I’ve just realised it’s been six months since my last blog entry. Oh I’ve got a long list of excuses (mostly involving children, other members of the family and moving house), but I still feel shame-faced about it.
Those months have been very busy, sometimes even with writing/writerly projects. New stories and readings for festivals and open mics, a talk for the Women’s Institute and a guest blog for the wonderful Authors Electric website – it’s all about creating complex characters and you can read it here on 31st May.
Last week I hosted the latest in the Words Open Mic evenings. Words of Change was another lovely couple of hours featuring a great line-up of talented local authors and I was very proud to see my daughter, Kitty Heap, reading her own work in public for the first time.
You can read more about the evening, and find a link to more information on how to set up an open mic on Jacci Gooding’s blog here. Jacci is a regular Upstairs at The Globe and has just published A Collection of Unsettling Short Stories available from Amazon here.
Poet Nigel Hutchinson also has a new book out, The Humble Family Interviews, available from local bookshops or from Amazon here. And many other of the writers who were at Words of Change have websites detailing their own projects and publications.
We’re already planning the next event on Tuesday 3rd October in our regular venue, Upstairs at Globe. I’m very excited to say that Historic Words will be in association with the Warwick Words History Festival, you can read more about the festival here.
As I was writing my new piece for Words of Change, I realised that I now have quite a number of short pieces written for open mics and other such events, so I’ve decided to put them together and I’m currently editing Women In Shorts (working title) which I hope to publish towards the end of this year. In parallel, The Mother and the Ghost is progressing, but very slowly.
Here’s to a busy and creative summer!
Jenefer Heap 
Many thanks for organising the event, Jenny!
It was lovely to have you there as always, Gwyneth. I really enjoyed your Yellow Taxi inspired story and thank you for letting me read the piece that led to it – I’ve been humming along to the ‘grave panda eyes’ and the pooch who ‘poisoned all the trees by peeing’. Excellent stuff. :O)
I’m very much hoping you’re up for Historic Words on 3rd October!
The open mic evening was fun, thanks, Jenny. It was interesting hearing such a variety of stories and poems. Seeing Kitty having the confidence to face an audience was inspiring. I hope she enjoyed it too.
Thank you, C Barrett. Delighted you could come along. Kitty did enjoy it and, although she was very nervous on the inside, she handled it all very well and kept her poise. Upstairs at The Globe has such a friendly atmosphere, it’s a great place to debut at the open mic.
I am in awe that you manage to achieve what you have – given all the constraints on your time. Wonderful photograph of Kitty. Keep writing you two.
Thanks, Jill. Hope you and all the family are well. And hope we get to see you up this way very soon.