CWC Blog

Review of Meeting 3rd February 2026 by Piers Rowlandson

Chair: Steve Bullas.

There were fourteen people present including Ian who manages our website. 

Steve introduced the programme he is writting which is aimed at helping authors of novels at the plotting stage.

As an excercise and to illustrate the programme, Steve showed a series of slides that outlined a collective short novel to which we were all invited to contribute.

Title: Echoes in the Chalk, when the past refuses to stay buried.

Suggested themes: hidden history shapes the present. Courage often begins with asking questions that no one else dares to ask. The past refuses to stay buried when someone asks the right question.

Setting: Chichester and the Downs. An archeological dig.

Era: the present.

Protagonists: Daniel Mercer, a shy and retiring retired IT consultant, who becomes more assertive as the truth comes to light. Sir Alastair Greythorne, Lord of the Manor, a charming but ruthless manipulator.

Given all this information we were then told the titles of ten chapters divided into three Acts.

Act One 1.The Find. 2.The Whispering Past. 3.Dr Evelyn Shaw arrives.

Act Two 4.Local Resistance. 5.Echoes in the Chalk. 6.The Hidden Archive.

Act Three 7.Pressure Mounts. 8.Rhiannon's last stand. 9.Revaluation. And finally: Chapter Ten Choosing the Right Future.

We divided into groups of three or four and each group was given different chapters to outline, all working simultantiously and without knowing what the others were doing.

The end result was a hilarious couple of hours which produced a strange and disconected series of suggestions for chapters, rather like a parlour game.

Personally if you are planning to write a novel or produce a book of poetry I would advise you to use SCRIVENER and KDP.

Delicious tea and cake provided by Sharon.

Review of Meeting of 6th January 2026 by Piers Rowlandson

Chair Piers Rowlandspon.

Seven members attended and one guest.

Apologies from Lesley Pardoe.

It was an evening for reading current work. 

Neill Soley read the first 1000 words or so of a short story titled The Sun Bird, an intriguing piece of writing about an old wooden boat in a derelict boatyard that was being restored by an old man who at first seemed hostile to the photographer who wandered into the yard. Jennings is the photographer and the main character. His intentions are not yet clear. The description of the yard and the decaying boats was vivid. A few suggestions about words were made. We are looking forward to reading the completed story.

Janet Denny read aloud part of Chapter Six of The Turnstone, her novel about a WWII German pilot. Karl is on a brief visit home, having qualified as a pilot. There is so much to tell; everyone in the family has something to say. Some of the news is troubling. An uncle who has come out as gay has disappeared. Later, we will find out that under the Third Reich, gay people were incarcerated. Already food is running short and Karl's mother, in particular, is tearful and anxious in contrast to Karl himself, who is excited at his coming role in the conflict but hopes he won't encounter his English friend in battle. The characters and their environment are brilliantly handled. 

Sharon Hurr read out her review of a Japanese novel, The Woman in the Purple Skirt by Natsuko Imamura. It sounded most confusing, partly because the woman in question hardly ever wears a purple skirt. We all agreed it is hard to get to grips with Japanese novels because the culture is so different. Indeed, so many objects don't have a European equivalent that the text is peppered with Japanese words. 

Anna, our guest, read out a piece of Flash Fiction: Death and the Firebird. About 600 words describing an accident at the Devil's Punch Bowl, Hindhead, as seen by school girls on a trip to London to see Stravinsky's The Firebird. They do get to see The Firebird; Their experience is vividly described. Brilliant writing with evocative details.

Excellent tea and doughnuts provided by Sharon.

Review of Meeting of 2nd December 2025 by Piers Rowlandson

Lesley Pardoe was in the chair.

Seven members and one guest attended.

In what has now become a tradition, everyone contributed a nibble and a drink. There is a rule that mince pies are not allowed, so no mince pies but plenty of Stollen! There was also delicious homemade pizza, plenty of grapes, cheese and Lubchen biscuits, to mention just a few of the treats covering the corner table.

Lesley had warned us about the competition. Each of us produced a piece of writing to be read out and judged by our peers. There were three poems and four very short stories. The winners were Daniela and Philip, joint first. 

Members' news: Robbie's novel "The Rector's Daughter" is out now. It is the fourth novel in the Family at War series.

A most satisfactory ending to a successful year.

I have asked Ian to update the passwords for two members.

Review of Meeting 4th November 2025 by Piers Rowlandson

We invited Barry Smith of the South Downs Poetry Festival to talk to us about writing poetry.

There were nine members and two guests.

Barry's theme was that poetry can be inspired by landscape or even by great paintings of the landscape, for example, Chichester Canal by Turner. He then read out his poem about a river in Bedfordshire (The River Ouse?) He and his cousin grew up playing by the river. Pleasant memories were suddenly dashed by the recollection that his cousin had drowned in the river. He emphasised that poetry is brought to life by bringing in personal details and emotions. As a further example of this, he read his poem about Turner's painting of Chichester Canal, comparing it to the view across the Ouse to the spire of a church in Bedfordshire. The personal aspect was added when he realised that the mist rising off the river reminded him of his mother's dying breath. He said that the image just came to him suddenly and unexpectedly, even though he had meant to write about his mother for some time. Poems do sometimes come to one all complete without one having to make any alterations and then at other times there is so much to do to get it right. The test is to read it out loud and see if it works. We were then given a few minutes to begin writing a poem about a picture that we had previously selected.

Barry invited us to read our poems at the Open Mic at New Park on the last Wednesday of the month at 7.30. The next Open Mic is on Wednesday, 26th November. There isn't one in December.

In the second half of the meeting, Emma read out a 400 word piece of flash fiction. It was a gruesome and scary piece about a farmer who shot a boy. The father came to work on the farm with his other son. The land became sterile and the second son took root as a scarecrow. What an imagination! We discussed where the piece could be entered into a competition: Bridport prize? 

Emma mentioned The Sky Island Journal as an online journal that may take short stories.

I read out a poem about children running down the Downs and falling down. v light-hearted.

Neill read his poem about a beach he knows well in Sweden that has become horribly polluted. It had great impact.