Spellnotes

Sometimes, it feels as though writing short stories or flash fiction can be harder than writing a full-length novel. You may be limited to a relatively short word or page count. You might not have any idea how to come up with a storyline that will fit into the length required for a short story.… Continue reading Writing Resources – Short Stories

The brevity of Jocelyne Lamarche’s Ghost belies its complexity. Coming in at just 210 words, the story manages to pack in vivid imagery, establish a strong sense of character and weave its way through feelings of sadness, longing and hope. It is a story to be read again and again, one of those which yields… Continue reading Summer 2022 – Fiction

This season’s writing tips post is going to focus on the relationship between physical setting and characters. I have come up with what should be a fun and challenging writing exercise which will allow you to consider the importance of these two important elements of fiction writing. Setting – by which I mean the physical… Continue reading Writing Tips – Setting and Character

This blog post will help you respond to the following Spellbinder Instagram post: Write a script about a family summer holiday/road trip. You can go down the comedy route and have lots of absurdly annoying things happening. You could also have a thriller/horror twist at some point in your script, after of course tricking your… Continue reading Summer Prompts – Holiday Scripts

This blog post will help you respond to the following Spellbinder Instagram post: “Experiment with artworks or photographs depicting water. How can you capture water’s colourlessness, movement and fluidity in a still image? Can materials such as fabric and glass help you create that illusion?” Water, along with clouds and the sky, are some of… Continue reading Summer Prompts – Water

This post will help you respond to the following Spellbinder Instagram post: “Choose a scene or a chapter from your favourite summer read and rewrite it from a different point of view. You could also maintain the main character as is, but switch points of view (eg from the first to the third person). Think… Continue reading Summer Prompts – Point of View

Cornwall – Lily Rose Winter drinking wine on the beachfront it’s that time between light and dark when the sea begins to look like an untuned television screen noise among silence pixelated, out of focus, flickering, i listen with one ear to what you say while the other is drawn to the sea, as if… Continue reading Spring 2022 – Poetry

This blog post is all about the National Gallery in London and the inspiration it can provide. It will also focus on the Gallery’s website, which is an excellent place from which to draw resources. I was in London this weekend with my partner. It had been my responsibility to plan a day out but… Continue reading Art Resources – The National Gallery

Character is a key element of prose writing, whichever form – short story, play, novel – that might take. Characters are often at the heart of a story. They drive it forward. For readers, they are often the reason we keep reading something. We want to find out more about a character’s motivations or thoughts.… Continue reading Writing Resources – Character

This blog post aims to introduce you to the concept of mind mapping, which is a really helpful tool to use if you are ever stuck on working out details of character or setting in particular. Simply put, mind maps are a way of tracking and organising information. They can also be really useful in… Continue reading Writing Tips: Mind Mapping

This post will help you respond to the following Spellbinder Instagram post: “Write a script about spring cleaning. Whether it’s a literal wardrobe clear-out or a metaphorical soul-cleansing endeavour, what are the benefits (or negatives) of tidying, downsizing, and letting go? How can you convey with your dialogue the liberating (or empty) feeling the characters… Continue reading Spring Cleaning Prompts

This post will help you respond to the following Spellbinder Instagram post. “Experiment with a watercolour painting of gorgeous springtime flowers. You can paint a field of flowers and/or flowers in a vase. What colours, shadows and vibrance can best convey the unique specialness of flowers?” One of the most distinctive features of spring is… Continue reading Painting Spring Flowers

This post will help you respond to the following Spellbinder Instagram post. “Challenge yourself with a constrained writing exercise this spring. Here are some examples: write a haiku about new beginnings and or/rebirth; write a 500-characters memoir about springtimes past; write a fiction piece without ever using the letter ‘S’.” Here in the UK, we… Continue reading Spring Writing Exercises

Sarah Wallis’ comedic stage play My Psycho Ex Was an Angel is a genuine delight to read. As an editor, I was instantly captivated by its unusual plot and surreal tone. The scene painted for us is one of a first date, which is taking place in an art gallery between Adrian and Claire. It… Continue reading Winter 2022 – Drama

Sometimes, starting a piece of fiction can be one of the most daunting and difficult elements of the whole process. This post will suggest some ways in which you might wish to begin a story or piece of flash fiction, and hopefully serve as an aid if you are struggling to do so. These are… Continue reading Openings

This post will explore the relationship between art and mystery. I will look at a couple of my own favourite pieces of art. However, the points I will touch upon can also apply to your own personal favourites too. Mystery often serves an important purpose within art. A painting can create a small slice of… Continue reading Art and Mystery

A difficult year calls for the fulfilling familiarity that the cosiness of December brings. The last few weeks, leading up to the beginning of a new year, feel like a suspended simulation where one revels in one’s guiltless liberty to take a pause, disconnect from the harsh realities that life demands, and simply dwell in… Continue reading Winter 2022 – Non-Fiction

A Bargaining The red plate on the green table has a loaf of lemon bread on it. There are blueberries on top of the loaf. You know it smells freshly baked even though you can’t actually smell it. Your nose is broken and doesn’t work anymore. You do not know when your nose became broken.… Continue reading Winter 2022 – Fiction

This post will introduce you to free-form writing, a technique which is extremely useful and versatile. As a writer, it can often be easy to be overcritical. We can all get bogged down in overanalysing what we have written or agonising over what we write next. Sometimes, we may not know what to write at… Continue reading An Introduction to Free-form Writing

This blog post will help build upon the latest series of Winter themed prompts on the Spellbinder Instagram. Winter can be a hard, and harsh, period of time. It can feel desolate and bare. Here in England, it is currently damp with winter rain. The nights come quickly, and are long. As a writer or… Continue reading Winter Prompts