Published

I mentioned in a 2014 recap post that I had a short story accepted for publication by a literary magazine. Having been asked by everyone around me, “Are you proud? Because you should be.” I thought that I should let myself really be proud and give it a short post to itself. Preemptive apologies for this festival of self-love.

Sitting around with housemates one night last year we began to talk about how everyone seems to have a person, a stranger, who they’ve seen more than once. Perhaps you have one of these people who you’ve walked past a couple of times before? Who makes you double-glance wondering where you’ve seen that face before only to realise that the last time you saw this stranger was in the cleaning aisle of the supermarket or the outdoor area of a pub or the backrooms of a brothel. Wherever.

Well, I came up with the idea that it would be ‘funny’ to create one of these people for yourself by simply following someone. Learning their movements. Becoming their stranger-but-not-quite.

And then I wrote a story about that idea. Which, wasn’t very funny at all.

And thanks to Voiceworks magazine, this story is now open for public consumption. It would warm the heart of both me and the literary industry if you got yourself a copy and had a read. If you’re the kind of grown up who has some spare money I give you permission to not feel guilty about spending it on writers.

If you are an angel who has read it or will read it, let me know what you think. So long as your words are compliments not critiques. I can’t hack criticism. Oy vey, this industry is going to kill me isn’t it?

Link to magazine.

I’d also love to see if any other writers out there have some recent writing successes they’d like to share – comment below if so!