Blogs

Story and Poem of the Week and Inspiration Point

It’s getting ever closer to winter and our Poem of the Week is a beautiful reminder of the season to come - Thoughts of an Oak Tree’s Spirit by skinner_jennifer. You can read it here: https://www.abctales.com/story/skinnerjennifer/thoughts-oak-trees-spirit Story of the Week is the very powerful and brilliantly written story, Wednesday Club, by celticman. You can read it here: https://www.abctales.com/story/celticman/wednesday-club This week’s...

ABCtales Critiquing Service - good reports!

Over the years many of you have asked for a critiquing service and it has taken a long time to find (a) someone good enough to do it well and (b) someone who will charge what we regard as a reasonable fee. Finally, we've done it! Lorraine Mace is a freelance writer, columnist and tutor for the Writers Bureau. Winner of the Petra Kenney International Poetry Competition (comic verse category), Lorraine's fiction, features and humour have appeared...

ALCS UK

I'm sure if you have any writing in print, you will have already have done this. However, if not, Joining ALCS UK ensures you receive payment if any of your work has been photocopied/reproduced for use in schools/colleges/work seminars etc. I got a significant payment this year. Join ALCS, it is worth it. As you can see from the image, it comes at what - for me - is the worst month every year, March (no, idea why). Oh, and join PLR too, which...

Happiness is a warm keyboard=I live to and love to write

Writers have a need to understand words, to gather them like flowers in a literary garden of colorful, pungent, blooming, budding words. They carefully pick them to tell a story, structure a tale, by placing those words in a way that brings the reader in. Characters light up with specific details and become dimensional. Some writers tell you that characters, once fully formed, can take on a life of their own. When you know your character, you'll...

Frank Warren (2005) PostSecret.

PostSecret is a collection of anonymous postcards people sent to Frank Warren, who in 2004 printed 3000 postcards with his address on them, inviting strangers to fill them in and tell him their secrets. The response was so great, he didn’t have to print any more postcards. People sent their own, in various languages, including Braille. ‘Like fingerprints, no two secrets are identical.’ Reading is a kind of voyeurism. We always want to know more...

Story and Poem of the Week and Inspiration Point

Posted by airyfairy. Thank you to all our writers, as ever, for the marvellous work on the site this week. Our Story of the Week is a thank you to someone who has been at the very heart of ABC Tales. Jean D has been generous enough to share her journey through cancer with us, with her customary wit, warmth and talent. All of these things are in evidence in what, sadly, she has told us will be her final posting here. We shall miss you, Jean. The...

Sebastian Barry (2009) The Secret Scripture.

Sebastian Barry (2009) The Secret Scripture. You should never step into the book you’ve read before (or something like that). Sebastian Barry is a terrific writer. This book won the Costa Book of the Year 2008. The Secret Scripture is in many ways the story of Ireland after the Famine, with a centurion Roseanne McNulty providing the handwritten shape of her life played out against the Civil War years in Ireland and the world wars that also came...

Descending the Mountain (2021) Directed by Maartje Nevejan

https://descendingthemountain.org/ Descending the Mountain is monks on acid. I’ve never taken acid or magic mushrooms and I’m pretty old, so unlikely to do so now. But I’m not as old as Vanja Palmers, a Zen monk and the central character in the experiment. Palmers took acid in the swinging sixties. He found himself as an incarnation of the Buddha presence in the same way I’d missed the last bus home. It enlarged him. But he stopped taking drugs...

I'm A Woman by Mary-Ann Storm - Available now!

I'm very happy to announce that I'm a Woman by Mary-Ann Storm who writes on ABCTales as Mary-Ann is available now on Amazon Very apt for International Women's Day! Link to buy (Amazon): https://tinyurl.com/2d5pvd7y

World Book Day 07.03.24 *My talk at Drogheda Grammar School, Ireland

I was nervous, I'll be honest. I was standing in the gym to give a talk to two groups - 5th year & TY years - about not only how important books are today (perhaps even more so now), but also my journey as a writer and my processes. But I had nothing to worry about; after my spiel as to how I became a writer, a very lively Q&A from the students kept me on my toes. And I found their enthusiasm infectious. I was also very honest with them...

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