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- Can you please tell us about your daily life? I am an illustrator and lecturer, always looking at people and looking for clues or listening to their stories - When did you start writing? How often do you write? I have been writing on and off since I was 9, making books, stories and pictures. I collect bits and pieces, details, triggers, conversations, notes, photos, things that speak to me. I mull them over and then something clicks, and I start writing. It is like drawing. Facing the blank page, you roughly know the direction you might be going in, but there is always an element of unpredictability involved, an exciting and necessary part of the process. I have a story published in the Summer Edition on Food, by Fly on the Wall Press. I can’t wait to get my copies. - How does it feel to have your work recognised? I am thrilled that my work or story has struck a cord with your judges, and particularly this story which is about people who might feel invisible and overlooked due to their age or circumstances. - What's the best thing and the hardest thing about writing a Short Story? What I have always loved about short stories is how they capture something anodyne, and use the everyday: an incident, a decisive moment, or a subtle gesture. The short encapsulates it into something gleaming which you turn over and over. It haunts you, and you can savour it long after reading the last sentence. - How did you come up with the idea for your LISP selected story? Is there a story behind your story? And, how long have you been working on it? This story has been brewing for about 3 years and features some of characters I have regularly observed around the small town I live in.
- Can you please give us a few tips about writing a 1500-word short story? That’s difficult for me because that is quite long for me. I would say, write what you know is crucial and indispensable. Write it because you have to write it. Because it speaks to you. - What's the best thing and the hardest thing about writing competitions? The best thing is feeling ready to let the story go out into the world. Obviously after that, is when your work gets chosen or if you can get constructive feedback! That has been really useful. The hardest thing is to keep going, and keep productive, whatever happens. -Lastly, do you recommend the writers to give it a go on short story and LISP?. Absolutely, I love its multidisciplinary and transmedial platform!
