Outside Liverpool station, a woman approached me and asked if I would take part in a survey. I had a spare hour, so I agreed and signed her…

Once we were undressed, they gave us plastic contraptions to wear over our genitals, but we’d all signed a contract agreeing to show our…

John’s pet shop was small, straw-smelling, and dimly lit. Vi’s second-hand bookshop was next door. Every day except Sundays for 21 years…

Elect a Leader — This is the last of 12 weekly writing prompts specifically designed to use with the technique of freewriting. For instructions on how to freewrite click here, or you can just plough on as follows: don’t pre-plan write for 10 minutes don’t stop writing to think or read back The main…

How to play ‘The Exquisite Corpse’ game and generate creative writing ideas — I’ve been playing around with the well-known surrealist word game called “The Exquisite Corpse” in order to generate story ideas. Traditionally, the game is played by a group of people who take turns in writing a word on a piece of paper, folding it over to conceal it, and handing…

A Time You Were Lost This is the eleventh of 12 weekly writing prompts specifically designed to use with the technique of freewriting. For instructions on how to freewrite click here, or you can just plough on as follows: don’t pre-plan write for 10 minutes don’t stop writing to think…

The beds contain dull-eyed, bleached-out faces. Their stillness is surrounded by the constantly-moving, colour-coded staff, occupying…

A Performer Speaks — This is the tenth of 12 weekly writing prompts specifically designed to use with the technique of freewriting. For instructions on how to freewrite click here, or you can just plough on as follows: don’t pre-plan write for 10 minutes don’t stop writing to think or read back The main…

Dealing with criticism of your work — How do you feel when you receive negative feedback on your creative work? Are you able to stand back, take a breath and weigh up the merits of the critique in order to decide if it is something that you should take on board? …