Diane Simmons

The Andrew formerly known as prince.

Huge congrats to the shortlisters, you stars! (not me). And good on us nearly-got-there longlisters. I'm thrilled to now have 2 in the 2025 anthology, but still chasing that elusive shortlist! Kudos to @bathflashaward.bsky.social for the professionalism + @kazbarwrites.bsky.social for the judging.

Just rewatched The Winter Guest with Emma Thompson & Phillida Law. What a film! Filmed in and around Pittenweem. Cracking film. On Film4.

Delighted to see my story on this list, thank you!

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I can’t cope with the tension. #bakeoff

What the heck is Tom doing?

Oct 2025 Long List Congratulations to all the authors who have made our Award long list and huge thanks to all who entered.Author names are yet to be announced, so while it is fine to share that you are on the long l…

www.bathflashfictionaward.com/2025/10/oct-...
Very late in the day but at last our Oct 2025 Longlist. Congratulations to all. And apologies for the delay

Ooh!

Just seen an advert for a wine advent calendar. Now you’re talking!

Damian Barr's Bookshop Bookshop UK Welcome to my wee bookshop.  I'm the author of Maggie & Me and You Will Be Safe Here. My new novel is called The Two Roberts and it's out with Canongate in Sept 2025.  I'll be making a special she...

I've been zhushing the shelves of my wee bookshop. Have yourself a browse:
uk.bookshop.org/shop/damianb...

At the other end of the garden, the final phase: log cabin is up. Much cheaper than a swanky oven-ready garden room but let me tell you, untreated timber is NEEDY. Nearly a week later and we’ve only just finished treating and priming. Painting this week. AT LAST. (Reposted minus typos)

A book (BITTER OVER SWEET by Melissa Llanes Brownlee) sitting amongst a plant with big green leaves and a red flower.

BOOK MAIL 📚📬

This much anticipated flash collection has finally arrived!! Congrats @lumchanmfa.bsky.social, it looks beautiful!

Sea Gooseberries by Sarah Doyle The tideline wears you like a broken necklace, sun-glittered gems strewn along its foamy contours. Plump glass marbles: stranded, stilled, alien as fallen moons. How vulnerable you seem in your naked transparency, insides on show, sand refracted through the bright lenses of your bodies. Displaced pearls sent airwards, the vagaries of navigation exiling you beyond the salt-safety of submergence. Your exposure is exquisite, for all its tragedy. You look to me like I imagine ovaries might when they outlive their use – flawless crystal ornaments, slow-fired and vestigial in death. Half gentle, half frantic, I cradle your sparkling ovoids in my palms, return you to your fold of sea: fearful you have already atrophied in the late-summer glare, hoping furiously time has not run out for you as it has for me.   (c) Sarah Doyle

For #WorldMenopauseDay: my poem 'Sea Gooseberries', which was highly commended in the 2022 Ginkgo Prize and is included in my V. Press pamphlet '(m)othersongs'. The poem merges ecological fragility with body crisis, and was inspired by witnessing a mass beaching in Norfolk.

Big thanks to @emmalee1.bsky.social for this wonderful review of Darling Blue..just a week till publication now and Droitwich launch a month today!!! 🎉🎉🎉 (More info here: sarah-james.co.uk/?page_id=17191)

a man in a vest is dancing in a living room with a couch and chairs ALT: a man in a vest is dancing in a living room with a couch and chairs

Things are happening in NFFD land! We’ve got our anthology guest editor & our 4 microfiction comp judges lined up & we’ve decided on a theme for our next anthology!Watch this space!

She is amazing. I think they love Tom.

I miss the days on twitter when people used to talk about Bakeoff. Do Bluesky people not like Bakeoff?

Made a trifle for Burns night: raspberries, whisky, cream, Swiss roll, custard. But to be honest, have only eaten trifle twice in last 30 years.

Yes. Agar agar. Made of seaweed.

Yes! No jelly. But i grew up in Scotland. No jelly! Also am a veggie

Trigle shouldn’t have jelly in it!!! FFS.

Thank God I don’t have to do Bakeoff. Still traumatised by O’level Domestic Science.

If you enjoyed someone’s book, please consider putting a star rating on Goodreads. I think it’s particularly important for books from small presses. I’ve read some fabulous novellas-in-flash that have hardly any ratings. Goodreads doesn’t demand a review, so it only takes a minute.

Oh these things are such a pain. I had one saying how sad it was that Finding a Way only had a dozen reviews on Amazon when it has way more than that. Careless scamming 😂

😊 I rarely write reviews as I find them stressful, but hopefully remember to do a star rating.

If you enjoyed someone’s book, please consider putting a star rating on Goodreads. I think it’s particularly important for books from small presses. I’ve read some fabulous novellas-in-flash that have hardly any ratings. Goodreads doesn’t demand a review, so it only takes a minute.

Ross Noble brilliant on ‘Have I Got News for You’ tonight.