Rosie Edser has been writing short stories for five years, selling to women's magazines and entering competitions. She describes herself as 'addicted to the buzz that comes with seeing work in print'. She would write all day, every day given the chance.

My first sale was ...
To Take A Break ‘The Last Time He’ll Need This’ May 2005, I think.

My family think my writing is …
In danger of taking me over forever.

The best/worst thing about writing short stories for magazines is …
Being able to ‘talk’ about something I feel passionate about in the context of a story.

Long hand first or computer?
Computer, most of the time.

On completing a story I feel…
Emotionally sated.

When I run out of ideas I ....
Do something mundane.

Ideas come to me when…
I do something mundane, or when I look at other people’s lives, eavesdrop on a stranger’s conversation.

My biggest tip for new women’s mag writers would be…
Join a good writing class, read out your work, ask for help!



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I've been on a couple of shortlists lately, but this one is special. SENSE is a charity that campaigns on behalf of deafblind people. In March this year they will host an award ceremony at the Geffrye Museum where Miriam Margolyes will read excerpts from the winning stories.

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‘It all depends on the production’, said the programme seller when I expressed my dismay. Gone was the lovely theatre-in-the-round space created for the performances of Alan Aykbourne’s Norman Conquest trilogy, still in place for ‘Complicit’, starring Richard Dreyfuss. In its place was an awkward three-tiered horseshoe.

A recent TV advert for American Airlines shows the theatre’s artistic director Kevin Spacey in what I assumed was a pre-conversion Old Vic. Cooing about how he appreciated good service his onscreen persona transferred from the dress circle to his seat in AA business class (Currently to be see in the new George Clooney ‘comedy’ ‘Up in the Air, in case you didn’t catch Spacey) I wish I could say the same about my own experience at last Thursday’s matinee for ‘Six Degrees of Separation’.


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Why do some novels make we want to write?
It’s certainly not a feeling that I could do better. That couldn’t be further from the truth. But this inspiration doesn’t happen with everything I read. I’ve noticed lately that while I may have enjoyed two books equally, one of them will make me itch to pick up a pen or reach for my keyboard, and the other I’ll enjoy simply as a reader.


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Which 3 writers, living or dead, would you invite to dinner?
Noel Streatfield. All-time heroine, and apparently the first children's writer to make book tours into an event and be really glamorous. I'd love to ask her about that. JK Rowling. For all the obvious reasons. And to talk about how she's getting on with changing the lives of children in Eastern Europe. Petrarch. I once got to hold his Rime in the Vatican Library (long story), with his own writing and rubbing out! Was overwhelmed by a sense of kleptomania, held in check only by the Swiss Guard at the door. I'd love to talk to him about how great the South of France is. And poetry. If I could have a fourth, it would be Caitlin Moran. I've admired her since she was a teenager and I've just discovered her on Twitter. And can I have Meg Cabot too? Please?And Aaron Sorkin, so I can fall at his feet about how good the West Wing was? Plus Petrarch will need another bloke to talk to. The writer who's given me the most pleasure over the years is PG Wodehouse, but I feel as if I know him so well already, so I'm happy with six.


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Thinking about fairies, my mind springs into a land of lilac and green. My whole bedroom is painted lilac (I was given the paint) and I stuck luminous stars on the ceiling with a crescent moon (was given them too) to bring a little magic into my life. The light shade is pale blue, an upside down cotton, four-sided pyramid with a tassel dangling about breast-height (this was another gift). If I could just get up off my arse and accessorise it would be little-people heaven, with crystals and all sorts of witchy bobbles. Actually, the ceiling is the only part of the room that could be called finished!

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Crossed Genres, the sience fiction and fantasy e-zine, have asked writers to post stories to encourage readers to donate money to charities helping in the Haiti crisis. If you enjoyed my own story (or even if you didn't) please click on the link below to see some of the charities involved and make a donation, or support any other charity you know of who are involved. There are links to many other stories on their site.

Crossed Genres website


This story has not yet been published... I hope you like it.

The Glassy Roll of the Eye

Louis had never broken a bone in his life and could have picked a better place than the New Mexico desert for his first experience. He’d left the motel early, hitching his way to where he’d heard there were some good rock art. The colors kept clear and bright in the dry heat, and some were as sharp as the day they had been painted.
Sketchbook under his arm, he had set out east, eyes roaming the landscape for likely material. He had filled fifteen pages when the accident happened. He was climbing down off a rock when he slipped and landed badly, feeling his ankle snap with a sickening jolt of pain. The rock hadn’t even been high.

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I started writing ‘seriously’ just over three years ago. At the time, I had one ‘child’ already flown the nest and another leaving school, heading to university. A new phase of my life was beginning and, wallowing in blissful ignorance, I knew which path I wanted to take - I wanted to write. I wanted to write novels. Lots of them. To be published. To have people read and love my words. To tell stories...I thought I knew what that entailed. Take out your laptop and er...write. I knew it couldn’t be quite that simple, but also naively wondered how hard could it be? I had absolutely no idea how steep (forget steep – try precipitous) the learning curve would be. How many twisted rungs the road to publication ladder would have? Hell, I thought ‘show and tell’ meant one of the girls taking their favourite cuddly toy into school with them.

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