St Andrews is a small place that for any of its ex students holds a hoard of memories, all of them inextricably linked to the time as well as the place. I remember going back a few years after my graduation and feeling mostly a sense of loss. People I knew had left, their places … Continue reading St Andrews, its place in time
Amongst the many delights of signing with Linen Press has been the unexpected joy of having an editor. I’ve been in more than one writing critique group and learned lots from writing workshops, so I consider myself quite a good self-editor, but having lived with Blink for several years and in multiple versions, I hadn’t … Continue reading The Joy of Being Edited – and a festival in St Andrews
I’ve just been reading William Boyd’s Sweet Caress which I picked up when I spotted its photography connections. It’s about a girl growing up in the twenties who, after a family trauma, joins her uncle as a society photographer in London then unshackles herself from an unhealthy relationship to reinvent herself several times over and … Continue reading Photography in fiction (1): Other people’s photos
Sometimes something just feels right. Having toiled for what has seemed like aeons over my fictional version of the Hill and Adamson partnership, I looked at what I had a few weeks ago and realised it was finished – maybe not totally ready for publication, but the beginning and end felt right and the middle … Continue reading Signed with Linen Press – In the Blink of an Eye
Having seen my historical short story Silver Harvest shortlisted several times without ever making the winners’ enclosure, I was beginning to suspect that even if competitions were ‘welcoming’ all genres, there was a reluctance to give the overall prize to a historical piece. I’m happy to say my suspicions have been allayed , since on Friday … Continue reading A win for historical fiction – and me!
Ali Bacon, Author 