South Manchester Writers' Workshop is a creative writing group based in Didsbury. We are open to writers of all types - novels, plays, poetry, short stories...

Notes from meeting - 31 January 2012

John K gave us three sonnets on a jazz club, Hampstead liberals and a block of flats with the side blown off - all iambic pentameters and petrarchan rhyme schemes.

Jess has survived the night sharing a cabin and Harris is less self-confident than he was yesterday. In Ruth's story, Jess wonders how self-destructive his quest for a personal monster will be.

John W took us to meet Jenny's friend Julie, back in Sheffield. She is not going to say anything to the journalists sniffing round for leads on the fugitive from a murder charge who rang her last night.

I'm inside my skull, scrabbling with countless others to get out. I'm standing over my murdered mother. And Sam didn't seem to say it was just a dream.

Fuschia is a moth - desperate not to be found, and fighting the magic which threatens to expose her - until she becomes a cat to observe her companion Oak emerging from the straw. In Peter's world, shapeshifters don't carry any clothes.

Mark showed Edward and Laura on a serious date. As they stare at each other over the resturant table, the hunter in him takes second place to warmer feelings.

Notes from meeting - 24 January 2012

Edward is trying to get to know Laura, but his romantic pursuit is conducted with the calm detachment of a hunter seeking prey. Mark is trying to balance likeability and nastiness.

The shapeshifters in Peter's fantasy epic are carrying out a dangerous mission. They change into the ravens preferred by the enemy, in order to pass unnoticed. Very sneaky.

Rose L told us a short story about a girl's connection with her grandmother and the need to break into an abandoned asylum. The secrets are revealed slowly, from a building which loomed as large as any of the characters.

The children laugh at Edgar's appearance and the signs above his picture house. He is an unusual eccentric, and the townsfolk aren't keen on him. Megan's prologue hinted at menace to come.

Rose S's narrator remembers past, present and future all at once on a journey into self exploration. He's also trying to find the old woman in the picture. We shall continue to follow his footsteps.

The dwarves want asylum, and they're willing to pay for it. In dog food. But who gave them the idea? Andy's policeman will work it out. Eventually.

A father and daughter are repairing a greenhouse, and enjoying spending time together. The father's illness threatens to make things less enjoyable. Jane gave us a wonderful picture of relationships, and the unspoken words within them.

Notes from meeting - 17 January 2012

It's Geoff's project, so he gets himself organised at the hotel then sets out for the abandoned building where his nephew was last heard of. Lisa's playing catch-up so she isn't so organised when she turns up and sees something dangerous starting. Terry hasn't let up the pace in chapter 2.

It's too quiet, and Sophie's ill-matched pair Theodore and Sebastian (call me Seb) don't know where everybody is. The chill really comes when a 999 call rings and rings.

Dan's Red dogs and hummingbirds gave us a couple fighting to experience the good things of life against psychological conditions which seemed to make it a losing battle.

Esther has worries about how she is thought of at school and her inability to tell anybody about the older boy harassing her. Her sole trusted companion is her dog, but a dog can't last for ever. Annie took us through the night when little Kyowa breathed his last.

At the end of part one of Elaine's iron age saga, Mortunda is no longer the centre of attention for the plotters. They do, however, expect to be able to use her as they look to other members of her family.

Andy continued his story of asylum for magical creatures. The elf and the rock troll are safely installed in the police station and now... here come the dwarves.

Notes from meeting - 10 January 2012

We remember Ashron in rather violent surroundings. Now Peter shows him in a serene, ethereal chamber. His spirit merges briefly with a comrade and you remember his death in an earlier chapter.

Jess is drooping, but she's not sure about joining Harris in their little cabin. She distracts herself by dipping into his book again and, as we've seen before, Ruth can send her deeper into a book than most readers can manage.

John took us back to ancient times - Ricardo so convinced of his academic future in the study and divination of sand that he courts the teacher's anger by musing on why Orando finds everything so easy.

The house asserts itself gently, so that by half-way through Hans's short story we have seen people behaving strangely but there is as yet no explanation.

Geoff's latest story began as a piece of serious commentary. He should have known better than even to try - judicial product placement and a sentence of weekly beatings-to-within-an-inch-of-your-life are much more productive ground.

Jill's eyes follow Pete into the ambulance as he deputes himself to help Stiles. Chris's final chapter showed him ready to do something much less charitable, but those eyes have stayed with him and eventually...

Notes from meeting - 3 January 2012

It's Kate and Steve's first fight, over the usual ludicrous cause - tidying the fridge. Unpromising prehaps, but Ed is starting to turn the story round.

Alison is tired, looking forward to a quiet evening rather than the invitation to sit with the boy upstairs. Rose only hinted at what he was like.

Young Bill is posted to a squad he doesn't want to join, but manages to win a camouflage competition on his second day. Then he threw in a pen-portrait of his grandma.

Another Rose painted a series of intriguing scenes. A life story? A mystical experience? "The story is always true," we were told twice. More please.

Harris discovers that young trolls are like other children - they love dinosaurs. Bonetti drives the white van looking like a bouncer on his day off, all - Andy said - to find Rocky and Tergil a safe place to stay.

How to relax in Andalucia

A posthumous publication

Group news

Three novels and a book of stories developed at the group are available in a Kindle edition: Ruth Estevez's Erosion is available here and Marie Antoinette by Ed Wilson is here. Teresa Maudlin has Illusions of Grandeur and Reflection of a Rainbow.

Nicola Batty's January Raw Meat newsletter is out now.

Nicola is serialising her story The Reluctant Vampire on her blog. The first chapter is here and she's up to chapter twelve (and counting - one a week, so keep up).

Andy Smith (under his pen name Aycy) has won third prize in the national Stepping Stones Nigeria short story competition (every story began with the sentence "In the distance stood Mount Kilimanjaro.").

Dmitri Gallagher's story Shoreline took third prize in the Didsbury Arts Festival short story competition.

Rupan Malakin's story I, Crasbo has been commended in the judging of the Manchester Fiction Prize 2011.