Category: News

Events, News

HYTHE LIVE

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What a brilliant weekend we had at Hythe Live, this is the test run in our very own author tent! We had readings from many authors, you may even spot some famous faces. Our members sold their books also a good amount of networking went on all over the weekend.

There was also a great assortment of stalls to keep everyone happy and I hear the booze tents did really well. There was another stage for the bands to play all day then in the evenings the other marque was opened up for jazz and music nights.

There were writing, poem and fancy dress competitions and one of our youngest members looked great, she comes with her dad to our meetings.

Debby and Matthew did an amazing job of organising all this so it went off without any problems, well done and a huge thank you from all the group.

Events, News

HYTHE FESTIVAL – TODAY!

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It’s the last day today, what a super weekend it has been down at Hythe. We have had many authors popping along to sell their books and chat to readers. We have been selling our last anthology called GHOSTS BY THE SEA and promoting our next book that is out soon, it is available free on kindle unlimited.

Debby takes the award for best seller, for her own book and the groups books. Come along and get your free bookmark and learn about the writing group, they do say everyone has a story in them but even a poem is great plus you might see your own words in our next book.

So many great stalls, loved the Bubbly one, then you have Matthew selling cherry cider, that sounds delicious. Super tasting ice coffee and many food stalls.

Pop along and say hi 👋

News

GO FOLKESTONE MAGAZINE APRIL 2021

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What a fantastic write up in the Go Folkestone magazine this month, it’s things like this that make it all worth while.

Our photography competition for the front cover of our next book which should be out in August closes on the 1st May. Please send your pics of beach huts to the email address above. We don’t appear to have any photos yet with any huts with doors open, let’s have a last minute rush of intriguing different photos of our beach huts. The best one will be on our front cover for the anthology by Write By The Sea. The competition is open to all Folkestone residents.

News

OUR BOOK IS PUBLISHED!

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It is with great happiness that I can tell you that our first book called GHOSTS BY THE SEA is available now on Amazon here.  I would like to take this opportunity of thanking everyone from the group for their support and help in making this happen for us all.

Many of our members have contributed to this book in different ways so it really is a combined effort from everyone. All the stories are set in Folkestone in many iconic buildings, you can even follow a map around the different places as you read about them.

I will be on Academy fm tomorrow at 11 o’clock you can listen here.  We will be running a competition so listen in and you might win a copy of the book.

You can also buy copies from The Hideaway when they open, which hopefully will be the 17th December if we leave tier 3.  Other places selling the books will be listed on our social media pages when they receive the books for sale.  Please support the many writers that have given their time to write such magnificent stories about our town.

Let us hope that we will be able to meet up again in the New Year, Merry Christmas everyone.

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News

DEADLINE!

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I hope you are all getting on ok with your ghostly stories as the deadline is looming up very quickly.

15th NOVEMBER 2020

The setting has to be in Folkestone and can be any genre as long at it has a ghostly touch of some sort. This will be the first anthology from Write By The Sea with many members contributing in some way, either by a story, poem, prowse, illustration, photograph or even a script.

Meetings

THE RETURN OF OUR GROUP MEETINGS

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The Hideaway – Thursday 30th July 2020

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After welcoming everyone, discussing the social distancing and leaving all names plus numbers as per the recommendations from the government, then the drinks were bought with some eating as well, we then got underway.  It was great to see you all after such a long time.

It was a good turnout for our first meeting since this awful pandemic started with twelve of us meeting and apologies from Debby, Matthew, Carol, Mary and John.

Tony decided that the Zoom would not work as needed someone to ‘man’ it.  Facebook messenger was suggested but think that would have the same problem.  Mark suggested that we film it and then put it on the website.  I will talk to Hannah as she may have a suggestion.

Debby asked me to mention the Hythe Festival 25th to 27th September, Facebook page here.  They are thinking a book marquee for workshops, readings and selling your books.  I will update when I hear more but keep the dates free if you can.

Author events – These may be people we know or our own members giving a talk.  I will chat to Charlie Gallagher as he could do a local talk.  Also, our member Paul who writes children’s books offered to do one, I thought this would be good as not had a children’s author visit us.  I had Andy Markwell booked to do a talk about photography for book covers in November so hopefully, that will still go ahead.

Roll-up banner – Tony met up with Roger to ask about the progress so it is still in hand and going ahead, we must remind him in a couple of weeks and see how it is progressing.

Our Anthology – Andy did some calculations so we are looking at the 5 advent calender stories, which may need a polish off by the writers.  Then another 15 stories of about 1,500 to 5,000, I am thinking 2,000 is an average word count.  It would be good to have a couple of poems and some illustrations or photos to mix it all up.  Should we have a children’s section at the back with a story and poem in there for our young readers?  The theme has always been ghostly set in Folkestone but you can mix that up into romance, comedy or anything, as you are all great writers.  I can ask Andy Markwell to assist us in the cover photo.  We will aim for Halloween, Christmas or Easter lol

Sharing of work – It was great to hear what everyone has been up to on their writing journeys and listening to the poems and stories we all shared.

The Wellbeing Centre – I have had to stop the storytime sessions here but if any of you would like to do something similar then please contact Sheree on Facebook messenger.

NaNoWriMo (National Novel Writing Month) – This will be for the month of November, I think we should all try to be involved with this, more so if we do have another lockdown as we can make a messenger group or WhatsApp group to keep everyone updated about what and how much they have written.  We can support and encourage each other.

Future meetings

Meetings held at The Hideaway, 16 Bouverie Rd West,

Folkestone CT20 2SZ  at 6.30 pm

3rd September – Ghostly writing to share and brainstorm

8th October – Group meeting plus ghostly writing & sharing work

12th November – Group meeting & sharing work

19th November – Andy Markwell, photography for book covers

10th December – Group meeting & Christmas meal/buffet

7th January – Group meeting

Contact: Karen 07967532899 or email: karensworld.writer.co.uk

See you all on the 3rd September at 6.30pm        New members always welcome

I have attached a poster of dates so if any of you can share that it would be good as I am not putting out posters in town myself.

https://folkestonewritebythesea.wordpress.com

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Meetings, News

NEWS – TONIGHT

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Hi, first of all I hope you are keeping well and safe. A few things have been bubbling away in the background and I would like to share the Zoom meetings with you that Tony has undertaken to host for the group.  Thank you Tony.

I am struggling with this lockdown so not really up for much at all, in fact I keep thinking I should be writing about all this as it will eventually be history that our future generations will read about and learn, but the motivation and thoughts are just not there.

Here is the message from Tony about how to connect with us tonight.

TONIGHT 6.55

 

Firstly, if you have not already done so, please make sure you have downloaded Zoom:

https://zoom.us/
Zoom is the leader in modern enterprise video communications, with an easy, reliable cloud platform for video and audio conferencing, chat, and webinars across mobile, desktop, and room systems. Zoom Rooms is the original software-based conference room solution used around the world in board, conference, huddle, and training rooms, as well as executive offices and classrooms. Founded in 2011 …

The meeting ID is 788-8834-9662

The meeting Password is 132655

You may not have to use these figures.

I will open things up at 6.55pm.

I have now purchased a monthly subscription to Zoom, so there should be no issues about the meeting stopping suddenly.

That said, we can break again around 8pm in order that, those who wish to, can express their support for key workers.

I am planning now that we are joined each week by one or more local creatives to entertain us. This week, I am delighted to say that we have two popular artists for the price of one.

Some of you may know Helen Finn (Finn to her friends), owner of YoYo’s Street Food stall on the Old High Street. She is also a talented singer-songwriter, as well as fine interpreter of others’ work, and she will be singing and playing for us this evening.

In addition, I am so pleased that we will have Anthony White from Poets’ Corner reading his latest poem, “Isolation April 2020”.

With the 75th anniversary of VE Day on the following day, I invite attendees to read anything relating to the Second World War that is meaningful to them – poem, speech, personal reminiscence. Frank Butler and I are currently planning to read from the poets from that conflict.

It would also have been Robert Browning’s birthday, so if anyone wants to read from his work, they will be very welcome.

Ultimately, you are invited to read anything – a favourite poem, extract from fiction – or something you have written.

And if all else fails, I have another light Coronavirus inspired quiz for us to do!

Finally, if anyone would like to invite friends to join us, it would be great to see them too.

Look forward to seeing you this evening!

Tony Quarrington
 
(Owner, Tony’s Fabulous Folkestone: Voted Best Home Based Business in Folkestone 2019)
Telephone:     +44 1303 778543
Mobile:           +44 7738 624522
Blog:               www.tonyquarrington.wordpress.com/
See you all later
Karen
COMPETITIONS, Events, Meetings, News

MEETING & NEWS

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First of all thank you to the one’s that attended the group meeting and I am very sorry that I could not get there. I have a problem with my heart and now blood pressure that thinks it’s a yow yow. Hopefully they will sort this out soon as do not really want to spend any more time in the hospital with the current situation. Thank you Hannah for taking notes.

Please take care all of you, there will be no Thursday morning writing at The Hideaway for the foreseeable future.  The Wellbeing centre is also closed.

Kerry Barnes author event Thursday 19th March

After speaking to Kerry we have decided to cancel this event, we will re-book Kerry for later in the year.

The event at The Beacon has been postponed until the 15th & 16th August, this will be an even bigger event which will include workshops and an outside area. So please keep the dates free. Anyone that booked and paid for their table it can be transferred to the new dates.  There will also be a Christmas event over two days at the beginning of December, dates to be confirmed. You can each decide which events you would like to attend if not wanting to do all of them.

The Chambers loved the event last year so they would like another one on 18th October which will be on a Sunday 11am to 6pm. Sci-fi, crime and ? to be decided, any ideas? I would like it to be children’s but it is finding enough childrens authors, if you know of any then please ask them and get their details for the next meeting.

The Folkestone Rotary are very kindly buying us our roll up banner, everyone agreed with the design and I will put picture at the end. They have requested a talk for one of their meetings so if that is this month then Tony Quarrington will deliver it, if anyone wants to go with him you are more than welcome or if you would like to send a letter for him to read out about what you think of the group etc then please do. Contact Tony at tonyquarrington@msn.com

Our Ghostly Anthology is going ahead with printing in September, ready to sell in October.  The stories from the Living Advent will be included, these can be increased or adapted if required. We need some more ghostly stories set in Folkestone of between 1500 and 5000 words. There will be about 15 stories plus the 5 from advent calendar. Please spread the word to your writerly friends, if you want any more information then please email Andy at MARCHIE77@googlemail.com  Maybe Hannah Palmer could do a poster and leaflet when she has time as I know she is really busy at the moment. I will contact Hannah Nickolls to see if she would like to do some illustrations for the inside. I am looking for a good ghostly photo for the cover of our book, so keep your cameras ready for that one special photo. The closing date for stories will be 31st July. Then we have August to pick the 15 stories and arrange design ready for printing in September.

During this hard time of living with this coronavirus you can always share your work here, asking for feedback if wanted, plus write your ghostly stories about Folkestone. At the next group meeting on 2nd April you can share your own work if you require feedback or write a short crime piece of about 150 words. If we cannot hold the meeting we can do it on-line. Please do not feel isolated as we are all here for each other.

On 23rd April there will be a Shakespeare Evening organised by Tony with music, food, posters. For your task think about what he would make of his birthday in 2020, his presents, the party, or even imagine you are him. You can read a saying, quote or poem that he wrote. This sounds like a very entertaining evening and we can all hope that this goes ahead, I will keep you informed.

Stay healthy everyone and hope to see you all soon.

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