The date of our next meeting is
Thursday
23 February 2012
7.30 to 10pm
at the Bibendum Wine Bar
Eastbourne
“An Evening with
Robert Longden”
Acclaimed
Writer, Actor, Director, Lyricist and Composer Robert Longden will be
answering questions from the audience about his career at the February meeting. Please send
the question you would like to ask Robert by 15
February to info@neweastbournewriters.co.uk.
This promises to be an exciting evening. Do come along and meet
Robert.
Guests welcome £3.50 on the night.
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To see what we got up to in 2011 click on the
For results on our January 2012 in-house competition
- theme Love -
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The winners of our 2nd National
Short Story Competition are:
FIRST PLACE: Sue Hoffmann with Smoke & Mirrors
- she receives a cheque for £100.
Read Sue's story and bio here
2nd PLACE: Veronica Bright with Rainbow Laughter
- receives £50
Read Veronica's story here
3RD PLACE: David Hill One Breath On The Interstate
– receives £25.
Two
commended are:
Gwenda
Mitchell with Big Dream
and Jeff Jewson-Fleming with The Fine Print.
Congratulations
to all our winners and those commended
and huge thanks to our Judge Vanessa Gebbie
and to everyone who entered the competition
Judge's
comments
"I
have had a great time reading the stories you sent! I whittled them
down to eight, then had quite a job, as they were al so
different.
Finally,
I looked at three things - at the consistency of the voice, at how
much I was convinced by the fiction and the fictive world, and at how
much the story achieved what I felt the writer had set out to do." Vanessa Gebbie
So
– first Smoke and Mirrors. The voice here is steady as a
rock. The writing is clear, spare, the setting is great, the story
amusing, convincing - of its type. A Micky Spillane take-off, it is a
real romp, and great fun. I was carried along by the story
absolutely, and laughed out loud at the end - I very very rarely go
for 'twist in the tail' stories - but here is one that worked in
spades - and the term even contains a pun if you consider one
particular character! The twist is flagged well - it doesn't come out
of the air - and it becomes a take off of twists, in a way. Loved
this one as soon as I read it, and made it work hard to stay at first
place... but it did.
Second
place - Rainbow Laughter. A very different piece, this -
gentle, poignant, an exploration of loneliness and loss, with a real
sense of being an outsider, even in a place one knows well. I thought
the story arc was well done - there is a real change in Arthur, than
main character. I loved the way this writer gave different colours to
laughter at the start of the story - that set the tone well. Nicely
done.
Third
place - One Breath On The Interstate. There is some
wonderful
writing in this story - it is fast-paced, and breathless, and it
echoes the motion of the skid that makes up a large part of the plot.
The reason this didn't come either first or second was that there was
a corner of this reader who didn't believe that in what might be
someone's last moments on earth, their mind would concentrate on an
analysis of what makes America America! But the quality of the
writing was such that it had to be taken very seriously, and it is
certainly thought-provoking.
And
two commended stories -
Big
Dream - a lot packed into a small space here, with a song
triggering memories of a life. I enjoyed the story very much,
but the narrator didn't quite convince.
The
Fine Print- a very creative interpretation of the prompt. Some
very neat writing here, too -but the ending was a little bit of a
let-down. However - this is one that echoes, and again, is
thought-provoking.
