as readers; how the quest for novelty and sensation can mask the potential richness of the pages we read. Sometimes, we need to read reflexively and thoughtfully, open to the possibility of being challenged. Sometimes, if we are bored, it is our fault.

Happy New Year Reading

In between the shopping and wrapping and visits and visitors and cooking and hoovering for the next round of visitors and cooking and eating I've managed to find time to finish reading Sarah Waters' "The Little Stranger" which I started about two months ago. It's no reflection on the book that it took so long for me to finish it. In fact as I got into it I wanted to wait til there were no distractions to interfere with the gorgeous moody writing. It has so much of what I love in a novel: a terrific setting in the mouldering Hundreds Hall, evocative imagery and characters, a slow boiling plot that utterly pulls you in.

Happy New Year

Happy reading and writing in 2014 from the Garden Room Writers.

My stories published at The Derry Review website and The Weary Blues

I'm deighted to say that I've two pieces published very recently online.  My story Myself Alone was published last week on The Derry Review website here  and  a flash fiction called Cooking for the Dead at The Weary Blues  here.

Happy Christmas

 

Happy Christmas from the Garden Room Writers, and thanks for stopping by and reading our blog.

(Christmas tree image - Mazeo's clipart from Openclipart)

Some more recommended readings in short fiction, poetry, letters and more

Here are more ideas for online readings over the festive season - a few first issues even. And below some beautiful, hard copy, hold in your hands literary magazines.

Shortlist for the Donegal Creameries & North West Words 2013 Poetry Prize

And, the shortlist is out. Congratulations to all. I'm looking forward to the readings in January.

My story With Matchsticks Not Money in The Linnet's Wings Winter 2013

I'm delighted to say that my short story With Matchsticks Not Money has just been published in the Winter 2013 issue of The Linnet's Wings here