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Writing prompts have never quite made sense to me. Whether it's a list of prompts from a writers’ centre, suggestions shared by an author, or even - and maybe especially - the structured prompts for short story competitions. I understand their intent - free your mind, get writing flowing, loosen the gears - but for me they’ve always felt like I was being handed someone else’s starting point and told to make it mine. It always turned out as a 'square peg, round hole' situatio

My microwave has begun describing its impressions of me. There will be no notes.

I’ve recently tapped into the Duffer Brothers on MasterClass. (Yes, I’m late to the party. Yes, I’m hanging off every word.) In the early lessons, they talk about beginning a show conceptually — not with scenes, not with dialogue, not even with characters in isolation — but with a clear, distilled idea. A short concept or brief. Something that forces you to articulate what drives the narrative. And I’ve been thinking about that a lot. Because I’ve just come to the end of my w

One year. One one family of four. Seventy-two appointments. And that’s without counting work, school or sporting commitments. I actually tallied. Because, the year prior, I’d felt like our calendar was endlessly full of clutter. And I desperately wanted to learn whether, when someone asked to catch up or we yet again couldn’t find a window to get away for a bit of respite, I might have been … imagining we were that busy? Appointments always live in the margins of life: doc

by Klaire Johnston I was recently recommended a Nora Roberts novel. Let me say this upfront, and with respect: Roberts is a prolific, profound, wildly successful writer. She has built a career most writers can only look at in awe. Me included. So when I picked up one of her books for the first time - mid-career, mid-empire, long after she’d proven everything there is to prove - I expected to witness perfection of the craft. I was completing a ‘Write Your Novel’ course, so I’d

When you become a writer, something subtle and irreversible happens to the way you read. Books stop being just stories. They become constructions. Sometimes this a joy. You notice the elegance of a sentence, or a phrase doing the heavy lifting. You see how a chapter ends with a hook, and how a character’s choice echoes something planted a hundred pages earlier (and maybe you give a little cheer!). Most of all, you recognise economy. Restraint when describing things. That'