How to win 100,000 dollars for short fiction

1. Write some great stories 

2. Get them published

3. You then have to win the Sami Rohr prize

If steps one and two did not defeat you, then go for it – but you will need to have chosen your mother carefully. Click on the prize link to see why. Congrats to Sana Karasikov who is this year’s winner with her debut short story collection One More Year. And thanks to Tania Hershman who told me about this.

What nationality is punk?

I’ve been thinking how much longer things used to take to spread from one country to another. By the time I heard of punk I expect it had pretty much crashed and burned in London but it was still reverberating in other places. My story in this Punk Fiction book is set in Germany and the music is from America and Ireland. So when I saw a union jack on the front cover, I was a bit surprised. Seeing it on my blog looks kind of strange, too.

Punk Fiction

Here is the jacket for this Punk Fiction collection that I’ve a story in, which seems to be on its way out some time in the next month or two. It has lots of stories by writers with different viewpoints on the whole punk thing. Author royalties are being donated to the Teenage Cancer Trust. Here’s what Johnny Marr has to say in the introduction: 

All punk was about a story. It was about living the story in your own head. Good or bad, fact or fiction, it didn’t matter, as long as it wasn’t boring. This book brings together stories with the punk spirit in the hope that it might inspire, provoke or simply entertain, as punk did. 

Long fiction

So yeah, I did finish ‘Solo’, in spite of the hefty page count. It’s billed as a hundred years in one life, but this doesn’t quite feel like what you get. Still… What I like about this novel is, it’s not afraid to be a little bit weird, to take an idea and run with it, maybe go a bit over the top here and there. Its anarchic structure means you sort of end up with two books – different yet connected, flipsides of the same tune in different styles.   

Reading Solo

I must admit the sheer size of this book scared me a bit. It’s not that I read short stories for attention deficit reasons — if I get into a good novel I’ll stay up all night to read it. This particular book, though, would take more than one all-night stint to finish. It’s about a man who is a hundred years old, and his attempts to make sense of all the changes (political, cultural, scientific etc) he lives through in his lifetime. The other night at Costa, while waiting for things to kick off at the Pulp Net Short Story Cafe, I asked Rana if he knew the Costa Book of the Year award was recently won by another novel with a 100-year-old narrator. He laughed and said he’d been on a panel at a literary festival the other day, and the guy next to him was Sebastian Barry. That is when they discovered the link between their novels. More on Solo later, if I finish it.

What word rhymes with ‘banker’?

The other morning when I took this photo, the other tube passengers bristled as the flash went off. But once they realised I wasn’t photographing them, they didn’t say anything. (Doubt they would have, anyway…. Northern Line, in the morning? Don’t think so.) Besides the sticker says it all really. Without offending nearly as much as the average free paper that people on the tube were busy reading.

 

 

2009 winner – Willesden Prize

Inspiring night at Costa Coffee for the Short Story Night, with writers Jo Lloyd, Jill Widner, and Margot Taylor. Wise words from Rana Dasgupta who this year replaced Zadie Smith as judge of the Willesden Herald prize and awarded top place to Jo Lloyd (pictured) for her story ‘Work’.

After praising the shortlisted stories Rana offered the advice that: “Short stories don’t have to be small in their scope.” Brains behind the Willesden Herald Stephen Moran arrived on cue with a box of books fresh from the printer. How he published it so fast remains a mystery, but he had a smart-looking anthology ready double-quick, and in the counter-recessionary spirit blowing round people chose not to go out for dinner, and spent on paper instead. Every last book was sold (Rana’s new novel as well as the Willesden Herald anthology). It was fun to meet the writers, all of whom came a long way to read. Big thanks to Rosemary Gomez who worked wonders with sound, and Steve who took photos when my camera battery dried up. (Perhaps it’s time to trade in the indestructible Nokia brick for something fragile that doubles as a camera.)

In April the short story night would have fallen Easter Monday, so a break seems highly probable. Check Pulp Net for more info on future events.

Willesden Herald + Rana Dasgupta

are at the next Pulp Net Short Story Cafe – Monday 9 March, Costa Lower Regent Street, Piccadilly, London Town.

Reading from their stories shortlisted for the Willesden Herald Short Story prize are authors Jo Lloyd, Margot Taylor and Jill Widner. The 2009 judge of the international competition, Rana Dasgupta, will announce the winners of the prize. Rana will also give a brief reading from his novel, Solo. It is hoped the anthology will be on sale.  Time Out   Map etc

Insomnia and lit crit

Could not sleep last night. A writer whose work I like sent me a present of a lit crit book maybe a year ago, and about 3am I found it and started reading it. It was about 4, I think, before I stopped. Maybe next time I should try maths — could work faster, on the sleep-inducing front.

Mini-recording

Recorded a scrap from a story the other day. All very mysterious as it won’t be out for a while, but it was fun. Will post a link when I get one… Had to read quite slowly. Took this pic on the way home…