Welcome to Miniature Worlds

This section of my website is only for paid students. You will have created your own login and password to access these pages. Please keep those safe, as I’m unable to reset logins for other users.

First, a little housekeeping

You will have paid in either one sum or four. (Thank you). If you have paid in four, my website provider will automatically bill you when your second payment is due.

There are eight essays in Miniature Worlds. Essays will go live every Monday from 7am, British Summer Time. If you are not in my time zone, kindly wait until your equivalent of 7am and the essay will be waiting for you. The live session will take place on Zoom at:

1pm-1.40pm (GMT) on Wednesday, 20th March 2024.

You will be emailed a link to join the call closer to the time.

Sometimes people ask if they can please, pretty please, have an essay or two sent to them early because they are travelling or on holiday or want to read it on their flight. I’m so sorry I’m unable to fulfil these individual requests, due to the way in which the course is scheduled online to run through my website. If you are going on holiday or know in advance that you will be without internet access please wait until you have internet access again in order to catch up with the course in your own time.

If at any point you would like to navigate between essays that are already live and look back over it, you can use the Contents table below, where each essay is linked. You will have access to the essays for six months after the course has ended, via a password protected page.

I reference stories from my collection, Things We Do Not Tell The People We Love, and use them from time to time as examples. You may find it helpful to have a copy of the book if you don’t already have one. Please feel free to purchase a copy from whichever outlet you prefer.

If you have any questions related to Miniature Worlds and short story writing whilst the course is running, feel free to use the submit a question button in the course menu (in the top right hand side). I will collect any questions sent in and, if relevant, reply to everyone in the group with my thoughts, so that everyone can benefit.

Thank you!

Overview

In this course I invite you into my very own process of short story writing. I will show you how I both read and write short stories. I will show you how to gather ideas, how to turn those ideas into plots with ease, and how to develop your story with characters, description and structure before editing with a quick, professional eye.

This course will help you explore your own writing and fine-tune your craft, giving you confidence in your own abilities without ever being formulaic or overly prescriptive.

I write to you with the sort of honest advice I tell myself. Since my short story collection was published, I have been inundated with questions from readers and students attending my in-person writing classes wanting to know about things like narrative, technique, craft. I have tried to answer as many of these recurring questions in this course.

There is no one size fits all, no recipe for writing, but I am hopeful that I can offer you a simple, fresh and personal perspective with which to consider your own writing.

Miniature Worlds

Course overview

Every week you will receive an in-depth, thorough essay to read alongside weekly homework. Each essay is also available in audio format. Please use the menu opposite to navigate through the essays. The links will go live on the dates listed.

Homework includes weekly writing tasks to help you methodically begin to form the building blocks of your own short story and extra reading to immerse yourself into the short story craft. You will have the opportunity to submit any questions to me weekly through my website, and I will reply at the end of every week, sharing my answers with everyone on the course so that everyone can benefit.

I use personal examples from my own short stories, going behind the scenes to show you techniques I have used in my own work to create certain impacts or evoke certain emotions. For this reason, I would gently recommend you to have your own copy of Things We Do Not Tell the People We Love to hand (and I apologise in advance for spoiler alerts if you haven’t read it). There is also the option to upgrade to receive 500 words personal feedback on a story you have written.

The course is designed to feel thoughtful, playful; it is designed to fit in to your daily life, around work and family commitments, which is why a weekly essay, which you can read at your own pace, and tasks you can complete at your own pace, feels more manageable than something prescriptive. You can read the essays on the go, on your daily commute, logged into the member area of your phone. In the way of short stories, it’s my hope that the essays will stay with you, long after you’ve finished reading them, and the more time you are able to commit to the writing tasks, the more what you read about will hold true.