The Short Story Challenge

edit biographydelete Biography Short stories - they're my latest challenge. I've written them in the past, with reasonable success (Radio 4, Bridport, Stand magazine and so on) but now I'm trying to go deeper, or shall I say, take more risks. It's a form of problem solving. Each time I sit with a writing pad it's scary. It's like when I used to dip the oil tank (this was before I got a remote senser) . . . up the steps, unscrew the lid, stick in a cane. Is there anything left in there? Does it come out wet? If it does, what a relief. That's what it's like. And then getting someone to read them is scary too. My wife Rosemarie is my best critic. I usually end up taking on most of her comments. But sitting there while she reads is hell. What if she thinks it's rubbish? (She doesn't usually.) It's different from me commenting on her pots. You can react to a pot in a few seconds. It takes longer to explain what I like (or much less often, dislike) about it, but there isn't that wait. A pot extends in space, a story in time.