"Mark Haddon has chosen Owen Booth’s Frankenstein’s Monster is Drunk, and the Sheep Have All Jumped the Fences as the winner of The Moth Short Story Prize 2020, for which Booth will receive €3,000. “This felt like a winner from the very first sentence – ‘They’d dug him out of the glacier in 1946, pulled … Continue reading So I won the Moth Short Story Prize… →

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I'm thinking of you again tonight Vin Diesel, as I consider my dwindling options in a French seaside town, and the seagulls won’t let me sleep. The seagulls and everything else. Vin, the Fast and Furious franchise has made you rich, with the eight films in the series having earned a combined worldwide gross of … Continue reading I’m thinking of you again tonight Vin Diesel →

[Re-published in honour of Mars Rover Opportunity - rest in peace little friend!] We’re teaching our sons about Martians. For the last few weeks a group of lonely billionaires have been all over the news talking about their plans to populate the Red Planet. They’re auditioning for brave and clever and able-bodied young men and women … Continue reading What We’re Teaching Our Sons #362: Martians →

The bodies filled the streets, and people stopped and stared. There were bodies everywhere. They were all going about their business, just like that. You were there somewhere, walking around. Some of the bodies were considered remarkable. Some of the bodies were considered obscene. Some of the bodies were considered too big, or too small, … Continue reading The Bodies →

Some I nearly finished writing, some I abandoned before I'd even started work, all would have probably been terrible, but these are The Top Ten Books I Should Have Written in 2018... 1. The Terrifying Horse A dark, neo-gothic horror/romance set in a haunted North Yorkshire Moors village at the turn of the century. And … Continue reading The Top Ten Books I Should Have Written in 2018 →

 

Based on my years of experience in the writing game, I've come up with a list of 24 essential rules for creating short stories that will engage, entertain and enthral. Feel free to use them when inventing your own stories! 1. A good short story should not contain a single wasted word. The reader should … Continue reading 24 Rules for Writing Short Stories →

I woke up this morning worrying about Vin Diesel’s sleeves again, and what they mean and where they went and why he doesn’t just wear vests like his Fast and Furious co-star The Rock does – if getting his guns out is what this is all about –   instead of those weird, slightly ill-fitting … Continue reading Vin Diesel’s Sleeves →

Ex-Girlfriends We’re teaching our sons about our ex-girlfriends. How many of them there have been. What they meant to us. Where it all went wrong, again and again. We turn up at the doors of our ex-girlfriends with our sons in tow, ask if we can come in and state our cases. Our sons sit … Continue reading What We’re Teaching Our Sons #291: Ex-girlfriends & #96: haunted houses →