A short interlude from the existential identity discussions - and back to short stories! I have just posted/published/made my eyes screwy to upload April 2009 Issue of The Short Review. Here is a little about what we have this month:

In Memoriam: The Short Review is deeply saddened by the death of J G Ballard, the author of 22 short story collections and 19 novels. For a taste of Ballardian wonders, read our review of the The Complete Short Stories.





Congratulations! To Elizabeth Strout, winner of this year's Pullitzer Prize for Fiction for Olive Kittredge, a collection of interlinked short stories.

We bring you reviews of ten more this month, from Babylon to big worlds, creatures of the earth, eclipses and unlucky lucky days which are nothing like an ocean, to last night, where our story begins, with a little Javanese and some gay romance....

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I've found a new thing - yes me, the technophobe...and I've spent three hours tonight trying to work out how to export from one format to MP3 but I did it! So, for your delectation, here I am reading a couple of poems! ta ra...


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I always wanted to do English, but a small voice said it might not lead to a job - it was the voice of the school careers adviser. He told me you had to do a BSc to have any chance of employment. So I took psychology and it did lead to a job – I ended up as a Chartered Psychologist. Since turning my mind to writing stories, I’ve also come to believe that psychology is a great training for a writer.

Over the last twenty years I’ve assessed the abilities and personality of hundreds of business leaders and coached a good few of them including, topically, the chief executive of a bank. That gives you the chance to ask the questions that most people don’t get to ask. I’ve also done “job analysis” studies ranging from foreign exchange dealers to bus drivers. Ostensibly these were to help design selection methods, but as a by-product you get to spend time with them, watch them work and ask all those questions again. It’s all good raw material. I’ve also used frameworks for human behaviour in my fiction - The Grieving Cycle, for example - to show a character reacting to bad news.

In the limited space here, I’d like to mention one structure I’ve found useful: the enneagram. It’s no substitute for the deep curiosity and insight into humanity we all need as writers, but having a guidebook can help too.


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Not much to report I'm afraid. I've been spending a lot of time writing (the red notebook works) and reading. And signing up to a pretty darned cool local secret project which is rather exciting and different. More on that to come.

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And some cool links (to make up for the boring bit above!).

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Following on from the last post I would like to tell you about the best careers advice I ever received. This was also at school. I don't think it is surprising that it was from a writer.


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Anything else? Oh yeah - the local interest book project is gaining momentum. The two primary local papers have run a couple of articles about it and appealed to the readers for stories and anecdotes for possible inclusion. Apparently, a big story is due out in the Advertiser this weekend and I have another meeting planned for this Thursday about it. I am trying to get some quotes for print but the three printing companies I have had a response from have come back as much too expensive - so if you are reading this, and know someone in the print trade who is fairly local to Croydon, please pass on my contact details ASAP.


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IÕll be taking a two week interlude on my blog as IÕm flying up to Glasgow...

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Well, would you believe I logged on to the interweb to do a post about some of the things people are searching for when they stumble on my blogs, and discovered that Sarah Johnson of Reading the Past has been quicker off the mark! But anyway, here are my own favourites from the last month or so. We begin with the nonsensical...

ancient rhinos in rance

Then there’s the faintly unnerving...

men in high heels
big old ladies getting it on...



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When I was thirteen my father shouted when he found out about my Japanese pen-friend. It wasn’t hard to spot the airmail envelope among the bills, not to mention a small box of carved figures. My parents had shown indifference at letters from France, but poor Akio’s photo was consigned to the back of the door of the outside loo.

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Have you ever thought - I mean really thought – what it must have been like writing, years and years ago? First things first, you wouldn’t have had a computer. Try writing several short stories or a novel in longhand, by candlelight– the ink stains, the strained eyes, the writer’s elbow, bent over a desk, minus a back-friendly, especially designed chair. Even with a typewriter, imagine retyping or crossing out before the dawn of Tippex? Then you’d be faced with sending off your one and only precious copy – or, if the photocopier was invented, stumbling into town and handing your manuscript over, amidst your blushes, explaining to the man who knows everyone in the village that yes, you do fancy yourself as a writer.That’s the great thing about the computer, you see - the anonymity. No one else need know. You can print out your baby, post it and wait for the rejection slip without having told a soul. Previous to that, the best plan for discretion would have been a pseudonym.



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