The rain was falling hard on the esplanade. The view from the apartment of sea and beach was obscured by mist.
‘How is he?’ Karen asked her mother.
‘He’s been in a temper since we moved here. Now he’s bitter as well.’
‘Bitter with you?’
‘With me, himself, everything.’
‘Doesn’t he have any interests apart from…?’
Continue readingAlthough my journalist’s style guide has a whole section on avoiding clichés, I’m excited to share with you my awesome journey towards local newspaper stardom.
Earlier in the week prospects had seemed to be shifting downwards. An editorial encounter, at which I had intended to pitch an investigative project about vaping in schools, brought this well and truly home.
The drift of this went:
‘.…local rags can’t carry reporters with airy, ill thought out ideas…..where’s the research? ..by election coming up….get out on the streets and ask people how they think life can improve …if anyone mention vapes, that’s a bonus for you. ’
Continue readingPrison counsellor Richard Wilson peered through thick lens glasses at prisoner Wilf Watts, a small scrawny old man with a full head of silver hair, his eyes appearing open and honest. Wilf had been sentenced to four years for offences that lead to him being a local hero within the prison. Leaning forward Richard asked, ‘Would you like to explain the circumstances that led to you being here, Wilf?’
Wilf settled back in the armchair, thinking for a moment: ”It’s like this, you see my wife died last year. Wonderful women she was, my Margey. We were married for over forty years, she did everything for me. Sold our home as I couldn’t live there without her, bought myself one of those mobile homes and travelled all over. It is what she wanted. Found it a bit lonely to be honest. Then some bugger stole it, I lost everything and had a hard time getting even a little bedsit. The police were useless, didn’t do a thing, the insurance company gave me the runaround.
Continue readingHe stands on the corner of East Bank Way and Fabian Way, in the long winter shadow of Swansea Dockers Sports and Social Club, his tragic, asymmetrical body a cautionary tale of what might be.
The traffic is slow. It’s the usual blockage: cars, vans, buses and trucks, turning into Quay Parade, ignoring the yellow cross-hatched box that says to new drivers, “Do not enter unless your exit is clear”, but in the hurried world of nine o’clock deadlines, a warning to be ignored, along with the cheery horns of the oncoming traffic.
Continue readingHOMEWORK for deadline Thursday 10pm, 23.10.25.
TASK: ‘The Good Life’. Write 500 words or fewer about ‘The Good Life’. Your story title isn’t included in the 500 words.
Homework to be in by 10 pm at the latest, Thursday 23rd October 2025. (This time deadline will be helpful to both Martyn and Pat).
Meeting at 1.30pm, Sunday 26.10.25, Waterstones Bookshop, top floor [via stairs or lift], Oxford Street. Finish about 3.00pm.
Annabelle relaxed into her seat as the plane levelled out, gazing down at the bright lights below. Catching a glimpse of her reflection, she saw her perfect hair and makeup. Only her green eyes gave any hint of sadness. Gazing at her engagement ring gave her just a pang of regret, but she knew it was the right decision for her.
Landing in Malta she made it to the port, then caught the ferry to her hideaway on Gozo. She had been left the villa by the one man who had loved her for who she was and not her looks. Putting the flat in London on the market had been a wrench but she needed to disappear. Marcus would look for her but hopefully she had covered her tracks.
Continue readingSteve was struggling. The vaguely familiar face,- was it himself or Nige? Prosopognosia was a real bummer. Dr Shah had suggested focussing on a distinguishing feature. For Steven it was hair,or the lack thereof. His own scalp was silky smooth, shaven each morning at Ali Barber’s; Nigel had locks that tumbled to his shoulders Some sufferers could not differentiate between a face and a car so the fact he could now recognise both his own face and the mirror, evidenced, he had been told significant progress.
“Two Peas, two pods” his mother would say when strangers remarked on the dissonant appearance of the non-identical twins,- different in height and physique, yet incongruously ditto-dressed with strangely duplicate faces. They dressed identically over the boundary-pushing teenage years, into adulthood and beyond into middle age . That and their penchant for wearing copy-cat beanie hats come rain, come shine, was their USP. Nigel, taller, red-headed, a beanpole, was the brawn and he, a Billy Bunter, the brains. Brawn, brains and sibling rivalry make for uncomfortable bedfellows. In adolescence Steven would invariably get the girl whilst Nigel, having been caught copying Steven’s homework, would spend the evening in after-school detention.
Continue readingMy Dear Clatterworthy, inspiration – wouldn’t you agree? – is a stick of dynamite up the buttocks, a jug of icy water in the face, the unexpected rainbow, a yellow sun on a freezing winter’s day. Latterly its song has been reduced to a whisper but then, blow me down like a bark in a Gower gale, didn’t I hear that my fellow versifier, T.S. Eliot, had written a whole book of poems on the subject of – cats.
Now there’s a tidy idea, thought I to myself: popularity, a seaful of sales, and no need to draw deeply from inspiration’s well. Easily done, you could say. And out there are surely more cat lovers, their caterwauling pets inhabiting smoothed and ironed bungalows or furry flats, than are readers of rhyme. Wouldn’t such folk drool over further pages on paws, or tales about tails in feline feminine rhymes?
Continue readingYou know what? she thought. Fuck it, one more time. But no more after this.
She threw her phone onto the bed after replying yes and hitting send, disgusted with herself, then turned to look in the full-length mirror by her dresser, sighing. She’d promised Thomas that the last time really had been it, that she wouldn’t do it anymore. They didn’t need to any more money, she didn’t need to put herself at risk…
But this was too incredible an opportunity to turn down.
The man was one of those obnoxiously wealthy politician types, fingers in loads of different pies, and apparently some unpleasant vices. He’d made his fortune—from what she could gather from her research, at least—in oil, property, and telecoms, then branched out into more shady practices; weapons dealing to proscribed terror organisations, specialist dark web sites trading in narcotics and other less salubrious goods, and there were hints of things even worse.
Continue readingMiles winced when he rolled over and saw the sleeping woman beside him. It wasn’t that she was unattractive. On the contrary, even in the harsh morning light, her skin was beautifully clear.
Even so, as he fumbled around for his clothes, he shuddered at the memory of last night. He’d known the moment she started talking that she didn’t have that X factor. He was sick of the dating game, the nameless parade of girls who all looked the same and sounded the same and talked about the same inane things. All those wasted evenings, only the prospect of a one-night stand spurring him on.
He crept out of the room, catching a glimpse of himself in her hallway mirror as he slid his shoes on. He looked deathly pale. This lifestyle wasn’t doing him any good. He closed the front door with a quiet click.
Continue readingBrandon never wanted to be there, but Josh assured him the old man was loaded. The moment the lock clicked open, his eyes narrowed and he whispered, “This is a mistake.”
Josh shushed him with a grin. “Bloody virgin.”
He had experience, but it was served with a level of incompetence that made barristers choke. The large thumb marked “Time served at HM Pleasure” on the scales of his chaotic life bore solid testimony to that.
“Piece of cake. Easy compared to a real blag,” he concluded.
Continue readingMr Sailsbury was a man burdened by very little. Marriage arranged by parents, children raised by governesses, and his job was more or less inherited with his boss making no demands.
His wife likewise asked for very little, sighing as she heard of another late evening at the office with her typical reply of: “That’s alright dear” which was as passionate as their marriage got.
Mr Sailsbury, however felt that a man such as himself should have a mistress. A wife you did your duty towards; a mistress was for fun.
Continue readingColin ‘Corky’ Yates lived alone; alone enough for a ten-year-old boy. Since his mother’s death two years earlier, dinner was prepared by the housekeeper, and he spent his evenings doing homework, listening to the radio, and waiting for his father.
Corky didn’t mind. He just missed his mum.
One evening, while doing his homework with the radio on, he paused as the announcer signed off, “If you have a problem, get in touch with Doctor Parkham, on …”
He jotted the number down.
Continue readingHOMEWORK for deadline Thursday 10pm, 02.10.25.
TASK: ‘Taking the Easy Way Out’. Write 500 words or fewer about ‘Taking the Easy Way Out’. Your story title isn’t included in the 500 words.
Homework to be in by 10 pm at the latest, Thursday 2nd October 2025. (This time deadline will be helpful to both Martyn and Pat).
Meeting at 1.30pm, Sunday 05.10.25, Waterstones Bookshop, top floor [via stairs or lift], Oxford Street. Finish about 3.00pm.
Send all homework to Pat
As Rupa chugged the remnants of her Singha beer she caught sight of her inner arm tattoo and involuntarily winced with regret. The faded unicorn, a hazy reminder of a debauched weekend in Budapest with her bestie Ruby, who had the tattoo mirrored on her inner thigh.
“Who wears it best?!” they would often exclaim in unison. Rupa could never admit that she loathed it, seeing the unicorn as an emblem of her vulnerability, rather than a symbol of friendship. Rupa’s mother called Ruby ‘a bad influence’, whereas Rupa thought Ruby was ‘so much fun’. Collectively they were referred to by various monikers – the Ru Sisters, Ru Squared, Ru to the power of two or the more pedestrian Double Trouble.
Continue readingHer body shook, her legs trembled, her nerves were precious plates in unsteady hands about to fall to the floor. She must somehow keep a lid on it all.
A medic in a white coat came out. The crowd waiting in A & E became alert. ‘Angela Phillips?’ the white coat said. ‘That’s me,’ she mumbled and they all stared at her, a sick, grey-haired woman
‘This way,’ she was told. Fifty pairs of eyes followed her out of the cramped room.
Continue readingFirst year of college I had to endure Jerry Burns. He was your standard, entitled nice guy, forever moaning over his virginity and what an injustice it was that those heartless bitches wouldn’t date him.
I was unpersuaded to be his girlfriend, probably because in addition to being entitled and brimming with rage, he was also criminally boring; his only topic was himself.
Second year, I mercifully didn’t share a house with him, although he kept sending me drunken texts on how much he missed me, how hanging out with me was the best time of his life and what a stone-cold whore I was for ignoring him.
Continue readingCarefully opening her eyes, Holly had a head full of bees. The noise bounding around, clanging, forced her bolt upright. It wasn’t a dream, she was in a cell!!
The smell of urine caused her to gag. There was a toilet in the corner, the sight of which made her retch even harder. Slowly her memory returned in flashes .
Shawna again, why did she always go along with her wild ideas? It had been the same when they were in college .
The trip to the woods ended in a bog, then to add insult to injury a branch swung back and a black eye for Holly, with Shauna laughing her head off. A night on a pub crawl, Holly woke up in a bush on the prom, no sign of Shauna. Apparently she thought Holly looked so peaceful, she left her there. Getting caught trying to sneak into a posh nightclub, ejected by the scruff of their necks. The list was endless but this was the last straw. No more!
Continue reading
Mick sat in his land-train on an escarpment overlooking the crossing. Below, in the valley, the bots paraded alongside the slowly shuffling line of indentured labourers, their threatening gestures accompanying each faltering step. He counted five bots, one for every twenty humans.
“It’s all about ratios,” he muttered, pulling his scarf up to his nose. That’s how corporations preferred it. Bots were costly; humans were cheap. But everything had a cost. He’d rescued slaves before… for a price.
Continue reading
HOMEWORK for deadline Thursday 10pm, 21.08.25.
TASK: ‘Persuasion’. Write 500 words or fewer about ‘Persuasion’. Your story title isn’t included in the 500 words.
Homework to be in by 10 pm at the latest, Thursday 21st August 2025. (This time deadline will be helpful to both Martyn and Pat).
Meeting at 1.30pm, Sunday 24.08.25, Waterstones Bookshop, top floor [via stairs or lift], Oxford Street. Finish about 3.00pm.
Submit your work to Pat via email. Or contact us via the contact page.
