Sophie Kinsella (Oundle Festival of Literature)

Bestselling author of the Shopaholic series Sophie Kinsella will be in conversation with Alli Collier about her latest novel Twenties Girl.

Lara has always had an overactive imagination but now she wonders if she is losing her mind. Normal twenty-something girls just don’t get visited by ghosts! But inexplicably, the spirit of Lara’s great aunt Sadie – in the form of a bold, demanding Charleston-dancing girl – has appeared to make one last request: Lara must track down a missing necklace Sadie simply can’t rest without. Lara’s got enough problems of her own. Her start-up company is floundering, her best friend and business partner has run off to Goa, and she’s just been dumped by the love of her life. But as Lara spends time with Sadie, life becomes more glamorous and their treasure hunt turns into something intriguing and romantic. Could Sadie’s ghost be the answer to Lara’s problems and can two girls from different times end up learning something special from each other?

St. Peter’s Church, Oundle

Tickets: £6 (£5) are available from Oundle Tourist Information Centre (Tel: 01832 274333).

WIC 2010 offers 1-2-1 agent and editor meetings

Writing Industries Conference 2010
Saturday 6th March 2010, Loughborough University
A Literature Network, Writing East Midlands
and Loughborough University project.
http://writingindustries.com
Twitter #wic2010

Book tickets online here.

WIC 2010 – APPLY NOW FOR AGENT AND EDITOR 1-2-1 MEETINGS
The Writing Industries Conference 2010 is now open to applications for 1-2-1 meetings with agents and editors. Writers will have the chance to present their work in fiction, creative non-fiction and spoken word. A limited number of 1-2-1s are available and only ticket holders to WIC 2010 may apply.
1-2-1 meetings are available with:

• Lorella Belli, Lorella Belli Literary Agency http://www.lorellabelliagency.com/
• Ollie Munson, Blake Friedmann, Literary TV and Film Agency http://www.blakefriedmann.co.uk/
• Alan Mahar, Tindal Street Press http://www.tindalstreet.co.uk/
• Sarah Ellis, Apples and Snakes http://www.applesandsnakes.org/
• James Wills, Watson, Little Ltd http://www.watsonlittle.com/
• John Berlyne, Zeno Agency Ltd http://www.zenoagency.com/
• Jane Finigan, Lutyens & Rubinstein Literary Agency http://www.lutyensrubinstein.co.uk

For guidelines and details on how to apply please see: http://writingindustries.com/1-2-1-guidelines/

WIC 2010 will bring together writers from across the East Midlands and professionals from the writing industries to share knowledge, develop skills and forge new contacts. 200 writers from the region will have the opportunity to hear from and meet with professionals from the writing industries in a variety of settings:

• Agents and editors in one-to-one sessions with selected writers, giving advice and support in their area of expertise.

• Panel discussions exploring specific areas of writing, from breaking into commercial publishing to working in the community.

• Writing industries fair featuring stalls from local publishers, funders and other organisations involved with the writing industries.

• And of course there will be plenty of opportunity to meet and talk with other writers over a coffee.

Details of the full programme will be announced soon.

Book tickets online here.

If you have any questions regarding WIC 2010 or would like further information please contact:

Alyson Stoneman
WIC2010 co-ordinator (part-time)
Email: wic2010eastmidlands@googlemail.com

EMIT December 2009 – The Writing Industries

Connecting the literature community
A Literature Network publication
http://literaturenetwork.org

Tickets for the second Writing Industries Conference went on sale last week, and despite quickly selling out of early bird tickets there are still places available. Expect details on how to apply for agent and editor 1-2-1 meetings very soon. This month sees the publication of a new poetry collection from Michael Tolkien, and a review of Kieth Large’s fantastic play The Carrot Nappers. For all this and more, read on!

Damien Walter
Literature Network Coordinator

ARTICLES and NEWS

Writing Industries Conference 2010
The second Writing Industries Conference will be held on Saturday 6th March at Loughborough University. The conference will bring together writers from across the East Midlands with professionals from the writing industries to share knowledge, develop skills and forge new contacts. Read more

• New collection from Michael Tolkien
• Creative Showcase – Aly Stoneman
• The Kidnapped Carrots of Cambridge

Read more article and news

BLOGGERS

The Six Perils of Writing Workshops
Imagine if driving was taught by something like writing workshops. Each session, a group of learners would watch a colleague try a manoeuvre. Afterwards they would take turns to say what they felt went right and what went wrong, with occasional input from an instructor. It would be chaos, and not in a good way.

The rise and rise of creative writing courses
Ross Bradshaw asks if creative writing courses give their students an advantage in becoming published. The excellent Tindal Street Press from Birmingham is a well known publisher of fiction from Birmingham, whose modest output has a singularly strong record in being shortlisted or winning various literary prizes. They have just published Roads Ahead, short stories by 22 newish voices, some from the West Midlands, some from further afield.

Read more blogs

EVENTS

Short Fuse presents Flash Fiction Slam

The Unmissably Christmassy Flash Fiction Slam / Friday December 11th. Nerdy Gameshow Host /Sequin-Clad Assistant /Show Jingles /Venerable Judge /Rhinestones /Harshly Accurate Stopwatch /Applause-O-Meter…who will be Crowned 2009’s Flash Fiction King or Queen??? Win £££s! Top Prize £100, 2nd Prize £75, 3rd Prize £50 and Runners-Up Goodies to Include Fancy Undies + Top Notch Show Tickets!!! Read more

• Publish NG at the Kioskiosk
• Hilary Spiers First Book Launch
• Flying Goose Readings

Find more events near you.

OPPORTUNITIES

Blogger Alert!
Are you a blogger living in the East Midlands? Do you write about books, reading, literature, spoken or written word arts? Or are you a creative writer publicising your work through a blog? If so LiteratureNetwork.org would like to hear from you. From early 2010 the Literature Network will be publicising writer bloggers around the region. If you would like to be included send a link to your blog to the email address below: damien@charnwood-arts.org.uk

• Writing Sci-Fi Short Fiction
• Roll over Burroughs + Bukowski

Many more opportunities for writers.

*****

You are receiving this mail as a subscriber to the EMIT newsletter, a publication of the Literature Network.

To UNSUBSCRIBE please send an email with Unsubscribe in the title to: emit@literaturenetwork.org

Blogger Alert!

Are you a blogger living in the East Midlands? Do you write about books, reading, literature, spoken or written word arts? Or are you a creative writer publicising your work through a blog? If so LiteratureNetwork.org would like to hear from you. From early 2010 the Literature Network will be publicising writer bloggers around the region. If you would like to be included send a link to your blog to the email address below:

damien@charnwood-arts.org.uk

Creative Showcase – Aly Stoneman

Aly Stoneman is a writer living in Nottingham. She graduated from Nottingham Trent University with an MA in Creative Writing in 2008 and is now the Coordinator of Nottingham Writers’ Studio and the Writing Industries Conference. She performs poetry with a guitarist called Milk. In 2009 they played at a variety of events and venues including: SpeakEasy and Oxjam (Nottingham), Dazed and Confused at Summer Sundae Festival (Leicester), Canning Circus Extravaganza with LeftLion Magazine (Nottingham), Word of Mouth (Nottingham Writers’ Studio), Staple Magazine at Quad (Derby), Hello Hubmarine (Derby), Lyric Lounge (Leicester), Nottingham Artists Open Studio (The Refectory, Nottingham) and more….

Besides writing and performing poetry, Aly also reviews for LeftLion Magazine (Write Lion), works as a Learning Support Tutor and is a Freelance Arts Administrator (Literature). She is currently working on her first novel, A Beginners’ Guide to Running Away and two collections of poems. Her poetry is themed around environmental issues, myth and the relationship between water and humans – both physical and spiritual. Her novel-in-progress is an English road-trip story and tackles the logistics of hitch-hiking to a wedding (among other things). Her poetry is due to be published in Staple Magazine Issue 72 (The Music Issue 2009), other writing has been featured in Leap Anthology (Laundrette Books 2008), various magazines and an artists’ catalogue and website.

Dust
Inspired by travelling in Eastern Europe at the end of the conflict there in 1999, this poem relates to any area which has been through a war, and the people who have survived and returned.

By winter they had gone leaving only their shadows We stood where the dust settled watching rainbows and falling stars….listen to more

Mermaids
Many of the coastal villages we frequent in the summer are empty during winter, consisting mostly of holiday cottages. What creatures might we encounter that have been pushed to the verge of extinction by humans, and now return when people have gone….?

Tits wrinkled and slack, hair dripping lank / Pinched faces with eyes glittering black/ They hesitated , sighed, fell back……listen to more

A Beginners’ Guide to Running Away
Motorway Services are no place to be at three in the morning. A light mist was swirling around the car park and sodium lights created islands of fuzzy amber glow in the darkness. I opened the car door and Stick immediately scrambled over my lap to get out of the car. I climbed out after her and Cash pulled our bags off the back seat. Read more online.

Publish NG at the KiosKiosk

What: KiosKiosk Nottingham December 8-10th

Where: KioskKiosk, Pelham Street, Nottingham

When: Tuesday, December 08, 2009 at 10:00:00 AM

KiosKiosk Nottingham December 8-10th 2009
KiosKiosk is a fast brain food stall invented by top fashion designer Wayne Hemmingway. It’s located on the Pelham Street-Thurland Street junction in Nottingham City centre, just up the road from Slab Square.

Several Nottingham publishers and Nottingham Writers’ Studio have joined forces to bring together a selection of their recent publications, which will be on sale December 8-10th. Each publisher will be in attendance at the times listed below and their books will be on sale for the entire three day event.

Tuesday 8th December:
AM – Nottingham Writers Studio – Support and networking for published and aspiring local writers.
www.nottinghamwritersstudio.co.uk 49 Stoney Street, The Lace Market Nottingham.
- Meet coordinator Aly Stoneman. Published members of the Studio will be visiting during the morning.

PM – Weathervane Press – Nottingham based regional fiction publisher.
www.weathervanepress.co.uk
Meet the publisher Ian Collinson from 1pm.
- Recently published local authors Marty Ross (Aztec Love Song) and Steven Wilcoxson
(Make Less Strangers) will be available from 2pm to discuss their work and sign copies of
their books.

Wednesday 9th December.
AM – Candlestick Press – Publisher of the unique and hugely popular ‘Instead of Card’
poetry pamphlets.
www.candlestickpress.co.uk
-Meet the publisher Jenny Swann and stock up on Poet Laureate Carol Ann Duffy’s selection
‘The Twelve Poems of Christmas.’

PM – Left Lion Literary Confessional. Absolve yourself with Left Lion.
www.leftlion.co.uk

Thursday 10th December
AM – Staple Magazine – Literature and Arts magazine produced in Nottingham, now
receiving national acclaim.
www.staplemagazine.bigcartel.com
Meet the Editor Wayne Burrows.
-The current ‘Art Issue’ and back numbers of the magazine will be on sale.

PM – Pewter Rose Press-Nottingham based fiction publisher specialising in short stories.
www.pewter-rose-press.com
Meet the publisher Anne McDonnell from 1pm
Authors – Frances Thimann (Cello and other stories) and Roberta Dewa (Holding Stones) will
be available during the afternoon to discuss their work and sign copies of their books.

Publish NG is a group of independent Nottingham publishers
c/o Parker and Collinson Ltd, 42 Church St, Lenton, Nottingham NG7 2FH
Telephone 0115 9420140

New Collection from Michael Tolkien

A new poetry collection from Michael Tolkien has recently been published by Poetry Salzburg. For full details see the publishers website:

http://www.poetrysalzburg.com/

The first three parts of No Time for Roses explore various kinds of illusion in our formative experience and in our emotional, artistic and spiritual lives. The final part celebrates the power of love and mature perspectives over negative influences such as the loss of circumstances, objects and people we are attached to.

“[...] his poetry is fluent, crafted, easy on the eye and mind [...] it has a wide range of subjects and is anchored in a believable reality presented in detail which is allowed to speak for itself [...] his stance avoids sentimentality with a detachment which is not indifference [...]”

Eddie Wainwright, Envoi 144
“When moving away from the personal [...] his poems combine immediacy of description with dense but unobtrusive abstract thought [...] some of his nature poems leave the reader almost breathless with a sense of the transcendent [...]”

Julian Bell, Ambit 182

A Dickensian Silent Christmas

An illustrated Lecture with screenwriter Michael Eaton
Sat 12 Dec 1pm
www.phoenix.org.uk

Dickens and Christmas go together like a slice of plum pudding and a foaming glass of negus (whatever that is!). Michael Eaton, compiler of Dickens Before Sound, presents a seasonal selection of silent delights based upon the works of The Inimitable. This yuletide programme contains not only the earliest extant cinematic version of A Christmas Carol, made in 1901 and entitled Scrooge, Or Marley’s Ghost, but an even older animated Magic Lantern treat: Gabriel Grub, Or The Goblins Who Stole A Sexton. There will also be a rare chance to see D.W. Griffith’s only Dickensian adaptation, The Cricket On The Hearth from 1909. And no Christmas would be complete without a benevolent visit from Mister Pickwick.

Shonaleigh New Show

SHONALEIGH
with her new show, specially commissioned by Flying Donkeys,
FROST & FIRE

On a frosty night a lonely soul looks for a fireside by which to sit and spin out the long cold night with… stories from the dead of winter. Shonaleigh makes the cold crack open the fire in our hearts with this sparkling Christmas box of delights.

Wednesday 9th December
7.30pm
The Voice Box
Forman Street
Derby
DE1 1JQ

Tickets £6 / £4
Refreshments on sale

Car parking on Abbey Street
FULL DISABLED ACCESS

www.shonaleigh.co.uk or click on the link from our own website

We look forward to seeing you on the night: tickets are already being reserved, so do contact us. Shonaleigh is a fabulous storyteller; if you have friends who’ve never been to a storytelling before, tonight’s the night for the Christmas treat!

And finally, please note that in December, there is no Story Circle (fourth Wednesday in December this year being on Boxing Day)! Our Spring season opens again on January 13th at The Voice Box.

With very best wishes for a lovely Christmas and happy New Year,
seasonal greetings from Flying Donkeys…
Annie, Helen, John, Mel, Ray, Roy, Sophie…

you can contact us on
flyingdonkeysderbystorytelling@live.co.uk
roy@flyingdonkeys.co.uk
01773 781007 or 0795 875 7008

www.flyingdonkeys.co.uk
Look out for our new web design, and blogspot…

Youth Base Officer Wanted

2Funky Arts is a Leicester based organisation, committed to the creative learning and development of children, young people and artists. Our new Base is a centre for career, creativity and artistic development, inspired by music and youth culture. It has been funded by Big Lottery’s Young People’s Fund 2.

Plans for 2010 include young people’s projects in DJing, MCing, poetry, music production and vocal training. Alongside this will be a variety of high profile masterclasses with artists such as DJSS, 1Xtra’s G Child and producer Baby J.

Youth Base Officer
15 hours a week @ £7,000 per annum (1.5 years fixed term contract)

We are looking for a Youth Base Officer, with a passion for youth arts, to assist the Base Manager and deputise when required. You will need at least two year’s experience of working with young people and very strong communication skills.

Responsibilities include:
- Supervising artists, youth workers, young people and volunteers.
- Helping to run youth arts projects.
- Community promotion.

A recognised youth work qualification is desirable but not essential. Some evening and weekend work will be required.

This post will be offered subject to satisfactory references and CRB processing. The successful candidate will be subject to a three-month probationary period. To apply, please provide a CV and brief cover letter (outlining any relevant experience / your reasons for applying), to Vijay Mistry on info@2funkyarts.co.uk / 0116 222 0639/ 62 Belgrave Gate, Leicester, LE1 3GQ. Deadline: 5pm on Tuesday 22nd December (interviews to be held in January).

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