Events...

NEW BURSARY 

 The West Country Writers' Association is looking for aspiring authors to apply for its annual West Country Writers' Bursary. The bursary pays for an individual to attend the annual congress, including accommodation for two nights, all meals, which include the annual luncheon, and entry to the AGM and all talks by well-known writers, or others associated with publishing. 

In order to apply for the bursary, simply write a letter outlining your literary achievements so far, your hopes for future success, and a brief explanation of why you would like to attend the congress. This must be sent to the Public Relations Officer Becky Kodritsch, Henshears Farm, Roborough Down, Plymouth PL6 7BH.    
  
 

SHORT STORY COMPETITION 2012

Entries are invited for the annual Short Story Competition of the West Country Writers’ Association.
The competition is open to any author or aspiring author who has had no more than two short stories professionally published, or read on mainstream radio.
The winner will receive £50 in cash and be invited to spend a day at the association's next annual congress, being held in Bath, North Somerset on April 20th-22nd 2012. The winning entry will be published on the WCWA website.
Entries can be on any subject or theme but must include the words JANE AUSTEN at least once. The entry fee is £5 per story.
Entries must not exceed 1200 words, must be in English and be the writer's own unpublished work. They must not be on offer for publication or entered in any other current competition. Each piece of work with its title must be in clear type, double line spaced, on one side of A4 sheet(s) and details of the author must NOT appear on any part of the actual story.
Contestants may enter as many stories as they wish, but each must be accompanied by a separate entry form and the required entry fee.
The closing date for entries is Monday 12th December 2011.
Entries can only be posted to Diney Costeloe, Glebe House, Shipham, Winscombe, Somerset, BS25 1TW. Cheques should be made payable to WCWA. Please keep a copy of your work as entries will only be returned with a SAE.
Entry forms can be downloaded from the West Country Writers’ website www.westcountrywriters.com or by sending a stamped addressed envelope to Fiona McAughey, Trevean, Yeolmbridge, Launceston, PL15 8NJ.
Regrettably, the judges are unable to supply criticism of any entry, and no correspondence can be entered into concerning the result. All entries that arrive on time will be considered by the panel of adjudicators, whose decision is final.

Download the 2012 Entry From by clicking here.

 

2011 SHORT STORY COMPETITION WINNER

Congratulations to this year's winner — Clive Toomer. His short story 'Understanding' is reproduced below:
 

UNDERSTANDING
 

Mitchell lay watching the daylight as it leaked slowly across the bedroom ceiling. He checked his clock again.

05.38. That meant he had just under two hours to decide. Would he go to work today, or would he call the office, talk vaguely about ‘flu or some sort of stomach upset and stay at home? His sickness absences had been infrequent and he knew he would be believed. A few words of insincere sympathy and that would be that.
On the other hand, he hated the idea of deception and of the spinelessness that it implied. He ought to go to work. But if he did, he would inevitably come across Patterson – Jim to everyone in the office except Mitchell, who detested familiarity.
And then he would kill him.
Mitchell saw nothing melodramatic about this. He simply accepted, soberly, that it was now inevitable. Ever since Patterson had arrived in the office he had been insufferable. He was everything Mitchell despised: a chatterer who didn’t care what he talked about, a man who insisted on taking an interest in other people’s affairs, a man who wouldn’t take a hint or even a direct no for an answer. The others all liked him, which made him worse; Mitchell had tried to show that he did not share the general affection the others showed him, but the man simply could not – no, would not – understand. Mitchell had declined to laugh at his jokes, go with him and the rest to the pub at lunchtime, or respond to his elephantine efforts to be friendly. All useless. The attempts to include him in the social life of the office had continued, even though he’d tried to show he loathed the very idea.

07.15. Decision time. There was, in fact, no choice. Patterson was....incorrigible. Yes, he liked that word. He had tried in every way to get him to understand, but now there was only one way to make him realise, beyond all possibility even of wilful blindness to the obvious, just how objectionable he really was.
Methodically, he went through the tedious rituals of getting up. Lavatory, shower, shave, breakfast, lunch box....
He picked up his kitchen knife. A Sabatier, of course. “Always buy the best you can afford” his mother used to say – one of so many instructions he had heard so often and never thought to challenge – and it was solid and balanced in his hand. He knew it was sharp. A small nod of approval, and he put it into the top of his lunchbox and fastened the lid.

---
Mitchell was not a man with the empathy to detect what people called an “atmosphere”, but it was obvious even to him, within moments of his arrival, that something was odd. People were bunched together, talking quietly. Some of them were from the other departments down the corridor and one or two of the younger women were crying. It was not in his nature to ask what had happened, but there was no need. Johnson, who had the desk next to him, arrived and was immediately drawn into the nearest group.

“it’s Jim – Jim Patterson. Heart attack. He was walking on Dartmoor over the weekend, keeled over and by the time the Air Ambulance got there he was dead...” Mitchell felt as if a great weight had suddenly been laid on his shoulders – he could actually feel himself slump as if from the impact. He sat down heavily on his chair. He couldn’t be dead, not after all he’d put him through all these months! Not after all that debate with himself about how he could make him understand what he’d done! And now it was too late – he was gone and he’d never understand, never be made to understand....“Mitch?”

Jenny from Accounts. Plump, motherly Jenny, with her workstation cluttered with postcards, photos of cats and nephews and nieces, and a small teddy bear. Jenny, who everybody else on the corridor went to for an aspirin, a plaster, or things the girls whispered about which were handed over surreptitiously. She wasn’t in his department, he didn’t even know her surname, how did she know him? And Mitch?
But there she was, looking anxiously at him.
“I know, love, it’s a shock to us all but it must be worse for you, working with him in the same department. Were you very close? Don’t you move – I’ll get you some tea...” and she was gone.
Mitchell tried to speak, but couldn’t. He sat, silent and appalled, as the groups began to break up and drift away. Jenny re-appeared with the tea – hot, strong and sweet. He hated sweet tea, but he drank it abstractedly and Jenny didn’t seem upset at his lack of thanks. Indeed, she kept coming into the department during the day on different pretexts, each time giving him a smile and a word or two of sympathy, and wasn’t discouraged by his failure to respond. As for Mitchell, he gave the appearance of working, but he couldn’t concentrate. All he could think of was Patterson. All he had been thinking of, for so long, was Patterson; and now he felt, quite simply, bereft.
By the time he got home that evening his mood had begun to change. He began to think, not so much of Patterson, but of the things which had happened that day and, above all, of Jenny. How did she know his name? Who told her she could call him “Mitch”? Why should she think he’d accept the shortening of his name, which he’d loathed since he was a child? He emptied his lunchbox onto the kitchen table, and took the untouched food over to the refrigerator. Then, as he closed the door, there snapped, instantly, into focus what had been at the back of his mind ever since that morning. She had been so solicitous because she thought Patterson had been his friend! She thought he’d reacted as he had from grief, not because...because...
Why hadn’t it been obvious? If she knew his name, why hadn’t she seen how he really felt about Patterson? Why had she treated him just as Patterson would have done – silly names, sweet tea and unwanted sympathy? Didn’t she understand?

No. Evidently not.
But she could be made to.
Calmly, he walked back to the table and put the Sabatier back in his lunchbox, ready for the morning.