Литагент HarperCollins - Flying High

FLYING HIGH

The winners of

the 1993 Ian St James Awards

Copyright

HarperCollins Publishers Ltd.

1 London Bridge Street

London SE1 9GF

www.harpercollins.co.uk

Figure of Eight © Min Dinning 1993; The Spirit of the Times © Jude Jones 1993; Drawing from the Figure © Cynthia Chapman 1993; Berlin Story © Philip Sealey 1993; Karmic Mothers – Fact or Fiction? © Kate Atkinson 1993; The House with the Horse and the Blue Canoe © Cheryl Nyland-Littig 1993; The Wee Man © Lorraine Lorimer 1993; The Birthday Treat © Linda Pitt 1993; The Olive Tree © Hilary Waters 1993; Black Lizzie Black ©Jenny Maguire 1993; Good Neighbours © Stephanie Egerton 1993; Nobody We Know © Carey Jane Hardy 1993; Moira Flaherty ©Juliet McCarthy 1993; Richard Remembered © Leonard Tyler 1993; Someone to See You © Isa Moynihan 1993; Northern Light, Southern Comfort © Sheila Kelley 1993

A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library

All rights reserved under International and Pan-American Copyright Conventions. By payment of the required fees, you have been granted the non-exclusive, non-transferable right to access and read the text of this ebook on screen. No part of this text may be reproduced, transmitted, down-loaded, decompiled, reverse engineered, or stored in or introduced into any information storage and retrieval system, in any form or by any means, whether electronic or mechanical, now known or hereinafter invented, without the express written permission of HarperCollins ebooks

HarperCollins Publishers has made every reasonable effort to ensure that any picture content and written content in this ebook has been included or removed in accordance with the contractual and technological constraints in operation at the time of publication

Source ISBN: 9780006476542

Ebook Edition © NOVEMBER 2016 ISBN: 9780008235451

Version: 2016-11-22

Contents

Cover

Title Page

Copyright

Foreword

Judges

FIGURE OF EIGHT

Min Dinning

THE SPIRIT OF THE TIMES

Jude Jones

DRAWING FROM THE FIGURE

Cynthia Chapman

BERLIN STORY

Philip Sealey

KARMIC MOTHERS – FACT OR FICTION?

Kate Atkinson

THE HOUSE WITH THE HORSE AND THE BLUE CANOE

Cheryl Nyland-Littig

THE WEE MAN

Lorraine Lorimer

THE BIRTHDAY TREAT

Linda Pitt

THE OLIVE TREE

Hilary Waters

BLACK LIZZIE BLACK

James Maguire

GOOD NEIGHBOURS

Stephanie Egerton

NOBODY WE KNOW

Carey Jane Hardy

MOIRA FLAHERTY

Juliet McCarthy

RICHARD REMEMBERED

Leonard Tyler

SOMEONE TO SEE YOU

Isa Moynihan

NORTHERN LIGHT, SOUTHERN COMFORT

Sheila Kelley

Keep Reading

About the Publisher

Foreword

The sixteen stories that you are about to read emerged from over three and a half thousand entries for this year’s Ian St James Awards.

There have been several new developments in the last twelve months: the introduction of a shorter category of fiction under five thousand words alongside the established category of up to ten thousand words; for the first time this year, we opened our doors to writers in the English language from outside these shores and this volume contains stories by writers from New Zealand and the United States; the launch of Acclaim , a bimonthly magazine featuring stories by shortlisted writers in these Awards. Acclaim will publish sixty-four stories in six issues and include writers from Namibia and South Africa. All the activities associated with these Awards are co-ordinated at The New Writers’ Club. In the summer, the Club organized its first Short Story Workshop as part of the 9th Birmingham Readers and Writers Festival. There will be more to come.

Every writer who enters the Ian St James Awards – and they have to be over eighteen without a published work of full-length fiction to their name – receives an appraisal of their work. The success of this operation can be measured by the receipt at The New Writers’ Club of only eight letters consigning (a few of) our readers to the darkest depths. Not a bad ratio from such a large entry. The critiques are by no means definitive. In the time and space available, they can’t be, but they are intended to highlight a story’s strengths and weaknesses and are, hopefully, of great value to writers who find feedback so hard to come by. In addition, the Club also now appraises stories by member-writers outside the entry dates for the annual Awards and these more detailed reports are proving to be very popular.

To all the readers who have helped us arrive at this book, many thanks. Similarly, our thanks go to this year’s panel of judges who gave freely of their time to decide on the stories that would be published in these pages. I am sure that the stories that have been selected – and there is as always a real cross-section of styles and subject matter – will entertain.

To all the writers who sent us stories this year and missed out, thank you for entering, good luck with your writing and there’s always next year. This is the fifth Ian St James Awards book to be published in as many years by HarperCollins. Our thanks go to the many people at the publishers who helped with the production of this book and to all our supporters in the book trade. Finally, many congratulations to this year’s sixteen Award-winning writers who are now, without doubt, ‘Flying High’.

Merric Davidson

Director, The New Writers’ Club

Judges

CLARE COLVIN

Writer, journalist and book reviewer

DANIEL EASTERMAN

Novelist

CORINNE GOTCH

Marketing Executive, Booksellers Association

ELIZABETH HARRIS

Novelist

MARK ILLIS

Novelist

IAN ST JAMES

Novelist

NICK SAYERS

Publisher

CAROLINE SHELDON

Literary Agent

FIGURE OF EIGHT

Min Dinning

Min Dinning spent more than twenty years teaching English worldwide, travelling in Europe, South America, China, Papua New Guinea and Australia. She began writing fiction at the age of seven but lapsed for more than thirty years, only to begin again two years ago, inspired by a creative writing class. Until then she had written letters, diaries and academic papers and published some non-fiction. These days she teaches Business EFL and is trying to come to terms with domestic bliss in rural Cambridgeshire. She still has secret yearnings to run away to exotic lands.

FIGURE OF EIGHT

He tasted of sour pickle and rice porridge and stale tobacco. I had wanted this kiss for months and now I had it. Desire was injected uncomfortably into my bloodstream. His skin was hard and chapped as he pressed it into my face. I was shocked. It was not as I had expected. I was still unsure of why I wanted him. It may have been sex, but it wasn’t straightforward; he wasn’t attractive in a conventional way, like Martin. It may have been need and gratitude.

He kissed as if he didn’t know what a kiss was. Or maybe he wasn’t kissing at all. It was me who was doing it. His mouth was stiff and immobile but betrayed a repressed emotion that I couldn’t define. It briefly occurred to me that it might be anger. I had caught him unawares, walked up to him from behind. But was it unawares? We both knew.