small good things

• 

• 

• 

A quick post to let you know that my latest short story is now available in print.

‘The Women Who Swapped Their Baby for Salad’ is a Rapunzel/Sleeping Beauty modern mashed-up fairytale with all of that foggy brain and lack of appetite for life that comes with anaemia. There’s green salad, thorny roses, a good fairy, a witch, a drop of blood and lots of sleeping.

Photo by Maëliss Demaison on Unsplash

You can find it in Small Good Things, which is an anthology of short stories published by Dahlia Books. Click here to buy it.

If you are really quick then you can still grab a ticket for the booklaunch, which is tomorrow. It’s the ‘A Brief Pause’ showcase: developing your practice‘. session. I won’t be reading, but will be there. Click here for tickets. Kathy Fish workshops are like gold. There is literally a lottery for her longer courses, they are so over-subscribed.

Photo by Priscilla Du Preez on Unsplash

I never much liked the Disnification of fairy tales. That’s not true actually, I despise sanitised versions of stereotyped lives. I prefer the Company of Wolves-style tales of girls and women who lead interesting lives and stray from the path. The ones where they do something daring and dangerous to have a real reason to be saved! The only dressing-up costume that I ever wanted when I was little, was the one that Snow White wore, as she had dark hair, like me. One of my favourite fairy tale princess/matriarch/fierce females is a singer/songwriter/knitting pattern designer called TinyOwlKnits and of course the actor Eva Green, but that goes without saying.

The books that inspired me and continue to, include the following.

(Where is my copy of ‘The Bloody Chamber’ by Angela Carter when I need it?)

You’re never too old for a fairytale.