The Roy Chapman Ltd BeaconFlash 2024/25

We are delighted to announce the results of round seven of the 2024-5 BeaconFlash competition to the theme of ‘Happy as Larry’. The three stories listed below (in alphabetical order) go through to the final judging when the competition closes at the end of May, announced at this July’s BeaconLit festival. 

If your story is not listed below you are welcome to send it elsewhere. If it is, please refrain from doing so until after the final results. NB. The overall top three will be posted in full on this website. So, the three stories chosen for February 2025 are…

· A Happy Ending?

· The Rusty Donkey

· The Hippopotamus Who Learned to Swim

Morgen’s comments:

Boy, what a lovely mix of stories this month. We had more than in recent months so clearly a popular theme. Some stories had a character (not always Larry) clearly happy but that was all – the rest of the story strayed away from that. Where they are very well written they go through to a second read but can miss out when other contenders are closer to the theme.

It’s always a shame when something misses out for that reason but with more possibles than places, the theme has to be a strong factor. That said, if I go ‘Wow’ at the end of the story, it’s likely it’ll go through. This is a short story competition so the writing tends to swing it, especially where they are quirky and out of the ordinary. I recommend coming up with several plots and going for the less obvious so it has a better chance of not competing with a similar story.

Some tips arising from this month’s batch:

· ‘anymore’ is time whereas ‘any more’ is quantity so the latter is correct here. The easy(ish) way to remember is that quantity is usually followed by a noun, e.g. ‘Do you have any more cake?’ And anymore often appears at the end of a sentence, e.g. ‘I don’t want this anymore.’

· Do avoid clichés. While some regularly used phrases may not be clichés officially, ‘pitch black’ in one story, they can be distracting. 

· I’m a stickler for unintended repetition. I listen to these stories either by highlighting them on my computer and getting it to read them back to me or by sending them to my Kindle (Fire’s text to speech), alongside reading it on the screen, and repetition tends to leap out. Even if you don’t have either of these facilities I recommend reading the story aloud then you may spot something untoward. Given these stories are so short, it shouldn’t be difficult to see whether you’ve used a word twice, the second not evidently used for emphasis.

· I recommend varying the lengths of your sentences. Some stories had some really long sentences which slows the pace and can make the reader struggle to keep track of what’s happening where there is more than one piece of information in the sentence (i.e. they go this, that, the other). Short snappy sentences – especially early on – grab the reader’s attention.

· The inverted comma / apostrophe here should be facing left to show the missing letters / numbers are missing from the left, e.g. ’em (them), ’cos (because), ’un (one), ’81 (1981) etc. The easiest way to get a left-facing inverted comma is to type two, e.g. ‘’ then delete the first.

· Where an action (verb) has ‘starts to’ / ‘started to’ or ‘begins to’ / ‘began to’ before it, most of the time they’re not needed because unless the action is interrupted, the verb alone works better / is stronger. An example would be ‘the phone began to ring’. If it stops without being answered then that’s fine (although it still rang!) but if not then just have ‘the phone rang’.

· Where it’s clear a character is nodding to agree, we don’t need ‘in agreement’ etc. Also when characters are nodding or shrugging we don’t need the part of the body mentioned because they’re always heads or shoulders. Certainly mention the body part (or other) if it’s done a different way.

There were punctuation errors in some of the stories so worth clarifying here:

· Dialogue punctuation is, in theory, tricky but the single quote (‘) or speech mark (“) comes before what’s said, always with a capitalised first word: “Don’t do that,” Louise said. Because we have ‘Louise said’ following what she says you have a comma after the last word. If the sentence ends at the last word of the speech then it would be a full stop (or exclamation / question mark). If we already know it’s Louise speaking – perhaps because she’s doing something in the same paragraph (e.g. Louise slammed down her mug. “Don’t do that!”) or there are only two people in the scene – and Thelma’s just spoken – then it’s clear this is then going to be Louise so we don’t need the ‘Louise said’ (“Don’t do that.”).

· A quote, e.g. ‘happy as Larry’ isn’t speech so doesn’t need the same punctuation as dialogue, so no comma before or after the quote unless there’s a pause required, i.e. They say ‘happy as Larry’, or they would, except…

· When you’re quoting a saying or reported speech (telling the character what someone else said) within speech you use the opposite punctuation, i.e. single quotes (‘ ’) for the quote if you use speech marks (“ ”) for the speech, i.e. “She told me ‘You’re out!’ but I wasn’t.”).

· Where speech has an unrelated dialogue tag, e.g. someone laughing, moving, smiling, waving etc. (with it capitalised: He laughed. She picked up the mug. etc.) the punctuation should be a full stop rather than a comma so: He laughed. ‘Say that again.’ Had it been related description, it would be a comma: ‘Say that again,’ he said while fiddling with his tie. I see a lot of said/ings (said/fiddling) so best avoided.

We are delighted to announce the results of round six of the 2024-5 BeaconFlash competition to the theme of ‘Reset’. The three stories listed below (in alphabetical order) go through to the final judging when the competition closes at the end of May, announced at this July’s BeaconLit festival.

If your story is not listed below you are welcome to send it elsewhere. If it is, please refrain from doing so until after the final results. NB. The overall top three will be posted in full on this website. 

So, the three stories chosen for January 2025 are…

• Henry and the Talking Box
• Maintaining That Elusive Work/Life Balance
• Maureen's Time Machine and the Interdimensional Conundrum

Morgen’s comments:

A really fun and quirky bunch of stories this month… with four easy contenders for the shortlist and two other ‘possible’s. As well as strong writing, I judge a story on how I feel at the end. ‘Wow’ stories will often be the ones to go through, with ‘that’s nice’ still great stories but they have less impact and can miss out. Also, of course, it’s how close is a story to the theme. These three were the most impactful but also the closest to the theme, and feel as if they’ve been written for the competition rather than, perhaps, already existed but tweaked to fit.

• Although not grammatically incorrect, no comma is needed where an adverb or conjunction would stand alone. It would had the sentence gone on, e.g. ‘he said, finally accepting the truth’ rather than ‘he said finally’. The same would go for the likes of ‘though’ (or generally any other conjunctive) where they begin or end the sentence. Again it would if the remainder of the sentence made sense on its own, e.g. ‘Brian wasn’t finished in Glasgow, though he only wanted to go home.’

• A very random tip… a story was set in Brighton, one of my favourite places. If the competition’s judge is on social media it’s worth looking at his/her feed and picking something they like. Of course all judges should be impartial but it might make them smile. Even if it’s not a winning story, the chances are they’ll remember it. I was hoping for a twist in that story as it was set up to lead that way alas…

• Dialogue punctuation is slightly different to regular punctuation. The full stop, question mark, comma (never end the sentence with a comma if no ‘John said’ etc.) comes before the close speech marks rather than after. Do check for consistency. In one story we had ‘Smiths’ then later ‘Smith’s’ (the same item). It likely won’t lose you points as such, perhaps a brownie one.

• Do check the spelling of products, places etc. if you use them. There was a ‘cannon’ camera which should have been Canon. My father was a professional photographer, as was my uncle, so I was surrounded by them. (I’m a Nikon fan!) Again not a points loser as such.

• ‘in my/his/her mind’s eye’ is a bit of a cliché, as is and ‘out (of) the corner of his/her/my eye’ and to look a character ‘(straight) in the eyes’.

• I recommend not putting commas between adjectives, and certainly not immediately before the noun / object. It slows the pace… really slows it where there are several. I feel commas work best when the reader is supposed to breathe (or the writer wants to make the reader pause for a particular reason). They wouldn’t need to when describing an object and anything that slows what should be a fast-paced page-turning read is best avoided.

• I recommend writing numbers under 100 in full so they blend with the rest of the text. That said,I think all numbers unless titles (BMW Series 5) etc. are best written in full. Numbers generally aren’t hyphenated unless they would be anyway, e.g. a hundred and thirty-five. So half past nine would be nine thirty, not nine-thirty. If you’re submitting to a competition with a word limit (or exact count) this would mean an extra word, which is why I always recommend going twenty words or more below the limit.

• ‘pit of the/my/her/his stomach’ is a bit of a cliché.

• We speak in contractions (e.g. I’m rather than I am, isn’t rather than is not etc.), and it’s fine / preferred to use them in dialogue* and first-person narration as it comes across as more natural. It’s used less in third-person narration / description but it depends on the era – contractions tend to work better in contemporary novels. *How characters talk does vary between strangers (formal) and friends/family (informal).

• When speaking to someone and using a name, nickname or term of endearment (dear, love, pet*), generalisation (guys, ladies etc.), you’d need a comma before the name, i.e. ‘Do you know John?’ is asking if the person knows someone called John. ‘Do you know, John?’ means that the character is speaking to someone called John but asking them if they know something. A subtle difference but you want to avoid confusing the reader so they jump out of the story. If what’s said is very short, e.g. ‘Hi John’, then the comma’s not so important. *When it’s not a name it would usually be a small first letter.

• Where something’s not a direct question, it’s likely to be a rhetorical question – where the answer is obvious – so no question mark (or he / she asked) needed

We are delighted to announce the results of round five of the 2024-5 BeaconFlash competition to the theme of ‘Snowflakes’. A tricky theme as it transpires as we only received two stories this month. They are therefore listed below (in alphabetical order) and will go through to the final judging when the competition closes at the end of May 2025, announced at this July’s BeaconLit festival. 

So, the two stories for December 2024 are…

• Apres Ski
• Might I Catch Him in the Snow?

Morgen’s comments:

It’s not often that I go ‘wow’ at the end of a story but I did with one of these. The other was charming and a worthy contender, even though it went through by default. What makes a wow story? A very good question. Sometimes it’s an unexpected twist, often it’s a tug at the heartstrings, even if the ending is ‘telegraphed’ along the way.

• This is really a given but do spell check your story before submitting. In one there was a    ‘her’ instead of ‘here’. The context was clear so it’s fine but it loses a brownie point if not a real one.

• Including a movie star or other celebrity is a really good way of dating a piece. The one mentioned this month was from the 1950s/60s so before my time, but on googling the woman, it showed me what the character she was being compared to looked like. This is a clever tactic and is better in a short story where the reader can look him/her up but could be a distraction in a novel. I really liked the language barrier between the two characters and this added to the charm.

• Do try to use more ‘active’ verbs. We had some here including ‘spy’ instead of ‘see’, ‘slinks’ instead of ‘goes’ or ‘walks’. They add to the atmosphere of a piece.

We are delighted to announce the results of round four of the 2024-5 BeaconFlash competition to the theme of ‘The Plot’. The three stories listed below (in alphabetical order) go through to the final judging when the competition closes at the end of May 2025, announced at next July’s BeaconLit festival. 

If your story is not listed below you are welcome to send it elsewhere. If it is, please refrain from doing so until after the final results next year. NB. The overall top three will be posted in full on this website. 

So, the three stories chosen for November 2024 are…

•  One Step Ahead
•  The Manual of Marjorie Plankton
•  Pinioned As If Prometheus

Morgen’s comments:

If you’ve been following this competition for a while you’ll know I love quirky titles. I usually read the stories with the simpler titles first then the ones with the quirkier titles, hoping the stories will be just so. Sometimes they are, sometimes not. You want a story to stand out for all the right reasons, and having a quirky title will often help. One of the stories this month was written as a pair of emails. I’ve seen this done a few times and again they stand out again the crowd.

I’ve also read stories where the author has wanted to shock by using unnecessary swearing, violence or a character being sick. Everything has to have its place. When asked about swearing, I say it depends on audience expectation. Say you have a burglar shinnying up a drainpipe which comes loose so s/he falls. If they survive, they’re not going to say ‘Oh bother’. If you’re writing for a women’s magazine though you’d keep it mild; have the narrator say s/he swore. If you’re writing a dark crime novel, readers would expect grit. 

• Careful of too many _ly adverbs (quickly, happily) especially where they add to a clear emotion, i.e. if we know a character is happy we don’t need to be told how s/he’s reacting. Once you’ve written your story, do a search for ‘ly’ and see how many adverbs you have. 

• Akin to this, look at the dialogue tags (the ‘s/he said…’) in your story to check you’re not telling us how they’re feeling where it’s obvious, e.g. “That’s fantastic.” George smiled, pleased with the news. You can lose the ‘pleased with the news’. Also where we’re told something twice, e.g. ‘I didn’t know what to do. I was stumped.’ They say the same thing.

• Again, when you’ve finished your first draft. Look at how the characters react: do you have more than one character/instance of smile, shrug, nod, gasp, grin etc. It’s easy to duplicate a movement without realising. Of course we mirror people we chat to but like trimming dialogue, actions should be limited. An easy way to catch this is to write your characters names at the top of a page then list their reactions under each name then cross out each smile, shrug etc. NB. no need for ‘his/her shoulders’ (shrug) or ‘his/her head’ (nod) – it’s a give we use those body parts.

• Numbers under 100 are best written in full so they blend with the rest of the text. That said, I think all numbers unless titles (BMW Series 5) etc. are best written in full. For info., decades are plural so no apostrophe required.

• When talking to someone, we don’t often say each other’s names (and avoid too many endearments). Although dialogue doesn’t strictly reflect real speech, it should feel realistic and especially where you only have two characters in a scene and it’s been established who’s saying what, you can cut down on (or out) the name calling. Also rather than ‘Tom said’, have Tom pick up a mug or equivalent so the description, in the same paragraph as what he says, tells us it’s him speaking.

• When writing past tense narration, today isn’t today but should be that day (or similar). Likewise, tomorrow isn’t tomorrow but the next day / the day after, tonight is that night or equivalent, yesterday is the day before / a day earlier etc. Ditto ‘two years ago’ wouldn’t actually be two years ago but two years earlier. Dialogue is present tense so they’re fine in speech.

• Where there’s a change of main character viewpoint or gap in time, there should be a break, i.e. paragraphs separated by a blank line (ideally with a central asterisks so it’s clear it’s an intentional break) then start the new section will start flush to the left then indented second paragraph onwards.

• Words often overused include ‘all’, ‘now’, ‘very’ and ‘just’ (especially with ‘just in case’ where the ‘in case’ is sufficient). One story had four ‘just’s. In longer pieces I recommend searching for them with a space either side so – for ‘just’ as an example, it doesn’t pick up ‘adjust’, ‘justice’ etc. I’d recommend only keeping the ones for emphasis or detract from the sentence if chopped, or changing to ‘only’ where appropriate. And the likes of ‘just’ can be swapped for ‘only’ where appropriate but better to chop so whatever you swap it for doesn’t get used too often either.

We are delighted to announce the results of round three of the 2024-5 BeaconFlash competition to the theme of ‘Silver Light’. The three stories listed below (in alphabetical order) go through to the final judging when the competition closes at the end of May 2025, announced at next July’s BeaconLit festival. 

If your story is not listed below you are welcome to send it elsewhere. If it is, please refrain from doing so until after the final results next year. NB. The overall top three will be posted in full on this website. 

So, the three stories chosen for October 2024 are....

• The Homecoming
• The Waiting Room
• White Feather, Yellow Feather

Morgen’s comments: 

A mix of charming, amusing and thought-provoking stories this month. I know I often say this but it’s almost always true that in a different batch, so many of the stories could have gone through. There was rich description, skilled word choice and unexpected plots. Such talent! Some were closer to the theme than others and this often means the difference between the top three and narrowly missing out so bear this in mind before submitting.

A couple of the stories were 498 words, two of 497, another 499, which is fine as the limit is 500, but it runs the risk of the word count increasing should there be any words that have been hyphenated when they shouldn’t have been. Have three of those and it pushes the story over the limit. I can say this as I’m a fiction editor but it’s easy to chop words. Start with your dialogue. If you have the character doing something and speaking in the same paragraph you can lose the ‘said’. Just have them do the action then speak, or vice versa. More tips below.

• Where you have a direct question, the question mark should appear at the end of the speech (or thought in this instance) rather than after the dialogue tag so: “Will you be there tomorrow?” Tom asked.

• It’s a tough ask but the stories that usually make me go ‘wow’ at the end are the ones that are usually placed. I always recommend asking someone you trust to read your story. If you can get them to sit opposite you then you can see their reaction. If they go ‘wow’ then you know you’ve got a cracker.

• I recommend not having any characters with the same initial letter (especially in the same scene) wherever you can as readers remember characters’ names from the initial letter so I always recommend having them as distinctive as possible. Having the same letter, same second letter and the same or similar lengths (e.g. Mark / Matt) can be confusing and again, anything that can pull the reader away from the story, even for a second, is to be avoided.

• Stopping something or someone ‘in his / her tracks’ is a big cliché (as would be ‘stopping dead’).

• We speak in contractions (e.g. I’m rather than I am, isn’t rather than is not etc.), and it’s fine / preferred to use them in dialogue* and first-person narration as it comes across as more natural. It’s used less in third-person narration / description but it depends on the era – contractions tend to work better in contemporary novels. *How characters talk does vary between strangers (formal) and friends/family (informal).

• Although grammatically correct, I recommend you don’t put commas between adjectives, especially where there is one or more comma elsewhere in the sentence. It slows the pace… really slows it where there are several and anything that slows what should be a fast-paced turning read is best avoided.

• If a section feels a bit flat, it could be that you have too many sentences / paragraphs starting with a pronoun, e.g. ‘Barry did this…’ or ‘He did that…’, or that you have too much narration (Andy was angry) vs. dialogue or the character ‘doing’, e.g. “Get out!” Andy slammed his fist onto the desk. Dialogue = character. Narration = plot. It’s tricky to avoid the ‘I’ (or ‘we’) when writing in first person but it does stand out more than a mix of names.

• Another way of chopping words is if you ‘tell’ us how a character feels but also have what they say – that ‘shows’ us. Even if you don’t need to cut the word count it’s better to have the ‘show’.

• When speaking to someone and using a name, nickname or term of endearment (dear, love, pet*), generalisation (guys, ladies etc.), you’d need a comma before the name, i.e. ‘Do you know John?’ is asking if the person knows someone called John. ‘Do you know, John?’ means that the character is speaking to someone called John but asking them if they know something. A subtle difference but you want to avoid confusing the reader so they jump out of the story. If what’s said is very short, e.g. ‘Hi John’, then the comma’s not so important. * When it’s not a name it would usually be a small first letter.

• There are exceptions (re-sit is one) but most words starting with ‘re’ / re-, unless followed by an ‘e’, aren’t hyphenated. ‘re-edit’ and ‘re-evaluate’, for example, would be. Word doesn’t seem to like ‘rejoin’ but https://www.lexico.com/definition/rejoin confirms no hyphen.

• If you only have two characters in a story I recommend having different genders so the he/she are clearer, especially should you choose names where they could be either. Anything that might pull a reader out of a story is best avoided.

• I recommend writing numbers under 100 in full so they blend with the rest of the text. That said, I think all numbers unless titles (BMW Series 5) etc. are best written in full.

• In British English, the hyphen (-) is usually only used for connecting words, i.e. a well-known man. The ‘en’ dash (–) is usually used for everything else (interruptions with no spaces, asides with a space either side of the dash etc) whereas the longer ‘em’ dash (—) is usually only reserved for US English. https://getitwriteonline.com/articles/en-dashes-em-dashes explains the differences there. If a character is pausing/hesitating, or there’s a break in proceedings by narration, then you’d use the … ellipses (one ‘character’, not three individual full stops).

• When writing past tense narration, this/last/next night/week/weekend/month/year etc. is present tense should ‘the previous/following night/year’ etc. or ‘the night/year before’. Likewise, yesterday is the day before / a day earlier, tonight isn’t tonight but that evening / night, tomorrow isn’t tomorrow but the next day / the day after, today is that day. Ditto ‘two years ago’ wouldn’t actually be two years ago but two years earlier. Dialogue is present tense so they’re fine in speech but not when writing a past tense story.

• Where the dialogue tag (he said) follows on from what is said there should be a comma before the speech marks / inverted commas then small ‘h’ for ‘he said’ or ‘s’ for ‘she said’ or equivalent. There still wouldn’t be capitals, unless for a name, after a question or exclamation mark. And it’s fine to use exclamation marks when someone’s yelling / shouting (then you’d often not need the ‘he / she yelled / shouted’), but just one!

• One of the stories had multiple points of view. If you start with one main character then switch to another, or a gap in time, there has to be a clear break so the reader is prepared for a change.

We are delighted to announce the results of round two of the 2024-5 BeaconFlash competition to the theme of ‘Another Season’. The three stories listed below (in alphabetical order) go through to the final judging when the competition closes at the end of May 2025, announced at next July’s BeaconLit festival.

If your story is not listed below you are welcome to send it elsewhere. If it is, please refrain from doing so until after the final results are announced. NB. The overall top three will be posted in full on this website.

So, the three stories chosen for September 2024 are…

· A Snapshot of Life

· The Grand Solution

· Standing on a Distant Shore

Morgen’s comments:

Some stories were closer to the theme than others. It’s always worth making the most of the theme whenever there is one. I recommend writing down several ideas then going with the most obscure one, providing it’s something you’d like to write. The chances are there will be several stories with the same basic idea, as we had this month. Yours could stand out as something ‘fresh’.

Writing competitions are obviously about the writing but when there are several ‘winners’ to choose from, you want yours to ‘shine’. One did leap out as a clear ‘winner’, another particularly strong with three equally striking so it was a tricky task (several reads) to pick my favourite of the three. And that’s often what it comes down to; a judge’s favourite.

If your story isn’t listed above, it’s likely that it only just missed out so don’t lose heart. It could be a winner in another batch elsewhere.

When using adverbs in description or dialogue tags, it’s usually better to use a more active verb, e.g. ‘he strode’ rather than ‘he walked purposefully’ or ‘he snapped’ instead of ‘he said angrily’. The same goes for when the characters are doing something in the general description, e.g. ‘he plodded’ instead of ‘he walked slowly’. Apart from chopping a word – always useful when you have a limited word count, it makes for a more interesting read.

Although grammatically correct, I recommend not putting commas between adjectives, and certainly not immediately before the noun / object. It slows the pace… really slows it where there are several. I feel commas work best when the reader is supposed to breathe (or the writer wants to make the reader pause for a particular reason). They wouldn’t need to when describing an object and anything that slows what should be a fast-paced page-turning read is best avoided.

When we have someone’s/something’s age, we don’t usually need the ‘years old’ or ‘years of age’ because the number – within the right context – is sufficient. There would also only be a hyphen if preceding a noun (or implied), e.g. a fourteen-year-old girl / a fourteen-year-old. Had there been a non-exact name using ‘something’ (or similar), the ‘something’ represents an unknown number so it would all still be hyphenated as the likes of ‘twenty-two-year-old nurse’ would have been.

We only think to ourselves so we don’t need the ‘to himself’, herself, myself…

Don’t forget to use as many of the five senses as possible. By default we have sound (dialogue) and sight (narration) but what about taste, touch and smell. It makes a story all the more vivid if we can have one or more of those.

Where an action (verb) has ‘starts to’ / ‘started to’ or ‘begins to’ / ‘began to’ before it, most of the time they’re not needed because unless the action is interrupted, the verb alone works better / is stronger. An example would be ‘the phone began to ring’. If it stops without being answered then that’s fine (although it still rang!) but if not then just have ‘the phone rang’.

Technically, ‘now’ is present tense so it would normally be removed or changed to a past-tense alternative. Dialogue is present tense so they’re fine in speech, and you can get away with it, up to a point, in first-person narration, and it’s fine if used as a comparison, e.g. They were green but were now yellow.

We are delighted to announce the results of round one of the 2024/25 BeaconFlash competition to the theme of ‘Dog Days’. 

The three stories listed below (in alphabetical order) go through to the final judging when the competition closes at the end of May 2025 and announced at next July’s BeaconLit festival. 

If your story is not listed below you are welcome to send it elsewhere. If it is, please refrain from doing so until after the final results. NB. The overall top three will be posted in full on this website. 

So, the three stories chosen for August 2024 are…

· Did Someone Just Say 'Walkies'?

· Regular as Clockwork

· Summer Holiday Fever

Morgen’s Comments:

A really fun batch this month. In some stories, the dog was the main feature (a treat as a dog owner) but in others the story was inspired by the sultry summer weather https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dog_days. Most had a healthy mix of dialogue vs narration; I always recommend at least 50% dialogue as it brings the characters alive rather than rely on the narrator ‘telling’ us everything.

I recommend writing numbers under 100 in full so they blend with the rest of the text. That said, I think all numbers unless titles (BMW Series 5) etc. are best written in full.

When speaking to someone and using a name, nickname or term of endearment (dear, love, pet*), generalisation (guys, ladies etc.), you’d need a comma before the name, i.e. ‘Do you know John?’ is asking if the person knows someone called John. ‘Do you know, John?’ means that the character is speaking to someone called John but asking them if they know something. A subtle difference but you want to avoid confusing the reader so they jump out of the story. If what’s said is very short, e.g. ‘Hi John’, then the comma’s not so important. * When it’s not a name it would usually be a small first letter.

Where you have a character doing something and speaking, I think it’s useful to have the narration first so it’s clearer who’s doing the speaking – even if it’s obvious by what’s said – as early as possible. As well as often negating the need for ‘said’ (or equivalent), it also breaks up a pattern of speech/narration.

It’s good to have as many of the five senses as possible. By default we have sound (dialogue) and sight (narration) but what about taste, touch and smell. It makes a story all the more vivid if we can have one or more of those.

As well as the five senses, try to choose onomatopoeic words such as bang, crash, flash, wallop etc. We had a ‘pop’ in one story.

I recommend chopping ‘ing’s where you can, especially where they are verbs and at the start of sentences. Having ‘ing’ verbs at the start of sentences avoids having too many pronouns, e.g. He did this, She did that, which can become a list and therefore a little monotonous but ‘ing’s can jar equally.

I often come across ‘ing’s following ‘said’. A way to avoid that is to split the sentence but where there’s narration, especially the character doing something, the ‘said’ could go, e.g. ‘“That’s not fair.” Taylor pushed the note across the table.’ Or better still: Taylor pushed the note across the table. “That’s not fair.” rather than: “That’s not fair,” Taylor said, pushing forward the note.

First paragraphs of chapters/sections should be flush to the left with subsequent paragraphs indented, usually two or three spaces (via the top ruler rather than tabbed across or physical spaces).