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Keep Short Stories on Radio 4

Those of you who are on Twitter may already have heard about the campaign to stop Radio 4 from culling their short story output from 3 per week to just 1.  It was brought to my attention by Susie Maguire, an author who tweets (very fittingly in this instance!) as @wrathofgod and has been getting people to sign a petition, here.  There are 3746 names on there at the time of writing, including lots of authors and actors and culturally important types.  And me…

Continue reading “Keep Short Stories on Radio 4” →

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Latitude 2011: A Review

The one in which I tell you about my holiday, as if you even remotely care.

On Thursday I travelled from Edinburgh to Suffolk (on the train via Peterborough and Norwich, route planning fans) to attend Latitude, a nice middle class festival for nice middle class people.  If you think that an unfair assessment, incidentally, witness the food van that had the longest queue of the weekend on the right hand side of this post…  Please correct me if I’m being condescending and people lined up for ages to access this van at T in the Park as well, though.

The nice thing about Latitude is that it tries to do something a bit different by not being a straightforward music festival.  Whilst there are three music stages, it also has tents dedicated to comedy, poetry, literature, theatre and cabaret which have arguably far better lineups than the music ones do.

For instance, here is what we saw over the weekend:

Continue reading “Latitude 2011: A Review” →

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The Author’s Triumphal Return is Nigh

Right now I am probably trying to roll up a tent and put it away in a field full of mud.  I hope your Monday morning is full of similar delights.  Particularly if you work in an office.

To get you through the day, I suggest you have a look at the following.

– Hecklerspray (the UK’s foremost sarky gossip website)

– Chapter One – a five minute reading from Book 5 (that was the fantasy one about the wizard sheep)

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Hayfever Sets In

Afternoon all, I trust you are well.

If not, maybe these links will cheer you up.  And don’t worry, I’ll be home soon, and all this scheduled post madness will be naught but a distant memory.

– Hark, A Vagrant (comic by Kate Beaton)

– To Plan or Not to Plan – a reader writes in to ask me whether I do this off the cuff.  I reply.

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Happy Saturday

Morning all.  You’re looking nice today.  Have you done something different with your hair?  I imagine by this stage mine wants to get up and crawl off my head.  I don’t normally go this long without a shower, but when camping there’s not a lot else for it.  Still, The National were good weren’t they?  Probably.

Anyway, it’s Saturday, and you’re probably hanging around in your pyjamas thinking about making eggy bread but not quite getting round to it.  Why not relax further with a bit of:

– Hyperbole and a Half (brilliant cartoons drawn apparently in MS Paint by Allie Brosh, who is some kind of comedy genius)

– A foray into research on the Romance genre.  Includes hilarious quotes.  Well, I thought they were hilarious… April’s Genre

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Mad Props To Other Bloggers

Tis the second day of my brief Suffolk sojourn and I hope you are bearing up OK.  Today’s reading material for all y’all is as follows:

– Joel Stickley’s How to Write Badly Well – very short snippets that do pretty much what it says on the tin.  He’s in the literary tent at Latitude too, doncha know.  (I’m probably there too, with any luck..)

– A post bemoaning the volume of admin around promoting a project such as this, complete with list of people you should high five when next you see them; The Social Network

I hope these fill the gaping void left by my absense.  If not, perhaps consider buying a pet.

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