fantasy – Caroline Ashley

Lost in the world of novel writing

I realised that it’s been a while since I posted on my personal blog. Things have been relatively quiet here. I haven’t entered many contests and there’s not been any new publications to update about. However, I did get the good news last week that I had received an honourable mention in the L Ron Hubbard Writers of the Future contest for the second quarter of 2024. This is a well-known international contest, so being recognised for my work is a big confidence boost!

Otherwise, I have mostly been working away at completing my novel.

Tentatively titled “Battle Scars”, it’s the story of a woman named Rebecca Mason. She nearly died five years ago when a man named Rafe McKendrick brutally attacked her. His twin brother, Erik, saved her by turning her into a werewolf and Rafe was exiled from his pack. Rebecca struggles every day to reconcile her human life with the supernatural world. And then one day, Rafe comes back, and he’s threatening not just her but her new found pack and all of werewolf society. Does she have the strength to stand against the man who nearly killed her?

The novel is now written and one of my lovely fellow writers is reading it to give me feedback. There’s bound to still be plenty of editing to do but having a finished novel feels almost within reach!

On top of that, I’m also working on the sequel, which has a different point of view character. A gamble maybe, because I know people like having a single protagonist to follow, but it feels the right thing for the series I want to tell, so hopefully it works once it’s written! My aim for this book in terms of writing skills is to improve my efficiency, getting it written within a faster timescale by doing more planning at the beginning instead of just pantsing my way through it 🙈 If I can write faster, I’ll be able to get more books written in the long run so it’s definitely worth making myself more organised!

Look out for another Storytelling blog post, which I will try to get completed this week if I can pull my focus away from the novel writing 😊

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‘They Do Not Know The Earth’ and other things

If you follow me on social media, you’ll have already seen that the Hooghly Review have published one of my stories in their 3rd issue, which was released today. ‘They Do Not Know The Earth‘ is a flash fiction piece about a witch grieving for her lost family and trying to use magic to fill the hole they’ve left.

I’m aware I’ve been pretty quiet of late and I’m planning to attempt to get back on track this month. My writing has still been a priority but I was taking part in a free five day challenge with Writer’s Ink, as well as attending workshops organised as part of ProWritingAid’s Fantasy Writers Week. Both have provided some useful insights into writing longer fiction as well as the publishing and marketing side of the journey, which I’ll hopefully be able to use to my advantage with time!

It can be a bit overwhelming how many things are out there to help you with your writing – writing groups that you can subscribe to; apps for editing; apps for world-building; apps for structuring and planning. Not to mention the people you can pay for various kinds of editing and support in getting your book ready to go to agents. At the moment, I’ve resolved to try and do as much as I can without all that, just plugging away at my writing and editing, while attempting to get better at the whole social media thing and build some followers. Let’s see how it goes!

The next post after this will be for my Storytelling blog, on the topic of Third Person Omniscient Point of View, which I’m hoping to get out to you in the next couple of weeks. After that, we should be back on the usual monthly schedule. Any suggestions for topics to cover in Storytelling are more than welcome, so leave me a message with what you’d like to hear about.

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The Kelpie

My short story the Kelpie has recently been published by Elixir Verse Press in their inaugural issue – Elixir Verse Equinox: Terra Verses.

This issue has a great selection of stories all celebrating the magic of the earth and those who live on it. It includes a poem called Who Haunts Lonely Roads by Charlotte Amelia Poe, British author of How To Be Autistic. And a short story called All True Love Is Sacrifice by Maggie Nerz Iribarne, about a woman and her non-verbal son finding hope when they visit the fairies in Ireland. I also enjoyed Christopher R. Muscato‘s story, The Seven Sages of Grief, which explores a woman coming to terms with the loss of her sister.

I’ve made my story available for free here on my website, to give you a taste of the work within Terra Verses. There are many more beautiful pieces in this issue, so do please consider buying it if the concept captures your interest. Anthologies such as these survive through people contributing by purchasing when they can and telling other people about the stories they’ve enjoyed.

In other news, another story of mine, called They Do Not Know The Earth, will soon be published in Issue 3 of the Hooghly Review. This will be freely available so watch this space for another great collection of stories.

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Spillwords interview

Spillwords have published an interview with me that you are welcome to read on their website. They also published a shorter interview that I had completed before becoming author of the month, but which actually came out a week or so afterwards. I’m not really one for chatting much about myself, but I guess if I want to eventually sell my writing, part of that will involve sharing some of myself with my audience. Thank you to Spillwords for pushing me out of my comfort zone! 🙈

Globe Soup also announced the winners and finalists for their 2023 open contest at the beginning of the month. My story made it into a finalist place, which was amazing and another huge boost to my confidence as a writer, but also makes me feel a bit of a bridesmaid – when do I get to be the one who takes home the prize? 🤣 That said, the winners were very well written and their prizes well-deserved, so if you’re looking for something short to read, you can’t go wrong with checking them out 😊

In terms of my plan for the next few weeks, I should be posting my next Storytelling blog post within the week. Wish me luck!

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Author of the month!

When I started trying to get my work published online, Spillwords was one of the first places to accept a short story of mine for their website. This month I’ve been nominated as their author of the month for October 2023!

I’m never usually someone who wins popularity contests, being the introverted nerd that I am, so I’m very proud that my work has inspired people to vote for me 😊 If you haven’t read my stories on Spillwords, you can find them on my Spillwords author page.

I’ve just finished a long month or so of writing short stories for the Globe Soup genre smash followed by pulling another story together for the Commonwealth Short Story prize. My brain now feels like mince 😅 But despite that, I’m about to start working on the final chapters of George Square – started when my 19 month old wasn’t even born yet, I’m excited to get to the finale. There are already things that I’m desperate to edit but overall I’m really happy with what I’ve managed to accomplish. ❤️

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Defender of the forest

Just a short post to say that Roi Fai n é ant Press have published a flash fiction story that I wrote called Defender of the Forest. It’s a story about growing up and moving on from the games of our childhood but still holding on to the stories that we told.

I originally wrote ‘Defender of the Forest’ for a submission call by Space Cat Press on the theme of ‘Into the Forest’. It wasn’t accepted but I edited it afterwards and tried elsewhere. Many thanks to Roi Fainéant Press for publishing the new improved version 😊

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My latest story – Granny Beatson

Spillwords are showcasing my latest story, Granny Beatson, in the featured section of their website 😊 This is the third time they’ve published one of my stories and I’m very grateful to them for their support!

This story was originally written for Globe Soup’s Open short story competition last year and received an honourable mention. One of the reasons that I enjoy the Globe Soup community is that they do take the time to recognise the top 10% who enter their contests, as it gives you that little bit of feedback that you’re on the right track and your writing might be worth sharing. I did subsequently enter this story into another contest, where it didn’t place, but that’s the joy of writing! 🤣

Granny Beatson is the story of a girl and her grandmother and how their relationship changes as she grows up and her grandmother grows older. Because it’s me, there’s also a little dash of fantasy, with a ritual to the fae that binds them over time.

It was a difficult story to write because while it wasn’t autobiographical, it did bring up memories about my relationship with my nana and how it changed as I grew from a child to a teenager and she became less able. She passed away when I was still a teenager and I do look back and wish sometimes that we could have had a relationship when I was older, wiser, and less caught up in growing up and moving away from my roots. We certainly weren’t as close in my teenage years but I do fondly remember my childhood visits and sleepovers at her house.

I hope you enjoy reading my story and maybe that it inspires you to reflect on your own childhood and your relationship with your grandparents.

Over the next few weeks I’ll be working hard to finish my entries to Globe Soup’s Genre Smash and I’m also hoping to pull something together for the Commonwealth Short Story Prize.

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Behold, a new web address!

After around eighteen months of updating this website, I’ve made the decision to commit some money to its maintenance and now have a shiny new web domain. Upgrading my WordPress account also means no more ads, which should make reading my posts a bit more of an enjoyable experience 🙂

This past month has mostly been taken up with working on my entry for Globe Soup’s Genre Smash contest – I bought tickets for both western/horror and urban/fairy tale and I’m now in the editing stage for the former. These genres both really appealed to me so fingers crossed I can pull together something good.

In other news, I received an email that one of my stories has been longlisted for publication by Northern Gravy. This is the second story they’ve longlisted, so we’ll need to see if I get a bit further this time! Another story, ‘Granny Beatson’ has been accepted by Spillwords and should be out soon, though they haven’t confirmed a date yet – I’ll be sure to let people know once it’s out!

I have a few different short story projects I want to complete and I think George Square might end up taking the back seat unless I find myself being amazingly productive. The last time this happened though, I made up for it the following month with two chapters in close succession so this is my aim for November!

My next Storytelling blog post should be out soon – the plan is for it to be finished over the weekend so watch this space for updates.

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The writing continues…

Once again I need to come up with something to say to you all 😂

My daughter wondering what I’ve achieved this week 😅

I’ve been taking a bit of a break from writing this week due to being on holiday in a wee cottage near Annan. This holiday included my 1 year old and 4 year old, so largely included play parks and food, but we did get the reward of hot tub time in the evening once the kids had been put to bed, with a lovely view over the fields.

From a writing point of view, I mostly spent my time this month preparing a short story for Globe Soup’s Open Contest, which you could enter if you had paid for their writing course. Admittedly, I probably haven’t read their lessons as thoroughly as I should have, but I think the story that I finished with was fairly decent – hopefully the judges agree! 🙂

Since then, I’ve been editing the latest chapter of George Square and coming up with ideas for my next Storytelling blog. I even managed to find some time to submit a few stories to online magazines – hopefully at least one will be accepted!

In good news for this month, one of my stories was a finalist in the 10th Globe Soup 7 day story writing challenge. The winning story, by Morgan McIntyre, was really good and definitely worth a read.

My story for this contest had to be historical fiction, which is not my favourite. Largely because my historical knowledge is rubbish – while I used to be good at remembering dates and names for exams in school, my brain refuses to store such details as part of my ongoing general knowledge. Thankfully, historical fiction can also include fantasy elements, so this story was basically a story about a kelpie that happened to be set during the Highland Clearances. As always, my next step is to spend months on end trying to find someone who wants to publish it, so wish me luck! 🙈

In less good but still positive news, I submitted a sci-fi story to F&SF (The Magazine of Fantasy and Science Fiction), who are a pretty big magazine if you’re into sci-fi and fantasy. They rejected my story but with a very positive email, saying that they didn’t think I would have trouble finding a home for it. A sign of further improvement in my work! Now I need to submit to other places until I find one that says yes 🙂

Feel free to check out my other published work or have a look at my Storytelling blog, about the psychology within storytelling.

National Flash Fiction Day 2023

Just a wee update to let you know about a story of mine that’s been published as part of the Flash Flood for National Flash Fiction Day 2023.

I wrote ‘The Unicorn in the Garden‘ last year for a contest – I’m so glad that it’s now found a home somewhere for people to read it 😀

Feel free to check out my other published short fiction. I’m starting to build a bit of a portfolio which is a lovely confidence boost!