Sadie Hanson

Reading the other entries I didn’t expect that! Thank you. I really enjoyed this competition.

Well done @clebs. I said it’s excellent – and it is!

Congratulations, Clebs, a well-twisted tale. And thanks Alex for a prompt which produced such variety.

Burn

The day the power went off for the last time, Dad started on about the country again.

“When did this country change?” he growled. “Things never used to be like this. This is Britain, how did it get so the electric doesn’t work?”

Gemma didn’t understood when he talked like this. It was like he felt the whole island was somehow the same. G…[Read more]

<p style=”font-weight: 400;”><b>Upwards and Downwards</b></p>
<p style=”font-weight: 400;”>An unexpected ray of light pierced  the blanket of cloud which hung over the otherwise dull cemetery. A plot empty of earth with planks and ropes ready to lower a coffin screamed yet another death.
</p>
<p style=”font-weight: 400;”>Had the reaper taken…[Read more]

Admittedly the last edit I had done was via someone I have known for a while. But still, you are commissioning a job so it is up to you to tell them/ask them what you think is necessary.

I’d write along the lines of

Hey, Editor. Sort out this pile of horror for me, there’s a good fellow.

OK, OK. More along the lines of

Dear Editor

I got your…[Read more]

It did, but not by very much. I went looking for info on this, and found three post-nationalisation disasters with forty or more killed. Not quite slaughter on nineteenth century levels, but you have to take into account that the industry was being steadily run down.

Though I’m old enough (I was born in 1950) I don’t remember where I was or what…[Read more]

A ‘critical reading course’ sounds exactly what I need, (and I’ve a couple of books on the course list) but despite several books on ‘How to’, and the Future Learn course using the James Tait Black shortlists, I’ve realised my brain doesn’t work that way. Hope you get what you want from it. I’ve several books from the Festival added to my…[Read more]

That’s brilliant, Sandra. I still have a couple of books on my TBR list from last year’s festival.

In the end I didn’t sign up for this year’s Edinburgh events as I diverted my money to doing the School — Galley Beggar Press critical reading course.

Thank you for a fascinating blog, Richard.

I don’t know that things improved when coal was nationalised. The Aberfan disaster suggests not but I don’t know the details. It seems that in general workers in all industries had to wait for health and safety legislation and that the general public sill has a long road ahead of applying pressure when…[Read more]

And now that Edinburgh’s book festival is over, I need to thank you again for the heads up – so many hours of pleasure, not to say inspiration.

Thank you both, @richardb and @katemachon; Kate, the info on your process, experience and end results was especially illuminating. Thanks so much! ✨

I was just reading up on Gresford following this and noticed one striking coincidence. The name of an MP who castigated the mine’s management during a debate in parliament following the inquiry’s mealy-mouthed conclusions:

David Grenfell…

And thank you too, Seagreen.

For those of you who are interested enough to look up that song lyric, I should explain the significance of that line ‘Down there in the dark they are lying.’ On the grounds that conditions were too dangerous for any further rescue work, the controversial decision was taken to permanently seal the affected part of the…[Read more]