We are delighted to announce the winners of the 2025 Queen Mary Wasafiri New Writing Prize! 🌟 Poetry: Flora Beagley for ‘Sutton Hoo’ 🌟 Fiction: @jobardsley.bsky.social for ‘Iko of Benin, King's Diver’ 🌟 Life Writing: Luke Liu for ‘Chair Tombs on the Hill’ www.wasafiri.org/news-and-eve...

thin-skin.com?fbclid=IwY2x... And there is a bit of my flash fiction here

Totally floored! I won the Wasafiri Prize for New Writing! I have won precisely 3 prizes in my ENTIRE LIFE - a poster competition in 1984, a set of Pyrex baking tins in 2009 and this! I am so honoured and amazed!

I went to visit the Houses of Parliament today. Best bit was the large security guard humming Sodapop as he scanned my bag

Book related tragedy today - my lunch leaked over my brand new book. Serves me right for attempting to eat fish at work.

northerngravy.com/the-lake-by-... Here is my story! It was the first one that got accepted anywhere!

The longlists have been announced! And now it's time to celebrate! 🥳🎉 Join us, our two judges and Derby Poetry Festival at Derby Museums on 13th November where we will be revealing the winners of this year's Aurora Prize for Writing. 🥂 Tickets & see our longlists here 👉 bit.ly/AURORACEREMONY

I'm on the long list for this one - fingers crossed! The story has a really special setting for me, although it's on the other side of the world from the East Midlands writingeastmidlands.co.uk/for-writers/...

www.wasafiri.org/news-and-eve... So proud to be selected for the shortlist!

Our duck died.

• Jamila Fadhlaoui • Tom Morgan • @sarasherwood.bsky.social • @jobardsley.bsky.social • Mel Eagles • Liam Nolan • Michelle Penny • Cadi Cliff

Issue 003: Undersong | Out 13.09 Something is rekindled in the grainy late-night livestreams of the Eras Tour. A fisherman wakes to sing back the dead. A disillusioned thirtysomething finds solace in piano renditions of the Beatles. tinyurl.com/003Undersong

Back to school, year 28. The kids I taught in my first year are now in their 40s

Researching for the novel, I just tried jellied eel for the first time. It's nice. You should try it.

I'm on the long list! www.hastingsbookfest.org/2024-shortst...

Went to Brighton Aquarium, several fish very interested in First Born. Anyone know why this might be?

Offspring 2: Carry on like that and you'll get a walking stick whupping! Me: Who's been talking to you about walking stick whuppings? Offspring 2: The ancestors told me on the toilet.

I'm very interested in eels lately. I read Graham Swit's Waterland, which has good eel action

I saw somebody on TikTok using the word 'slopper' as a slur for people who use ChatGPT, and that's a thing we should start doing.

I swore I wouldn't write anything political here, but there is a Little People Big Dreams kids book about King Charles. Did someone change the meaning of 'Little' while I wasn't looking?

Huzzah! On a long list! crankedanvil.co.uk/2025/07/16/m... Their feedback was lovely as well, really detailed and positive.

So excited to be a finalist in the Jane Austen writing competition! janeaustenlf.org/writing-comp...

The Pirate (1948) with Judy Garland is avaliable through Apple TV. This has made my whole day better

Love this. So true. I always relax a little when I see the rainbow. "For some, a small rainbow flag can mean we feel safer. You see the flag and think; "I can fit in here" A simple way to know that I am also appreciated. Very nice video Oslo Pride🌈"

If the first thing you say when you wake on the first day of the month is 'rabbit, rabbit, rabbit', you'll have good luck all month. If the first thing you say is 'sh*t, my phone wasn't plugged up last night' you'll just have to carry on as best you can

Two publishers were discussing why they rejected my work in my dream last night. Their analysis was both correct and cruel. The only bit I remember is that some of my prose 'feels like raw potato tastes'

I'm shelving a writing project that won't come right. Now it's staring balefully from the corner of my documents folder and plotting to muck up whatever I do next

Less than 10 women under 25 took the test to ride any motorbike in any given year until 2009. So the other women who took their test with me in 1997 would fit round my dinner table.

The experience of delivering the kids to school 10 mins early and no one has screamed at each other. As rare and delightful as a ghost orchid

Saying goodbye to this year's butterflies

If your piece of creative non fiction doesn't end up with half your family in tears and the other half not speaking to you, was it even non fiction?

Superloop drivers are the honeybadgers of the London bus pool.

In case anyone else needs this: if your wife gets a burn blister on her hand, saying 'Wow, it looks like monkey pox' is not an acceptable response. #hardwonwisdom

I waged war on the weeds yesterday. Today I discover that my body is an agent of their revenge #overdiditandnowcantwalk

This week's hair

It's been ages since I found something good in a second hand book, but today my book had this snapshot in it.

Me to offspring 2 after jujitsu sparring the psyho kid: Did he make you feel worried? Offspring 2: No. Me: That's good. How come? Offspring 2: Because he's so easily crushed, mama, so easily crushed.

To do list for the long weekend: Weed front garden Mend chicken coop Write undying prose