Cyber Smut – call for submissions

Guts Publishing wants to know how the internet has impacted your life. We are seeking short stories and poetry for our next anthology Cyber Smut. Closing date for submissions is 29 February 2020.


This is wide open in terms of interpretation, and anything goes – poetry, memoir, erotica, literary fiction, sci fi, essays, etc – as long as it aligns with the theme. Things to consider: our daily lives are saturated with the internet, impacting our minds and behavior. Miscommunications and mishaps. Lust and desire for fame and money. Hilarity and tragedy with Tinder or Grindr. This is rich and fertile ground, and surely there are countless ways to approach this theme. We are thrilled about our next anthology and hope you are too.


• Closing date for submissions – 29 February 2020.
• Short stories (fiction & nonfiction) – 1000-5000 words.
• Poetry – up to 5 pages.
• UK & Ireland – seeking submissions from anyone living or born in the UK or Ireland.
• Unpublished work only please. We are not able to accept previously published work, print or online.

Visit gutpublishing.com for more info, or submit your work on Submittable: gutspublishing.submittable.com/submit

Stroud Short Stories is Open for Submissions until 8 March 2020

Stroud Short Stories is currently open for submissions for its special 20th event which is dedicated to Stroud writer Rick Vick who sadly died at the end of November. There were obituaries for Rick in The Times and The GuardianHere is the latter.
 
The event is for all Gloucestershire and South Gloucestershire writers. The theme this time is DISRUPTION. Submissions are free and you may submit unpublished or published stories. Ten stories will be selected and their authors will read/perform them at our event.
The deadline is the end of Sunday 8 March and the event is on Sunday 19 April at the 150-seater Cotswold Playhouse. Tickets will go on sale on 20 March.
 
All information about submitting is on the Stroud Short Stories website.

Call for Submissions – Short Stories & Poetry

Stories About Cyber Lives

Guts Publishing. Ballsy books about life. An independent publisher in London specializing in short story anthologies, fiction & nonfiction, and often with poetry. We also publish full-length memoirs. Our goal is to support exceptional writers to ensure that readers can find bold life stories (and that other stuff they call fiction) in the marketplace.

On 28 November 2019 we released our debut anthology Stories About Penises, a collection of 21 poems and short stories about, well exactly what it sounds like. We have some nice reviews on our website, and also on Goodreads.

We are thrilled to announce that we are open for submissions for our next anthology Stories About Cyber Lives. Seeking poetry and short stories (fiction & nonfiction) by UK writers. Which means anyone currently living in the UK, or anyone who was born in the UK. Closing date is 15 February 2020. This is wide open and anything goes (poetry, memoir, erotica, literary fiction, sci fi, lgbt, etc) as long as it aligns with the theme.

For details visit gutspublishing.com/submissions and our Submittable page.

We can’t wait to read your stories! xx Guts

Story Friday LEAP! Call for submissions

Story Friday in February has the theme LEAP! in celebration of 2020 as a leap year. Story Friday is on 28th February, the day before the leaping day, and we want to revel in the glory of this springing theme! Whether your stories feature proposals or boxing hares, Christmas lords or death defying jumps, we are so looking forward to reading what you come up with!

Story Friday LEAP! will be on 28th February, deadline for submissions is 17th February. We’re looking for stories that are 2,000 words or fewer.  (Full submission details are here).  Writers must be available to come to Bath for the event.  If you’d rather not read, we have wonderful actors who can read your story for you.

For more information about Story Friday, to listen to stories that we have recorded at our events over the years, and/or to submit your story please visit A Word In Your Ear.

Residential Writing Weekend with Claire Keegan

Teach Bhride Holistic Centre, Tullow, Co. Carlow, Ireland 3 to 5 January 2020

This residential weekend will see all participants arriving at Teach Bhride on Friday afternoon before dinner. The next two mornings will be spent writing in any genre in well lighted, quiet spaces without mobile phones.

Lectures and discussions will be held in the afternoons and evenings on the following:

  • Letters by Anton Chekhov & others

  • Paris Review/Writers at Work Interviews

  • Essays by Eudora Welty, Frank O’Connor and Flannery O’Connor

  • Hemingway’s advice on writing

  • Some poems on writing and creativity

  • Viewing of A Private World, a documentary on John McGahern

Tuition includes all meals and two nights’ accommodation, with everyone arriving before dinner on Friday, helping themselves to breakfast both mornings, and leaving before dinner on Sunday evening. This course will suit anyone interested in a quiet weekend of writing. None of what is written will be read aloud. It’s a chance to engage with the intricacies of the creative process and use your imagination.

To book your place, contact ckfictionclinic@yahoo.com Tuition is 400 Euro. A 50% deposit secures. See CKFictionClinic for more information.

KEEGAN ClaireClaire Keegan’s portrait taken in the offices of Sabine Wespieser, Publisher, Paris

Claire Keegan’s story collections include Antarctica, Walk the Blue Fields and Foster (Faber & Faber). These stories, translated into 17 languages, have won numerous awards. Her debut, Antarctica, was a Los Angeles Times Book of the Year. “These stories are among the finest stories recently written in English,” wrote the Observer. Walk the Blue Fields, her second collection, was Richard Ford’s Book of the Year in 2010, and won the Edge Hill Prize, awarded to the strongest collection published in the British Isles. Foster won the Davy Byrne’s Award, the then world’s richest prize for a single story. New Yorker readers chose Foster as their story of the year. It was also published in Best American Stories and is now on the school syllabus in Ireland. Keegan has earned an international reputation as a teacher of fiction, having taught workshops on four continents.

Every line seems to be a lesson in the perfect deployment of both style and emotion.” Hilary Mantel

The best stories are so textured and so moving, so universal but utterly distinctive, that it’s easy to imagine readers savoring them many years from now and to imagine critics, far in the future, deploying new lofty terms to explain what it is that makes Keegan’s fiction work.” The New York Times

Every single word in the right place and pregnant with double meaning.” Jeffrey Eugenides, The New York Times

Keegan is a rarity, someone I will always want to read.” Richard Ford

Writing Short Stories with Cynan Jones

Write and edit a complete short story and learn essential fiction-writing techniques on Curtis Brown Creative’s brand new six-week online course, Writing Short Stories led by award-winning short story writer Cynan Jones. Cynan won the Betty Trask award for his novel The Long Dry and he won BBC National Short Story Award in 2017, for which he was on the 2019 judging panel . His short stories have appeared in a variety of anthologies and in journals and magazines including Granta and the New Yorker.

We interviewed Cynan to find out more about his love of short fiction…

You won the BBC National Short Story Prize for your story The Edge of the Shoal in 2017 and now you’re on this year’s judging panel for the prize. How does it feel to come full circle? And what do you look for when reading short stories for competitions?

Judging the competition has certainly pointed out what an extraordinary thing it was to win. Ultimately, all a writer can do is write as strongly as he or she can, and work on a story until it’s the best possible piece they can produce. What happens to that story is a product of the work and attention put in. If nothing else, I know I’ve really worked hard to write strongly. In many ways then, it feels less of a circle and more of a starting point! What next? I’m always aiming to challenge myself.

The sense a writer has challenged him or herself is in the best stories too. You read great pieces and think, ‘How!? How did they write that?’ Such stories feel both totally impossible to write, but as if they couldn’t be written better.

When reading stories for competitions I look for that. Stories that take narrative risks and show the technical ability to make those risks pay off. That’s much rarer than you think.

What initially inspired you to start writing in short fiction?

I think several elements led me to shorter forms. Firstly, the thing of reading a story from start to finish in one sitting. I loved that as a reader and – as most of us are copyists when we first start writing – wanted to replicate that experience.

I also think that, even in my initial attempts at serious writing, the way my prose hit the page lent itself to shorter form. I aimed always to put a picture down as simply and powerfully as I could and relied on the reader to think and feel in response. That meant I didn’t write a great deal of explanation or back story, or direct a reader how to react. In itself, that makes for fewer words.

In retrospect, perhaps too there were constraints as to how long I could really dedicate to the process of writing when I first started. I usually had about three months for writing at the beginning of the year before the freelance work I did at the time really got going. Perhaps that made me feel I needed to write something I could start and finish in one block. (Which loops back to the first thing I mentioned here, about the immersive experience of starting and finishing something in one go.)

We’re thrilled to have you on board as the teacher of our brand-new Writing Short Stories course. What’s your favourite part of teaching?

Probably how teaching makes you dig into your own process and really work to understand it so you can pass what you know on.

Other than the help of the world-class authors I read, I taught myself to write. Because of that, it’s only since teaching that I’ve really dissected exactly what it is I do, and that’s helped me take things further.

Could you share your top three tips for writers who want to start writing short stories?

Read.

Work at the craft.

Don’t write to be published.

Read the full interview with Cynan over on the Curtis Brown Creative blog.

Curtis Brown Creative’s brand new Writing Short Stories course led by Cynan Jones is open now for enrolment.

Short Stops readers can get an exclusive 10% off by using code: SHORTSTOPSCBC

 

Story Friday Chemistry – we want your stories!

After a lovely long summer and story walks in the sun, Story Fridays is back inside, at Burdall’s Yard in Bath.  Our next event in November has the theme Chemistry. Are you thinking of bunsen burners, or eyes meeting across a crowded room? Whatever you choose, chemistry is all about reactions, explosive or otherwise. We can’t wait to see where our latest theme takes you!

Story Friday Chemistry will be on 8th November, deadline for submissions is 28th October. We’re looking for stories that are 2,000 words or fewer.  (Full submission details are here).  Writers must be available to come to Bath for the event.  If you’d rather not read, we have wonderful actors who can read your story for you.

For more information about Story Friday, to listen to stories that we have recorded at our events over the years, and/or to submit your story please visit A Word In Your Ear.

 

Call for submissions – Let your creativity sparkle!

Call for submissions – 2019 Ouen Press Short Story Competition

Ouen Press are pleased to extend an invitation for writers to submit an original short story in line with this year’s theme – ‘The Gift’. Winning authors will receive cash prizes and be published in an anthology early in the New Year. This follows on from the success of the competition in previous years and subsequent publications .

Ouen Press 2019 Short Story Competition – The Gift – Call for Submissions!

The short story must be a work of fiction involving in its theme a ‘gift’ of any sort [e.g. a present, a capability ] at any time [past, present day, future] or in any place [this world or another]. For the purposes of this competition, the term ‘gift’ will be viewed by the judges in the widest possible sense related to both setting and context. They will focus on well-written compelling storylines, thoughtful plots and engaging characters.

Deadline for entries is 31st December 2019 – full information and rules of the competition, which is open to writers worldwide, can be found at www.ouenpress.com

 For updates on our activities – come follow us on Twitter @OuenP 

 We’d be thrilled if you Like our Facebook page

14TH BBC NATIONAL SHORT STORY AWARD SHORTLIST INSPIRED BY #METOO, TRUMP AND DISCRIMINATION

NSSA_Stacked_2019Award-winning writer Lucy Caldwell joined by former bookseller Lynda Clark, charity worker Jacqueline Crooks, and new voices Tamsin Grey and Jo Lloyd to complete shortlist of writers exploring sexual politics, intolerance, community and immigration.

Lucy Caldwell, multi-award-winning novelist, playwright and short story writer, has been shortlisted for the BBC National Short Story Award with Cambridge University for the second time for ‘The Children’. Previously shortlisted in 2012 for ‘Escape Route’, one of her first ever short stories, Caldwell is joined on the 2019 shortlist by a wealth of emerging talent including University of Dundee Fellow and former bookseller Lynda Clark for ‘Ghillie’s Mum’; charity worker Jacqueline Crooks for ‘Silver Fish in the Midnight Sea’; civil servant Tamsin Grey for ‘My Beautiful Millennial’; and Welsh writer Jo Lloyd for ‘The Invisible’. The shortlist of five stories was announced on Friday 6 September 2019, during BBC Radio 4 Front Row.

The shortlist is:

  • The Children’ by Lucy Caldwell
  • Ghillie’s Mum’ by Lynda Clark
  • Silver Fish in the Midnight Sea’ by Jacqueline Crooks
  • My Beautiful Millennial’ by Tamsin Grey
  • ‘The Invisible’ by Jo Lloyd

Now celebrating its fourteenth year, the Award is one of the most prestigious for a single short story, with the winning writer receiving £15,000, and the four further shortlisted authors £600 each. Selected from over 900 entries (an increase of 15% on 2018), this year’s shortlist is the sixth all-female shortlist in the BBC National Short Story Award’s history.

Nikki Bedi, TV and radio broadcaster and Chair of Judges for the BBC National Short Story Award 2019, says: “One of the things I’ve discovered over a lifetime of meeting, interviewing and spending time with the most extraordinary creative minds in the world, is that they all have something in common: they seek to move us, to make us think and to transform us. I strongly believe all five of the shortlisted writers and stories we’ve chosen do all that and more. Judging them, however, has not been an easy process. To say it was a hard-fought contest is putting it mildly. We agonised over our decisions and disagreed vociferously at times, but on the whole, the discussion and debating was carried out in a civilised manner.” 

Nikki Bedi is joined on this year’s judging panel by novelist and writer of narrative non-fiction Richard Beard; short story writer, novelist and youngest author to be shortlisted for the Man Booker Prize Daisy Johnson; screenwriter, novelist and 2017 BBC National Short Story Award winner Cynan Jones; and returning judge Di Speirs, Books Editor at BBC Radio.

All five stories will be broadcast on Radio 4 on BBC Sounds in September and published in an anthology produced by Comma Press. The readers of this year’s stories include Line of Duty and Call the Midwife star Jessica Raine, who reads ‘The Children’, and Welsh actor Aimee-Ffion Edwards of Peaky Blinders and Skins fame, reading ‘The Invisible’. Tamara Lawrance, who read Candice Carty-Williams’ Queenie for BBC Sounds, reads ‘Silver Fish in the Midnight Sea’, and Katherine Press, whose television credits include Foyle’s War and the Golden Globe-nominated BBC series Dancing on the Edge, reads ‘My Beautiful Millennial’. Stephen Campbell Moore, best known for his role in the stage production of The History Boys completes the line-up with ‘Ghillie’s Mum’.

The BBC National Short Story Award with Cambridge University was established to raise the profile of the short form and this year’s shortlist join distinguished alumni such as Zadie Smith, Lionel Shriver, Rose Tremain, William Trevor, Sarah Hall and Mark Haddon. As well as rewarding the most renowned short story writers, the Award has raised the profile of new writers including Ingrid Persaud, K J Orr, Julian Gough, Cynan Jones and Clare Wigfall.

The winner of the BBC National Short Story Award 2019 will be announced live on BBC Radio 4 Front Row on Tuesday 1 October. The anthology published by Comma Press is out now.NSSA shortlist announcement

Stroud Short Stories is open for submissions until 29 September 2019

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Stroud Short Stories is open until the end of Sunday 29 September for submissions from Gloucestershire and South Gloucestershire writers.

It’s free to submit and we will select ten stories to be read by their authors at our 19th event on Sunday 10 November at the 150-seater Cotswold Playhouse. Our last 13 events have all sold out.

The event is part of the 2019 Stroud Book Festival.

It’s an open theme this time so any subject matter, any style so long as it’s a short story of no more than 1,500 words.

Information about our rules and how to submit is on the SSS website.

Tickets, priced at £8, go on sale on the Playhouse website on 11 October.

Liars’ League: INFINITY & BEYOND short stories, Tuesday 11th June

Infinity symbol or sign. Abstract night sky background

WE HAVE LIFT-OFF! Liars’ League‘s sci-fi-flavoured special to commemorate 50 years since the moon landings features five forward-looking stories exploring the ultimate theme. Teleport into The Phoenix, Cavendish Square on Tuesday 11th June to experience deep spacetime-travel tourismcryogenics gone wrongvanishing clones, astronautical ambitions and a terrifying game of Murder in the Dark …

INFINITY & BEYOND WINNING STORIES
London 2025 by Wan Shinfah NEW AUTHOR, read by Cliff Chapman
Proxima Centauri by Oliver Parkes NEW AUTHOR, read by Greg Page
How to be an Astronaut by Alice Franklin, read by Gloria Sanders
The Martlet by Abigail Lee, read by Lois Tucker
Frozen Futures by Rhys Timson, read by Tony Bell

Usual NASA rules apply: doors open at 7pm for a 7.30 start and tickets are £5 on the door (currently cash only, sorry, but there’s a cashpoint 2 minutes away). Entry includes a programme, participation in our infamous book quiz where fantastic science fiction can be won, and of course all the Flying Saucers you can eat. Drinks and food are available at the bar throughout. There’s no pre-booking, but tables for four or more can be reserved by calling 07808 939535.

The venue is the downstairs bar at: The Phoenix Pub, 37 Cavendish Square, London W1G 0PP

Accessibility note: Access to the basement is via stairs: there’s no lift, sadly. The Phoenix is 5 minutes’ walk from Oxford Circus tube station, which is on the Victoria, Bakerloo and Central lines

The Hunters Grimm- a storyhunting show in the streets of London

Bernadette Russell of White Rabbit  joins the wonderful Teatro Vivo cast in “The Hunters Grimm” a promenade performance in the streets of Catford and Stratford, London,aiding Jacob and Wilhem Grimm along with their companion Dot Wilde, in their search for a story of hope with a happy ending. Such stories seem in short supply in our troubled times….

The Hunters Grimm on the streets

The Hunters Grimm on the streets

Come and join us on our search! Who knows who you might meet on the way: a beggar Prince, Rapunzel now working in sheltered housing as a single mum, a young jobseeker in pursuit of 12 dancing princesses, a hungry wolf reminiscing about his glory days as a restaurant critic,  a step mother who needs a Kardashian make over….and many more

Dates are:

Stratford- 30th May- 1st June- please go here for more details and tickets

 

Catford- 6th-16th June- please go here for more details and tickets

 

For a tantilising taster go here

The Child in Society

Weekend of Fiction Writing & Reading with Claire Keegan

Amber Springs Hotel, Gorey, Co Wexford

June 29 & 30, 2019children

There can be no keener revelation of a society’s soul than the way in which it treats its children. Nelson Mandela

For two days, Claire Keegan, author of Foster (Faber & Faber) will explore fiction writing through the linked theme of The Child in Society. Discussion will include the rights of the child, having and not having children, fathering, mothering, fostering, adopting and neglecting children. Participants will be asked to imagine being a boy, a girl, a parent, a child minder – and undoubtedly there will be talk around housing, fathering, contraception, pregnancy, money, hunger, mothering, sleep and what it means to love and be loved, to mind and to be minded — from different points of view. The lecture will explore and display how time, tension, drama, dialogue and narrative structure are put to use in the following:

Jude the Obscure, a novel by Thomas Hardy

The River,” a story by Flannery O’Connor

Sleepyhead,” a story by Chekov, translated by Constance Garnett

The Widow’s Son,” by Mary Lavin.

Vera Drake, a film by Mike Leigh

Tuition 350 euro. Reservations can be made by emailing ckfictionclinic@yahoo.com

For more information, go to ckfictionclinic.com

Stroud Short Stories ‘Incendiary!’ Sunday 19 May – Tickets on Sale

Tickets are now on sale for the 18th Stroud Short Stories event Incendiary! on Sunday 19 May  –

https://www.ticketsource.co.uk/date/638976

Tickets are priced as usual at £8. The event, at our new venue, the 150-seater Cotswold Playhouse, Parliament Street, Stroud, GL5 1LW, starts at 8pm (doors 7.30).

Ten Gloucestershire authors will be reading their stories about fire, heat, passion, anger and rebellion selected from the 113 stories submitted.

The authors are –

Robin Booth

Joanna Campbell

Louise Elliman

Michael Hurst

Jason Jackson

Emma Kernahan

Geoff Mead

Chloe Turner

Steve Wheeler (aka Steven John)

Alwin Wiederhold

All info on the Stroud Short Stories website

 

Call for Submissions: Pixel Heart Literary Magazine – Issue Three: Nature

Screen Shot 2019-02-06 at 20.09.08

Pixel Heart Literary Magazine is currently open for submissions for its third issue, on the theme of ‘Nature’.

The magazine publishes flash fiction (under 750 words), poetry (of any length), and short stories (1,000 – 2,500 words).

There is no submission fee, and submissions are open to all – experienced and new writers alike.

Pixel Heart Literary Magazine is dedicated to publishing writers who are disabled, LGBT, and/or writers of colour, as well as writers from a working-class background. While all submissions will be considered with great care, if writers state in their submission email that they are any of the above, then their submission will be given a little extra attention.

For our more specific submission guidelines and info on how to submit, please click here. Submissions for Issue Three are currently open until midnight BST on May 31st, 2019. ❤

Liars’ League BEFORE & AFTER story readings – this Tuesday April 9th

rollercoaster crop text

As Brexit looms (or does it? who knows …?!) long-running, award-winning live literature legends Liars’ League have selected six superb stories of choice & change to take your mind off it all at our BEFORE & AFTER show on Tuesday 9th April. There are escapes & tippingpointscats & cowssex & deathpoetry & fistfightsyoga & porn, the Berlin Wall & a fishtank full of ghosts. And it’s STILL only £5 entry, which includes a programme, our infamous book quiz, and free birthday cake because we’re 12 🙂

WINNING STORIES for BEFORE & AFTER
Last Rites by Jess Worsdale, read by David Mildon
Namaste Bitches by Ana Soria, read by Keleigh Wolf
Counterfiction by Tim Aldrich, read by Tim Larkfield
The Poetry of Jenny by Gerard McKeown, read by Zach Harrison
No East or West by Mark Sadler, read by Silas Hawkins
Olena’s Scalpel by Alan Graham, read by Patsy Prince

Doors open at 7pm for a 7.30 start and tickets are a fiver on the door (currently cash only, sorry, but there’s a cashpoint across the street). Drinks and food are available at the bar throughout. There’s no pre-booking, but tables for four or more can be reserved by calling 07808 939535.

The venue is the downstairs bar at: The Phoenix Pub, 37 Cavendish Square, London W1G 0PP

Accessibility note: Access to the basement is via stairs: there’s no lift, sadly. The Phoenix is 5 minutes’ walk from Oxford Circus tube station, which is on the Victoria, Bakerloo and Central lines.

P.S. Want to submit a story for our next event, Infinity & Beyond? Deadline is Sunday 5th May and all the details are here

Story Friday The Garden – Call for Submissions

Story Friday in May has the theme The Garden.  I don’t know about where you are, but here in Bath the blossom is blooming, the tulips are budding and spring is definitely springing. So take a stroll down the garden path and let your imagination fly.

Story Friday The Garden will be on 3rd May, deadline for submissions is 22nd April.  That’s very soon, so get writing! We’re looking for stories that are 2,000 words or fewer.  (Full submission details are here).  Writers must be available to come to Bath for the event.  If you’d rather not read, we have wonderful actors who can read your story for you.

For more information about Story Friday, to listen to stories that we have recorded at our events over the years, and/or to submit your story please visit A Word In Your Ear.

Stroud Short Stories is open for submissions until 31 March

Stroud Short Stories is open for submissions from Gloucs and South Gloucs writers until 31 March – for our 19 May 2019 event in a new venue, the Cotswold Playhouse in Stroud. It’s free to submit and we are happy to consider published and unpublished work.

There’s a theme this time – Incendiary! Think of the theme as widely and flexibly as possible – stories about fire, heat, passion, anger, rebellion, incineration, climate change, inflamed senses, etc, etc.

As well as reading before an audience of 150 short story lovers at the Cotswold Playhouse in Stroud, the authors of the ten stories chosen will be offered a place in our next published anthology – due 2021.

Tickets for the 19 May event will be available from 21 April on the Cotswold Playhouse website.

All the info you need is on our website – http://stroudshortstories.blogspot.com/

Liars’ League: LOVE & LUST Valentine special, Tuesday 12th February

love & lust

Are you lonesome tonight? Does your lit need a light?
Do you like booze and fiction and art?
Do you find Valentine’s weighs on hearts and on minds?
Would you like us to uplift your heart?

Then look no further, because Liars’ League has found six pulse-pounding stories for our (just pre-)Valentine’s event, LOVE & LUST, and you can hear them all for just a fiver! On Tuesday 12th February our professional actors will read brand-new fiction featuring pagan bonfires, lustful teens, scarlet knickers, ill-advised one-night stands, fish suppers, sex at the Imperial War Museum and (naturally) the end of civilisation – and we’d love you to be there.

WINNING STORIES FOR LOVE & LUST
A Shared History by Seth Marlin NEW AUTHOR, read by William Teller
Fish-fish by Cherry Potts, read by Math Jones
The Wicker Heart by Alan Graham, read by Peter Kenny
The Red Satin Flag of Resistance by Mark Sadler, read by Silas Hawkins
Soul Searching by Liam Hogan, read by Keleigh Wolf
Lili of the Valley of the Shadow by Derek Ivan Webster, read by Alex Greenhalgh

As usual, doors open at 7pm for a 7.30 start and tickets are £5 on the door (currently cash only, sorry, but there is a cashpoint across the street). Drinks and food will be available at the bar, though there are also free Loveheart sweets and the infamous interval quiz features red-hot brand-new books to be won! There’s no pre-booking, but tables for four or more can be reserved by calling 07808 939535.

The venue is the downstairs bar at:
The Phoenix Pub
37 Cavendish Square
London W1G 0PP

Accessibility note: Access to the basement is via stairs: there is no lift, sadly.

The Phoenix is 5 minutes’ walk from Oxford Circus tube station, which is on the Victoria, Bakerloo and Central lines.

Story Friday Invitation – Call For Submissions

Best invitation ever?  Worst??

Story Friday  in March has the theme Invitation… to the ball, to the party, to the pub, to the moon, to the wedding, to heaven, to hell?  What is more intriguing than the perfect – or imperfect – invitation? We are inviting writers to write their favourite invitation story for a glorious story-party in March.

Story Friday Invitation will be on 22nd March, deadline for submissions is 11th March. We’re looking for stories that are 2,000 words or fewer.  (Full submission details are here).  Writers must be available to come to Bath for the event.  If you’d rather not read, we have wonderful actors who can read your story for you.

For more information about Story Friday, to listen to stories that we have recorded at our events over the years, and/or to submit your story please visit A Word In Your Ear.