Not a truly indicative picture of my tube-strike journey — but ALMOST made it worth it.

18 October: we write. 19 October: we edit. 20 October: world-exclusive anthology published, all for Macmillan Cancer Support. @sarahbrooks.bsky.social @rhi.bsky.social @rozkaveney.bsky.social @katharineorton.bsky.social

Honoured to be involved in this year's Sponosored Write, on behalf of Macmillan Cancer Support, along with a whole gaggle of amazing writers!

We have a beautiful title from @rhi.bsky.social this year and, as ever, 48 hours from creation to publication all for Macmillan Cancer Support. Grab your world-exclusive anthology by 18 October at justgiving.com/page/somewhere-thats-green

I very much enjoyed talking with @drrachelknightley.bsky.social for her brilliant writing podcast series. I'm not sure if I said anything useful, but all her questions are thoughtful and interesting.

Wise and generous creative insights from multiple-BAFTA-winning screenwriter, director and producer @danberlinka.bsky.social, joining me on The Writers’ Gym today. Follow or download wherever you get your podcasts.

Getting to know yourself as a writer — and becoming the writer that helps other writers along the way. Find Priya Sharma talking to me about writing, life, and finding what works for us on The Writers’ Gym this week, wherever you get your podcasts.

And my vote for ‘Most Ironic Book to Stand Your York Ghost Merchants Boo On’ goes to…

Me talking to the wonderful @drrachelknightley.bsky.social about my writing as if I know what I'm doing. youtu.be/Kq-HEL55Saw?...

Activist, critic, poet, fantasy writer @rozkaveney.bsky.social on the rewards and perils of research, deadlines, confidence, creativity — and of discovering how well we really know the characters around us on or off the page. Join The Writers’ Gym wherever you get your podcasts.

Thank you to the brilliant @drrachelknightley.bsky.social for letting me chat about my white noise obsession, creative doubts, and much more! I've found listening to her podcast incredibly helpful when my confidence is wavering, so it was an honour to be on it ❤️📚 open.spotify.com/episode/7En5...

One of the most important things about The Writers' Gym is showing success isn’t about not having the doubts or the struggles: that they’re part of what makes the wins so meaningful. Thank you @sarahbrooks.bsky.social for sharing such encouraging examples of making our writing lives our own.

For every nose I ever see turn up at what (they think) writing coaching is, I also get to read the real experiences — what it really changes, on the page and in the world. Thank you, Dr Kim Fleet, for sharing what these seven months have already created. This is why I do what I do.

Thank you Philip Palmer for a brilliant interview with The Writers' Gym: it’s such a pleasure sharing your love of writing and of supporting writers. open.spotify.com/episode/1znH...

New #Shelfies alert! This week, it's @drrachelknightley.bsky.social on Discworld, Holmes, Cadfael and Narnia! (ooh, I love the Cadfael books! Good call, there). Don't forget you can subscribe for a free weekly shelfie in your inbox!

The ‘what if’ that inspired thriller and Disney+ Series Playdate by Alex Dahl. Alex’s full interview with the Writers’ Gym podcast is waiting for you wherever you get your podcasts.

Here is a text message I got yesterday in The Writers' Gym Voxer, word for word. Writing coaching doesn’t tell anyone how to write. It frees them to enjoy being who they are and what that means they want to create. On the page and in the world.

Award-winning author, journalist, kidnap survivor and ovarian cancer wrangler Jennifer Steil joins the Writers’ Gym Podcast today. Writing for emotional health, creating our own realities on the page and in the most dangerous circumstances of our lives: find us on Apple, Spotify and everywhere else.

A genuine delight to bring Creative Confidence to @olympicstudios #barnes today. The books, businesses and new eras our club members are planning are a privilege to clarify and see them create. Wishing a happy beginning to everyone and can’t wait to see where we go from here ❤️

@drrachelknightley.bsky.social Just watched your video essay of The Seventh Grave Blu-Ray and thought your take was dead on. Enjoyed the movie quite a bit.

‘After’ and ‘Before’ shots of a truly lovely first workshop. What receptive, thoughtful writers (familiar and new faces alike) and, of course, a fabulous venue. Thank you, Olympic Studios #Barnes

My least ‘mid-word’ photo of Magnus’s interview with the brilliant @manuscriptgal.bsky.social at @srfantasyclub.bsky.social last night. Great to hear from Cari Thomas too and discover @allgoodbookshop.co.uk‘s books, notebooks and even honey!

Today I saw an optician walk backwards into a customer waiting for their appointment. She apologised and said she didn’t see her, entirely without irony.

So very proud of Writers’ Gym member Stacey Warner! Not just for the result but for everything that’s gone into showing up for yourself as a writer this year.

We have our first donation! Green Ink Sponsored Write 2025 has my favourite titles yet. Thank you @rhi.bsky.social for naming it and Elspeth Hannen for a beautiful cover. LITERALLY any donation gets you a world-exclusive anthology 48 hours after writing ends: www.justgiving.com/page/somewhe...

What a brilliant title by @rhi.bsky.social for Green Ink Sponsored Write for Macmillan Cancer Support 2025: Somewhere That’s Green: Paradises, Utopias and Happy Places. Sponsor the writers to receive the exclusive digital anthology, 48 hours after it’s written. (Writer announcements soon…)

Really loved recording my first interviews for the new series of The Writers' Gym Podcast: books, Disney Plus adaptations, drama, poetry, memoir, and how each writer finds their own voice through their own curiosity. Mini-episodes each Monday on all platforms, until release day.

Bagpuss’s home, the Smallfilms gallery of The Beaney. Like its subject, the gallery is a huge, beautiful world achieved in a small space. Reminder to us all it’s not about big budgets or infinite resources, it’s listening to your own curiosity, finding how to tell your story as only you can.

If you’re among the lovely writers who DMed about my creative confidence feature in @writersonline.bsky.social, hope to see you Tue 6 May for Magic Realism. It’s the perfect genre to explore your voice and develop your curiosity: www.eventbrite.com/e/1253152074... @alexdavis1981.bsky.social

Excuses Bingo! The workout I shared with the magnificent @rosiegarlandwriter.bsky.social on the Writers’ Gym podcast is in Writing Magazine @writersonline.bsky.social So happy it made the cover as it’s a crucial message: only you can do this, not through holding back but through curiosity.

Writing exercises for everybody who loves writing — or wants to! Build creative confidence and the curiosity that brings you to it.

Just ten days left to grab your tickets and enter a world not entirely like our own, with @drrachelknightley.bsky.social leading six weeks on WRITING MAGIC REALISM! www.eventbrite.co.uk/e/writing-ma...

I just asked my partner to ‘Wait a minute’ before starting the next episode of Black Mirror ‘because I’m just accepting my own invitation to collaborate on my own Instagram post.’

Biology may get in first, but identity is bigger. Who we are is through becoming, discovering, living. Trans rights are human rights.

I’m ALWAYS enormously proud of my former Roehampton MA student, now Writers’ Gym assistant, Bella Barbieri, but celebrating today in particular with her story published in Fincham Press’s gorgeous new anthology. Well done, Bella and well-chosen, @uni-roehampton.bsky.social!

Post-fiction-and-memoir-workshop view of Hammersmith Bridge, slowly but visibly becoming itself again.

Magic Realism: my new course with @alexdavis1981.bsky.social … and my vote the world’s best oxymoron 😊

Enter a world like - but also very unlike - our own with this six-week course from the brilliant @drrachelknightley.bsky.social exploring WRITING MAGIC REALISM! www.eventbrite.co.uk/e/writing-ma... #writing #writers #course #courses #class #classes #workshop #workshops

Reality and fantasy collide in the world of Magic Realism, and @drrachelknightley.bsky.social will be exploring this exciting area of writing in her next six-week course starting this May! www.eventbrite.co.uk/e/writing-ma...

Each healthy writing life is as unique as the writer — but our relationship with our own time is the masterkey. Kim Newman @annodracula.bsky.social joins me on the Writers’ Gym podcast this week.

So pleased to be working with @drrachelknightley.bsky.social for her forthcoming WRITING MAGIC REALISM course, kicking off on the 6th May! www.eventbrite.co.uk/e/writing-ma... #writing #writers #authors #fiction #magicrealism #course #courses #writingcourse #writingcourses

Bring a little bit of magic to your afternoons with this exciting six-week course from @drrachelknightley.bsky.social, starting on the 6th May! www.eventbrite.co.uk/e/writing-ma... #writing #writers #magicrealism #fiction #authors #course #courses

Thank you @drrachelknightley.bsky.social for inviting me into the Writers’ Gym podcast! 🌹 It’s all about the eyebrows… @marchvioletsband.bsky.social

There will never be a pleasure so true or so great as selecting a new pencil case (and/or Fun Fax) at WHSmith in the 1990s.

‘Weird’ as permission first, genre second. Join Aliya Whiteley at The Writers’ Gym this week, celebrating the strange wherever you get your podcasts.

I've written another short horror story inspired by an Adrian Chiles column in The Guardian. Here it is in full:

Beating the inspiration addiction on the Writers’ Gym podcast this week is award-winning poet, novelist, performer and @marchvioletsband.bsky.social vocalist Rosie Garland.

The greatest poet of rock and roll. And folk. And jazz. And prog rock. And an audience that knew it. Thank you @aeroash28.bsky.social, Jo Kendall and HMV Oxford Street for a great evening. Thank you Ian Anderson @jethrotu for everything ❤️

Magic realism is a long-established from with a prestigious past - but how do you go about writing it? @drrachelknightley.bsky.social is her to help you with this six-week online course, starting in May... www.eventbrite.co.uk/e/writing-ma...

Enter the exciting world of magic realism with the brilliant @drrachelknightley.bsky.social this May with this six-week course! www.eventbrite.co.uk/e/writing-ma...