Arachne Tenth Anniversary Online Festival

To celebrate our tenth anniversary we are having an online festival throughout January 2023, mostly weekends and Thursdays, although a couple of Tuesdays and Fridays have snuck in.

We invited our authors and friends to run the events they wanted to see, to set their own prices and number of tickets. It’s quite an eclectic mix, readings, discussions and workshops for writers, and about writing, or the business of being a writer. We invite you to join us! Visit the Eventbrite Collection

Saturday 07/01/2023 11:00-13:00 Cath Humphris
Why Flash Fiction? (Writing Workshop)
12 places, donation recommended £5
details and tickets

Saturday 07/01/2023 17:00-19:00 Readings from authors
Hiatus eBook Launch
95 places, FREE
details and tickets

 

Sunday 08/01/2023 19:00-21:00 David Turnbull
Longevity In Fiction: Time Bestowed, Time Stolen (discussion)
30 places £6
details and tickets

 

 

Thursday 12/01/2023 19:00-20:30 Jackie Taylor
Writing the Climate: Questions for Writers (discussion)
12 places free/donation
details and tickets

 

 

Friday 13/01/2023 19:30-21:00 Diana Powell, Melissa Davies & Sherry Morris
Three Takes on Place (reading)
95 places free/donation
details and tickets

Saturday 14/01/2023 11:00-13:00 workshop Elizabeth Hopkinson
Tales of Transformation: Bisclavret (workshop)
12 places  £8
details and tickets

 

 

Saturday 14/01/2023 15:00 reading/open mic/discussion Jeremy Dixon & Cherry Potts
Joy//Us LGBTQ Poetry
40 places  free/donation
including 10 open mic spots of 3 mins each – max 2 poems!
details and tickets

 

Sunday 15/01/2023 15:00-16:30 Lowri Williams
Translating poetry from Welsh into English (workshop)
suitable for advanced learners of Welsh and native speakers.
10 places – pay what you can £3/£5/£8
details and tickets

 

 

Tuesday 17/01/2023 19:00-20:30 Kavita A Jindal
Emotion as Ignition (workshop)
20 places £20
details and tickets

 

 

Saturday 21/01/2023 12:00-1:30 Neil Lawrence
Resilient writers (workshop)
10 places £20
details and tickets

 

Saturday 21/01/2023 15:30-17:00 DL Williams, Lisa Kelly, Mary-Jayne Russell de Clifford
Deaf Poetry and BSL translation
20 places Free/Donation
details and tickets

 

 

 

Tuesday  24/01/23 18:00-19:30 The Business of writing– The Society of Authors This is very kindly being run for us by two of the coordinators of the  Society of Authors Poetry & Spoken Word group: Johanna Clarke and Mathilde Zeeman

free tickets

Thursday 26/01/2023 19:00-20:30 Nikita Chadha
The Empire Writes Back: “Space, place and belonging” Interactive lecture/workshop
15 places £10
details and tickets

 

Friday 27/01/2023 18:30-20:00  Seni Seneviratne
Using family history/photos as inspiration for poetry (workshop)
20 places £12-£20
details and tickets

 

 

Sunday 29/01/2023 11:00-13:00 discussion/reading Clare Owen
Cormorants and #cornishgothic: creative ways to write about YA mental health.
15 places £5
details and tickets

 

Sunday 29/01/2023 15:00-16:30 workshop Saira Aspinall
Marketing on a tight budget for writers
12 places £10
details and tickets

 

 

REVIEW of Solstice Shorts Anthology

Those nice people over at Sabotage have reviewed Solstice Shorts: Sixteen Stories about Time

read the review here

They have particularly pleasing things to say about Helen Morris, Robert Shearman, William Davidson, David Mathews, and David Turnbull.

SOLSHORTS HALF SUN TOP

If you enjoy the review and want to try the book for yourself you can buy it direct from our Shop, or if you are in the Bath area, come to our reading at Oldfield Park Bookshop, 43 Moorland Road, Bath, BA2 3PN on 22nd April, at 7.30 where you can listen to stories, buy the book and get it signed by at least three local authors, and have a glass of wine at the same time. more info 01225 427722

 

Time for Man Go Home – A Few Minutes of Your Time Solstice Shorts final Video

Video

So here it is, the last of our videos from the festival,

Ray Newe reads David Turnbull‘s story A Few Minutes of Your Time in which the audience is held spellbound, but only for a few minutes

This story is one of 16 read at the festival and featured in the book Solstice Shorts: Sixteen Stories about Time 

and Shadrack Tye tell us to go home. A fitting end to the online element of the festival. Thanks for watching.

http://youtu.be/kP4BmUIHJd4

Our BSL interpreters wish it to be known that this is not what they consider performance standard signing, they needed a chance to rehearse with the performers for that, but you will be able to follow the story/song.

Our thanks to Royal Observatory Greenwich and West Greenwich Library for hosting.

And the Winners Are…

To celebrate National Short Story Week, the winners of the Solstice Shorts Festival Short Story Competition were announced last night at the Story Sessions

COMPWINNER email

(Trumpets, drum roll, searchlights… you know, that sort of thing)

Congratulations to:

Andrew Gepp
Cindy George
David Mathews
David Turnbull
Deschaney Tate
Emma Timpany
Helen Morris
Jayne Pickering
Pippa Gladhill
Sarah Evans
Tannith Perry
William Davidson

We are delighted to congratulate our twelve winners, who will receive various prizes including a surprisingly untacky trophy, and whose stories will be read at the festival, and published alongside a story from each of the judges in the forthcoming anthology, Solstice Shorts: 16 stories about time.

Five Judges Special Recommendations will be announced at the festival at SUNSET.

Thanks to everyone who took part (all 106 of you), we appreciate your interest in our festival which we hope is the first of many, so there will be other opportunities in the future.

Short-listed writers will receive brief feedback sometime next week.