writing

Join the Arvon Editing Retreat in January 2025

/ Claire Fuller / Leave a comment

I’m delighted that I’ll be back at Arvon in January 2025 teaching Editing Fiction and Non-fiction again.

Are you currently editing a novel or some non-fiction? In January 2025 I’ll be back teaching on an Arvon residential writing week in Shropshire on how to edit fiction and non-fiction, this time alongside fellow writer, Mike Parker. Mike’s books include the bestselling Map Addict, republished last year, On the Red Hill, which was Highly Commended for the Wainwright Prize and won the Wales Book of the Year, and his most recent, All the Wide Border, named by Waterstones as one of the best ten travel works of 2023.

And I’m very excited that our guest author, visiting for an evening discussion is Kit de Waal, author of novels, My Name Is Leon, The Trick to Time, as was short stories.

From a developmental review to the fine detail of the line edit, from comprehensive rewrites to the final polish, using exercises, readings, discussions and tutorials, we’ll share techniques, tips and best practices which will help you hone your voice, clarify your thoughts and transform your writing. Along the way, we’ll talk about the detail of hitting word-editing counts, creating and working with book maps, and how to break down your edit into manageable tasks. You will leave with a better understanding of how to know what needs changing, and how to know when it’s done. Whether you’re already published or just starting out, this course is for anyone with a draft that they want to bring to its best.

The week includes group teaching, workshops, one-to-ones with the tutors, as well as evening activities, accommodation and all meals. This writing week is held at wonderful house called The Hurst set in beautiful and inspirational grounds in Shropshire.

Arvon residential weeks are immersive, energising, and great fun!

More information / to book.

Insights from Festival America 2024: Authors and Connections

/ Claire Fuller / 5 Comments

I have just returned from Festival America – a literary festival held in Vincennes on the outskirts of Paris, and what a wonderful, inspiring, energising and creative time it was. I was there talking about my novel Terre Fragile (aka Unsettled Ground) which was published by Editions Stock in France in January.

It’s the eleventh year of Festival America, which happens every two years. And this year for the first time, the festival also invited authors from Europe, bringing our total to 80. France does literary festivals differently to UK festivals. Firstly, French audiences are so engaged and enthusiastic! That’s not to say that UK audiences aren’t, but they are much smaller. Even for the events with authors who might not be today’s ‘literary stars’ (me included), the turn-out was always more than 100. There are no questions from the audience, but after the event the authors sit in the signing tent behind their piles of books, sometimes for up to three hours. (In the UK, books are sold and signed immediately after each event – sometimes in the bookshop; sometimes just outside the event room, and authors aren’t expected to sit behind their books while potential buyers walk past.) What I really love is that authors and books are selected for panels based on a theme, and that means that authors of my level are often sat next to the ‘literary stars’ talking about a particular subject. The picture above was a panel about ‘What use is literature to the world today’, hosted by a bookseller, with me, Colson Whitehead and Stephen Markley (and our amazing interpreters). I’m certain 95% of the audience were there to see Colson, 4% to see Stephen (sorry Stephen) and 1% me – but that meant lots of people bought my books who had never heard of me before, which is a wonderful thing.

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I got to thank Lauren Groff (and give her hug) for her wonderful quote that she gave for Unsettled Ground. I did three separate school events in one day. I got to meet the whole of my Stock publishing family. I met Donal Ryan for the first time, and we talked about silence in fiction with Antoine Wauters. I sat a seat away from Richard Ford in the signing tent (he’s also published by Editions Stock). I love his writing and I introduced myself and well, we mostly talked about the weather in Paris and Missouri. I was on a panel about families with Szilvia Molnar, and I was so interested in what she had to say that I bought her book (in English – Shakespeare and Co had a stall in the signing tent). And then same happened when I talked about ‘On the margins’ with Jakob Guanzon. I saw a dog on the back of a motorbike, wearing glasses. I met Matilde, my French translator who has been translating my books for eleven years, but this was the first time we’d met in person. I bumped into Susan Barker, who was there with her author partner Glen James Brown. (Susan’s brilliant and scary novel, Old Soul will be published by my UK publisher, Penguin Fig Tree next year.) I laughed about with Colm Tóibín – mostly nonsense – and we pulled silly faces for no reason at all.

Sorry – not sorry – for all the name-dropping. It’s exciting meeting your literary heroes (and have them live up to expectations), but it is even more wonderful to meet so many writers who are new to me and discover their books.

Thank you, Festival America, for the invitation, the fun and the hard work.

Writing, Editing, Publishing Q&A

/ Claire Fuller / 9 Comments

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Over on Instagram (@writerclairefuller) I recently asked if anyone had any questions about writing, editing or getting published. And there were lots! I’ve answered them all in brief in an Instagram post, but it’s hard to be concise with so many questions. So here are my longer answers. Do let me know if you have any other questions in the comments below and I’ll save them up for a future post.

My writing day

How I organise my writing time (@raluca1503 @tftmotherland)

I worked for so many years in a marketing company following normal office hours that now I write full time, I can’t rid myself of the old 9 – 5. Well, actually 9 – 6pm. But I’m doing much more than working on my novel in progress in that time, and it does depend on where I am in the publishing cycle. I have been known to be promoting one book, Continue reading →

Flash fiction: Mrs Jellico

/ Claire Fuller / 51 Comments

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The teeth grinding and sobbing wake me. It’s disconsolate, broken-hearted, a funeral kind of weeping. I hear it through the wall, and I pull the cord with the red triangle. The nurses’ station buzzer sounds and shoes squeak on linoleum. The crying stops.
‘Where’s the fire, Mrs Jellico,’ the girl asks, although she knows I have no words left.
When she’s plumped my pillow and gone, the noise starts again. Keening, moaning, grinding. I rap on the wall.
The nurse is back, syringe in one hand, eyes kind. ‘Shh,’ she says. ‘Shh, Mrs Jellico. Not long now.’

The crying fades.

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Hear me read: 

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I’m not sure exactly how I got from the photo to this story; perhaps milling = grinding = teeth. Anyway, I got there. This is a Friday Fictioneers story of 100-words inspired by a weekly photo posted by Rochelle Wisoff-Fields. This week’s photo is provided by Shaktiki Sharma. Click here to join in and write your own story, or here to read other people’s.

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Last week I was asked by Penguin books to provide some tips about writing flash fiction, and they’ve just gone live on the Penguin website. Do take a look. I will be posting this piece on my own website in the future, so if you have any you’d like to add, please comment below here, and I’ll add them to the post, credit you and link to your website.

Flash Fiction: Once You Sat And Sewed

/ Claire Fuller / 56 Comments

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I wake with my eyes still closed and hear the squeak of the treadle that you asked me to oil, the hum of the wheel under your hand. I imagine the needle, ticker, ticker, tickering, in and out of the hem; your pursed mouth and concentrated frown. I smile when you swear, almost see the pins falling from your lips, the pricked finger, and the thread snapped.

But your chair is cold when I rise, the machine still. Only the stain of faded blood on the edge of my shirt proves that once you sat and sewed.

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This is a 100-word (or so) piece of flash fiction written as part of the Friday Fictioneers Group, hosted by Rochelle Wisoff-Fields. This week the picture is supplied by the wonderful writer Sandra Crook (go and look at her writing – it’s very good). Click here to join in and write your own story, or here to read some more.

Flash Fiction: Now we are the same

/ Claire Fuller / 35 Comments

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For two nights and a day they bloomed. Filling the world’s skies with light and apparently, sound. We sat on the playground, our faces turned skyward. The greatest firework display on earth our teachers said, their mouths round with each flowery burst. We watched late-night television in the common room, the hands explaining physicists’ and UFO experts’ theories, prophets’ and doctors’ warnings. And the doom-mongers’ threats: don’t watch, the lights will blind.

Too late they learned: it wasn’t the lights, but the noise.  They say the world is disabled; but we sign that now we are all the same: deaf.

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Listen to me read this story:

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This is a 100-word (exactly) flash fiction, part of the Friday Fictioneers group, hosted by Rochelle Wisoff-Fields. This week’s picture is supplied by Vijaya Sundaram. Click here to write your own 100-word story, or here to read others inspired by the same picture.

 

Flash Fiction: Talk

/ Claire Fuller / 55 Comments

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I stand under their bedroom window at night and hear them talking:
‘I don’t think she’s ever had a boyfriend,’ she says.
‘No?’ he says.
‘Still a virgin; at her age. Can you imagine?’
‘Not like you then, is she?’ he says, and she shrieks and laughs as if he’s goosed her. They are both silent for a minute or two, and I try not to imagine.
‘Do you think she misses it?’ she says.
‘You can’t miss what you’ve never known,’ he says.
‘But having someone?’
‘No,’ he says. ‘Not her.’
And I turn away, both stronger and sadder.

Listen to me reading it:

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This is a Friday Fictioneers story, hosted by the lovely Rochelle, and inspired by the photo above. This week provided by Janet Webb. Click here to join in and read more.

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A few weeks ago my short story, A Quiet Tidy Man won the Royal Academy & Pin Drop short story award. At the award ceremony the winner was announced by actress, Juliet Stevenson. The recording of the event and her reading my story aloud is now available to listen to. Visit this page, and click through to listen.

Flash Fiction: Add but don’t subtract

/ Claire Fuller / 43 Comments

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Her body sank to the cobbles, each bony vertebra grazing skin against whitewashed wall. In slow motion she slid sideways into the shade, eyes glassy and the taste of dirt and leather in her mouth from a million sandals that had trod the alley before her. It was empty now, everyone indoors – away from the midday sun. As sleep, or something greater overtook her, she saw her mother pouring homemade lemonade from a pitcher she had never owned.

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This is a Friday Fictioneers story. A re-run (because it’s summer and we’re all busy) of an FF story I wrote in 2012. It became a Continue reading →

Flash Fiction: Feral

/ Claire Fuller / 62 Comments

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I set down the saucer of milk in the corner of the barn and scuffed around in the straw, calling and blowing little kisses. Every day I’d visited the kittens, pressing each soft face against mine and sighing.

Cara had sighed too. ‘They’re not your babies, Frances. They’re feral cats and in a month they’ll be yowling, and scratching and copulating.’

Now she stood in the doorway, the sleeves of her shirt sodden.
‘Have you been to the lake?’ I said.
She held out a sack, the dead-weight at the bottom dripping water on the concrete floor.
‘You’re too old for playing mother,’ she said.

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This is a Friday Fictioneers story of 100-words or so, hosted by Rochelle Wisoff-Fields, and this week the picture is provided by Piya Singh. Click here to join in or here to read other people’s.

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I had some great news yesterday. One of my short stories, A Quiet Tidy Man, has been shortlisted for the Royal Academy / Pin Drop short story prize. The winner will be announced at a ceremony later in June at the Royal Academy of Arts in London, where the story will be read by the actress Juliet Stevenson. More information.