Session number 4, 23/11/2022

Posted on: 31 January 2023 by David Tierney in Creative Writing group

For November we had our first creative writing meet-up upstairs in a pub near to The University of Liverpool campus, the Belvedere...

The room we had was cosy, quiet, with several large tables. Myself and Saul Leslie ran this session which had a great turn-up with a few new people attending to share as well others who just came to listen.

There was a mix of work, with a variety of non-fiction. Stephanie Hernandez read the intro for a feature on Carly Simon and her album No Secrets which established what is known as the “Carly Simon Principle”—the bond we feel with singer-songwriter music. Juan Sebastian Rivera Soriano shared a travel writing piece about the cape, Cabo San Juan del Guia, which he described in great detail, talking about the crowds at its beaches, as well as detailing the colour patterns in the sky and the warmth of the soft waves.

I followed by reading a personal essay about the passing of my dog early last year, describing her battle with cancer as well as my father and I burying her. It was difficult for me to read out but I felt comfortable about it in the environment we’d built in the group. The group was able to move between how they look at work, asking Stephanie questions about audience, looking at the areas Juan could expand upon, and giving feedback on my essay’s narrative structure. Similarly, for Saul’s work which was historical fiction continued on his story, The House of Tolerance there was a discussion of the descriptive writing as well as its factual elements, looking at the way it drew its setting with French phrases scattered in amongst the English prose.

The other work was an interesting mix of fiction genres as well as some poetry. Tom Kaye read several poems which drew from a few everyday activities such as having a morning off or commuting to work, each of them drawing deft images such as leaves falling on an October morning, roads winding and fragmented light, and the crackle of rain on glass.

Moving differently, Marta Zanucco’s story Trial was an exploration of grief through the medium of a speculative technology where the experience could be supplanted onto someone else’s mind. Paddy Brennan then read part of a story, Sharpened Words which went through the break-up of its main character and the trajectory his life would take over the next twenty years of his life, the story containing both sharp humour and sadness.

Finally, Alex Carabine read the prologue of her story, The Ancient Work of Trees which was set in a cemetery with a woman at the grave of her husband, a story that also dealt with grief as well as introducing characters and tension of what’s to come. As with the fiction and poetry, everyone was given feedback which focussed on various aspects of their work, and unlike previously, we stayed at the Belvedere after the session was over, continuing to talk about writing as well as generally chatting until the pub closed.