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Writers Wasteland….I am there. This week has been fraught with never ending obligations. Work and home have monopolized my life to the point of stagnant. I have no thoughts to work with and no energy to give to my writing. I know there are weeks like this in every life and so I am not surprised by it…just frustrated. These are the days I wish I could sit upon white sand beaches or gaze up at snow capped mountains from a reclusive log cabin....

It's been a particularly fantastic week for prose this week - really exceptional quality, and I could have chosen any one of about ten pieces, but Crepuscular by RJF has stuck in my head and I don't even like horror much, so it must be good! Our Poem of the Week is Menarche which is an exceptional piece from love_writing who's going from strength to strength. Congratulations to both! http://www.abctales.com/story/lovewriting/menarche http://www...

It takes a certain sort of courage to say that you are wrong. Robert D Putnam thought all the hoo-ha of kids not being able to grow up and get on – the essence of the American dream, work hard, play hard and you’ll get your just rewards – was belly aching from those that had failed to thrive. In any society there are winners and losers. He was a winner. He didn’t come from a rich family, and through hard work became Malkin Professor of Public...

Tree Me I am a tree today More willow than oak I breathe with the flow Air in my hair - I pray For the fluster to calm Each quiver leaf - stilled Each bowing branch filled With soothing balm I am a willow, till tomorrow Laced with grace Will not break Will overcome all sorrow I am a tree bearing wind and rain Till they cut me back Burn me black Then I'll be ever free from pain

This book left me cold. I read an extract of the story of these sisters in The Observer a while back, one living and the other dead. I was intrigued. I know what I’m supposed to feel. What I’m supposed to say. But it feels a bit like someone leaning over the garden fence and saying yada, yada, yada and I’m saying yeh, yeh, yeh. That’s true. You’re right. I wish I’d thought of that. In the first act of J.B.Priestley’s An Inspector Calls stasis is...

As quite a few of you know going by the number of reads she gets, Bee has been writing a series of poetry and prose charting her journey since her cancer diagnosis. These are very special pieces, so we've decided to give her a little corner on the front page for them and we will also be featuring them on Facebook and Twitter along with our regular Picks of the Day. You should be seeing the first of these shortly so do watch out for them - and...

This week has been crammed with poetry and prose delicacies. I’ve been awake at night deliberating over pieces and now see how difficult it is for Scratch and Insert to whittle down the picks from such top-drawer work. Without further ado and an imaginary drum roll... Our poem of the week is Elliot C Mason’s ‘Song for Lost Olivia’, chosen for capturing the heartache of loss in such a colourful, celebratory style. http://www.abctales.com/story/...

Time is non existent as I create this new world. I don’t even feel fatigue as the clock ticks off the early morning hours. I don’t know if anything I write is good - I only know that I am seeing the characters and writing their dialogue, and loving the flow of words. I see the story unfold on the screen. I am alive and sooooo awake. It is as if time does not exist, It is 9pm…12pm…and into the wee hours in what seems like only seconds whenever I...

I have to admit that my expectations of ' The Robert Peston Interview Show (with Eddie Mair) Radio 4, Mondays 11pm weren't high. The trailer for the programme involved the presenters acting out the sort of matey 'banter' that always sounds false, the basic premise, Peston and Mair take turns to choose who will be interviewed meaning that one has prepared for what is to come and the other is, allegedly, coming to it cold seemed pretty hokey too...

This week I have mostly been reading dystopian fiction; more specifically The Day of the Triffids by John Wyndham and The Death of Grass by John Christopher. I read both novels about thirty years ago, when I was in my mid-teens, and seem to recall that I had borrowed The Death of Grass from the library purely because I liked the title. If my fifteen year old self was reviewing the books, this post would be very different, as my opinion has...